Free Essays on Ansel Adams

Journals: â€Å"Ansel Adams and the Photographers of the American West† By Eva Weber and Ansel Adams Ansel Adams This chapter explains about Ansel Adams life and accomplishments. Some interesting things I found out, was he wanted to be a musician instead of a photographer. Early in Ansel’s life he became very ill with influenza and while sick, he read guide books of Yosemite National Park and entranced by the Natural beauty he persuaded his family to visit there allowing him to make his first photo with a Kodak boy camera. Yosemite became a vital part of Ansel’s life from there on out. Ansel became a conservationist a well-noted photographer and a teacher in his lifetime. His early photography was just a source of additional income as a picture realist photographer characterized by soft focus images that was enhanced further by darkroom manipulation. He soon became a self-conscious modernist devoted to photography. He designed the zone system to expose the previsualized result. After such success in photography he suffered a physical and mental breakdown. That put a halt to his w ork for a while, but he was commissioned to produce another book of mountains photos of the Sierra Nevada. After this book he went back to his goal to become a leading figure in American Artwork. Adams contributed greatly to MOMA, as a photographer, a teacher, and a consultant. Adams also founded the Sam Francisco Art Institute and the University of Arizona’s Photography Center. The amount of prints that Adams produced and sold increased the appreciation of photography by the art institutes. Views Aesthetic and Spiritual In the west painting and photography went hand in hand in depicting the beautiful and picturesque landscapes of the west. In the work of many artists the landscape became an allegory for the divine and a revelation of Gods intentions towards humanity. Europeans feel of superiority over the inferior United States cultur... Free Essays on Ansel Adams Free Essays on Ansel Adams The show commemorates the centennial anniversary of the birth of one of America’s most popular and beloved photographers. For those die-hard Adams enthusiasts, this show is unique and should not be missed. Szarkowski’s vision of Adams is a personal one; it seeks to demonstrate why Adams is not only a great photographer and avid environmentalist, but also why he is one of the great modern artists of the 20th century. This extensive vision is crucial, as it seems likely that much of the general public’s experience of the prolific Adams has been through the mass marketing of a limited number of images that have appeared over and over again in calendars, posters and cards. These images have not addressed Adams’ full range of artistic clarity and sophistication as an artist. Because of this, many of us may view the artist solely through the lens of the objective photographer or as a Californian environmentalist, which altogether bypass the sensitivity and complexity that an artist, and not a mere photographer, can offer an audience. Located in a number of galleries within the museum, the exhibition has been intelligently broken down into categories that are clear, descriptive and help give shape to the artworks. The first gallery, titled â€Å"Context,† displays pieces of various disciplines by several artists and serves as a device for peer comparison. The next gallery features a selection of works that display the artist’s process of self-education. â€Å"Motive† investigates Adams’ need to bring form to his desire to express his vision, which leads to â€Å"Reconsideration,† an evaluation of how the artist related to his own work. The last two rooms, â€Å"Responsibility† and â€Å"Further Possibilities,† discuss the function of such artistic pursuits and what other artists have gleaned from Adams’ oeuvre. Visitors will want to select their visiting ti... Free Essays on Ansel Adams Ansel Adams was born in 1902 in San Francisco, where he lived with his mother and his father. Throughout his life he became one of the best photographers known to time. And for sure one of the most well known. His specialties were western landscape photos, but throughout his photography career he took commercial photos and then gradually worked towards turning his love for landscape photos, into a profession. In Ansel Adams lifetime he managed to be a spokes person, a very good pianist, and the most widely exhibited photographer of his generation. Ansel Adams career started when he was inspired by his trip to Yosemite Park, after his parents bought him a camera he started taking photos are every chance he could get. He told his parents he wanted to â€Å"capture the beauty of nature†. He became a well known pianist but that soon ended when he go one of his photographs acknowledged two years later. He soon won three Guggenheim grants to photograph national parks. Ansel Adams came up with zone exposure to get maximum tonal range from black and white film. He taught a Yosemite workshop â€Å"the U.S Camera Photographic Forum† with Edward Weston. A few years later he collaborated with Dorothea Lange on a life commission for a photo essay on the Mormons in Utah, Which took him over a year to complete. Later in his life he moved to Carmel, California where he helped in the foundation of the Friends of Photography. Ansel Adams died April 22nd in 1984 of heart failure aggravated by cancer. But his photos are still recognized today.... Free Essays on Ansel Adams Journals: â€Å"Ansel Adams and the Photographers of the American West† By Eva Weber and Ansel Adams Ansel Adams This chapter explains about Ansel Adams life and accomplishments. Some interesting things I found out, was he wanted to be a musician instead of a photographer. Early in Ansel’s life he became very ill with influenza and while sick, he read guide books of Yosemite National Park and entranced by the Natural beauty he persuaded his family to visit there allowing him to make his first photo with a Kodak boy camera. Yosemite became a vital part of Ansel’s life from there on out. Ansel became a conservationist a well-noted photographer and a teacher in his lifetime. His early photography was just a source of additional income as a picture realist photographer characterized by soft focus images that was enhanced further by darkroom manipulation. He soon became a self-conscious modernist devoted to photography. He designed the zone system to expose the previsualized result. After such success in photography he suffered a physical and mental breakdown. That put a halt to his w ork for a while, but he was commissioned to produce another book of mountains photos of the Sierra Nevada. After this book he went back to his goal to become a leading figure in American Artwork. Adams contributed greatly to MOMA, as a photographer, a teacher, and a consultant. Adams also founded the Sam Francisco Art Institute and the University of Arizona’s Photography Center. The amount of prints that Adams produced and sold increased the appreciation of photography by the art institutes. Views Aesthetic and Spiritual In the west painting and photography went hand in hand in depicting the beautiful and picturesque landscapes of the west. In the work of many artists the landscape became an allegory for the divine and a revelation of Gods intentions towards humanity. Europeans feel of superiority over the inferior United States cultur... Free Essays on Ansel Adams Ansel Adams, UCI, ca. 1966. Photograph by Richard Schlesinger Ansel Adams (1902 – 1984) Mount Williamson – the Sierra Nevada, from Manzanar, California Ansel Adams, 1945 The first question to ask is what makes an Ansel Adams photograph an Ansel Adams. To classify him to one certain category would be nearly impossible. Ansel Easton Adams, born on Thursday, February 20, 1902, in San Francisco, was an only child. For many years his Aunt Mary home schooled Ansel. However, in 1911 he was enrolled in the neighborhood school. It was at the young age on twelve that Ansel’s interest in the piano began. His parents supported his interest, and Ansel began to teach himself to read and play music. Ansel continued for many years with this passion and became outstanding. In the spring of 1916 while recuperating from a cold, Ansel’s attention started to stray from music when he read In the Heart of the Sierras by J. M. Hutchings. The book set in the Yosemite Valley illustrated by maps, engravings and photographs kept Ansel’s imagination. It was because of his fascination with Yosemite, that his father and mother would take him there on a family vacation. This was a momentous event that would change his future forever. It was on this trip that his parents gave him his first camera. Yosemite be came a place that Ansel would visit frequently and held a place in his heart that would remain and that would inspire him. â€Å"From his first days with a camera, fourteen-year-old Ansel approached photography seriously.† In his early career, Ansel tried to emulate pictorialism. Pictorialism is photography that invoked the qualities of painting. True pictorialism had no heart in reality, but instead muted the truth of hard lines with soft focus, diffused light, and textured papers. As each year passed Ansel approached photography in a more serious manner. Ansel spent the majority of his teen years concentrating on photography...