Ansel Adams
Mount Williamson, the Sierra Nevada, from Manzanar, California

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Images(2)

Artist Ansel Adams (American, 1902–1984)American, 1902–1984

CultureAmerican

Titles

Mount Williamson, the Sierra Nevada, from Manzanar, California

Date1944, printed c. 1973

Place depictedCalifornia, United States

MediumGelatin silver print

DimensionsImage: 15 11/16 × 18 3/4 in. (39.8 × 47.6 cm)
Sheet: 15 11/16 × 18 3/4 in. (39.8 × 47.6 cm)
Mount: 21 7/8 × 28 in. (55.6 × 71.1 cm)

Credit LineGift of Mike and Mickey Marvins

Object number2012.619

Not on view

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Department

Photography

Special Collections

Marvins Family Collections

Object Type

PHOTOGRAPHS

DescriptionAnsel Adams is best known for his majestic photographs of portions of the American West that were still unpopulated in the 20th century. He was also a founding member of the Sierra Club and a tireless campaigner for preserving America’s wildernesses and shores, and his pictures were among the strongest tools in the campaign for their preservation. Mount Williamson, the Sierra Nevada, from Manzanar, California, which was made while Adams was on a self-assigned project to photograph the Japanese relocation settlement in Manzanar, is of a deceptively simple subject: a vast boulder field at the base of a distant mountain range. But by shooting from a low angle, Adams created a scene that is simultaneously majestic and playful. The boulders mimic the mountains and spark the question “Is this some abandoned sports field of the Gods?”
Provenance[Halsted Gallery, Birmingham, Michigan]; purchased by Michael Marvins and Michele Marvins, Houston, April 10, 1990; given to MFAH, 2012.
Exhibition History“A Photographer’s Collection: Gifts from Michael and Michele Marvins,” The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, April 4–July 5, 2015.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks

verso of mount bottom right in pencil: 79:014

Signed in pencil on mount, lower right below image: Ansel Adams

printed verso of mount center with additions in ink: Photograph by Ansel Adams / Mt Williamson, The Sierra Nevada / from Manzanar, California / Route 1 Box 181 Carmel, California 93921

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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