Ansel Adams

Ansel Adams – A malcontent with his own ideas

Ansel Adams was born in San Francisco on 20 February 1902. The son of the chemist and wood merchant Charles Hitchcock Adams, he came into contact with art and photography at an early age: his father was an amateur astronomer and owned state-of-the-art optical equipment, whilst his mother was more inclined towards porcelain painting. At the age of four, Adams broke his nose during the catastrophic earthquake in San Francisco in 1906, leaving him with a crooked, left-pointing nose; he was a poorly child, but still undertook long excursions in the natural world, and when confined to his bed with measles in 1912, his father explained to him the basics of photography and the principle of the camera obscura. Adams showed little interest in school and was often involved in scraps and quarrels, so that his father eventually took on his tuition himself together with a friend who was a priest. Adams also learnt to play the piano and showed such talent that he seriously considered a career as a professional musician while a teenager. 

For Adams, photography and nature belonged together

Ansel Adams received his first camera as a gift from his father during a holiday in Yosemite National Park. The 14-year-old immediately started photographing the landscape and found within it his profession. His fascination for the expansive, untouched wilderness would accompany him his whole life – and was committed to its protection alongside its photography. Adams initially simply kept a visual diary, as he called his picture sequences. He gained a job in a photo laboratory through a neighbour who noticed the boy’s passion, allowing Adams to familiarise himself with the technical basics of photography. In 1930, he met the photographer Paul Strand and was deeply impressed by his clearly conceptualised pictures with their bright colours. This encounter confirmed his path to a naturalistic style that would eventually culminate in straight photography. As co-founder of the f/64 group, he campaigned with photography colleagues such as Imogen Cunningham, Sonya Noskowiak, Edward Weston and William Van Dyke for the recognition of photography as an art form. 

An icon of landscape photography

Ansel Adams had a lasting influence on the photography of his time. As well as his groundbreaking landscape photographs, he also distinguished himself with numerous theoretical writings on photography, initially published in the form of essays in professional journals, but later also as comprehensive books. Whilst Adams held Alfred Stieglitz in great esteem, his association with Edward Steichen was considered strained and led to him not working with the MoMA photography department, curated by Steichen, for many years. Adams’ probably most famous picture, Moonrise, Hernandez, was created rather by chance, and shows a moon rising over a barren landscape populated by few houses and a snow-capped mountain range. It would become an icon of landscape and lunar photography and an example of the photographer’s ability to anticipate and capture unique moments. In the 1930s, Adams and his fellow photographer Fred Archer formulated the famous zone system which helped to transfer the colour contrast range of a motif into the limited means of the black and white photograph. 

Ansel Adams died on 22 April 1984 in Carmel-by-the-Sea in California.