A Grand Vision: The David H. Arrington Collection of Ansel Adams Photographs
A Grand Vision: The David H. Arrington Collection of Ansel Adams Photographs
Ansel Adams
Yosemite Valley from Inspiration Point, Winter, Yosemite National Park
Auction Closed
February 17, 07:14 PM GMT
Estimate
70,000 - 100,000 USD
Lot Details
Description
Ansel Adams
1902 - 1984
Yosemite Valley from Inspiration Point, Winter, Yosemite National Park
mural-sized sepia-toned gelatin silver print, mounted to Homasote board, framed, circa 1940, printed circa 1955
image: 70½ by 94½ in. (179.1 by 240 cm.)
frame: 72½ by 96½ in. (184.2 by 245.1 cm.)
Bonhams New York, 28 October 2008, Lot 26
Ansel Adams in Yosemite Valley (2014), p. 189 (variant)
400 Photographs (2007), p. 287
Looking at Ansel Adams (2012), p. 113 (variant)
Adams' first foray into making mural-sized photographs came in 1935, when he was asked by his employer at the time, the Yosemite Park & Curry Company, to undertake a series of murals of Yosemite for the San Diego Exposition of that year. He became an articulate spokesman for the form, writing articles such as 'Photo-Murals' for U. S. Camera in November 1940, and discussing mural theory and practice in books such as his own The Print: Contact Printing and Enlarging of 1968. 'I was fascinated with the challenge of making a photographic print in grand scale,' Adams wrote in his autobiography. 'Many of my large-format Yosemite negatives took on a new resonance in mural-sized proportions' (Ansel Adams: An Autobiography, p. 187).
The present mural-sized print was one of a series executed in the mid-1950s. These murals were printed in sections, by the Moulin Studios or General Graphics in San Francisco. The sections were so large that they were developed in mammoth trays, then mounted with wheat paste to Homasote board.