Worth A Thousand Words: Ansel Adams

Preface: For those of you who followed my “Worth a Thousand Words” series, you know I usually focus on one specific photograph by a photographer and then take a deeper dive, exploring not only what the image shows but also what the photographer may have been trying to tell us, or have us think about. But for this installment, I’m going to try things a little differently and talk about one photographer and his work (and reputation) in a more general sense. Warning: some of my words may be perceived as inflammatory or disrespectful or antagonistic, all of which may indeed be true.

The God of sharpness, perfect exposure, cable releases and beard grooming     Photo credit: J. Malcolm Greany, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The God of sharpness, perfect exposure, cable releases and beard grooming

Photo credit: J. Malcolm Greany, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons


Today, I’d like to discuss the work of Ansel Adams. He is most likely the most well-known photographer in the history of the genre. He is held in high regard by many people, photographers and non-photographers alike. His work can be seen in many formats: not just impeccably printed photographs framed on a museum wall but also in books, calendars, postcards, coffee mugs, refrigerator magnets… I could go on, but I’ll stop there. My motivations for discussing Ansel Adams is rooted in a paradox in my own mind regarding his importance to the art form and his position in the canon of the fine art photography.

I won’t go too deeply into his biography, you can head over to Wikipedia for that. Instead, here’s a list of his achievements. I’ll mark the ones I have a problem with using my newly patented star system.
One * means… a-ok or not so bad.
The more ****s, the more something bugs me.

Ansel Adams was an American photographer and environmentalist, known for his black-and-white images of the American West. *
He was a life-long advocate for environmental conservation *
He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1980. (from Jimmy Carter, so that’s cool.) *
Adams was a key advisor in establishing the photography department at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, an important step in securing photography's legitimacy. *
He helped found the photography magazine Aperture. *
He co-founded the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona. *
He helped found Group f/64, an association of photographers advocating "pure" photography which favored sharp focus and the use of the full tonal range of a photograph.**************
He developed the Zone System ************ a method of achieving a desired final print through a deeply technical understanding of how tonal range is recorded and developed during exposure, negative development, and printing. ******************* (the bane of my college darkroom education!) **********************

I have always felt conflicted when I think about the work of Ansel Adams. As a little shutterbug, I was in awe of his photos. From a technical standpoint, they seemed an untouchable level of perfection. His subject matter, predominantly his nature landscapes, showed a world (that in hindsight I realize) mesmerized my young eyes with their rendering of the sublime. However, as I went off to art school, I began to realize that the photographic medium encompassed so much more than the world that Adams was showing us. That is when I steered away from the “Ansel Adams Admiration Society.” Of course, some of my attitude was no doubt fueled by the ever-expanding rebellious streak that my college years had fostered and encouraged. I distinctly remember the first time I laid eyes on a Robert Frank photograph and needed much time and thought to reconcile that these two men were working in the same medium, yet their photographs seem so different. Frank’s (and many others’) work appeared far more visceral, energetic and also critical of society. It expanded my perception of what photography could be. And though there is still a place in the world for Ansel Adams, I moved further and further away in my appreciation for his work.

I recently stumbled upon a quote by Thomas Barrow, pulled from an interview that he did with photographer David Ondrik. Barrow’s statement about the work of Ansel Adams really struck a chord with me, finally articulating what I’ve thought about his work.

“Nobody seems to want to be challenged in photography. Maybe it is simply too easy, people want a simple rendition of what they saw at one time or another. A friend wrote, regarding the recent Adams Polaroid auction, to say he just doesn’t get it, that Adams is the greatest 19th century photographer who happened to work in the 20th. Now, Adams was a great guy, great Naturalist, Environmentalist, Martini drinker. But there’s nothing 20th century about his photography. Looking at his photos you wouldn’t know that Impressionism, Futurism, Abstract Expressionism – that there were major changes in the visual arts in the 20th century.”

What really ring true for me really for the first time and thinking about Ansel Adams was Barrow’s point about Ansel Adams being a great 19th century photographer. And looking at his work again after reading this quote I do realize that Adams seem to create his work devoid of any reference to what was going on certainly in the art world also in the photographic world and to some extent what was going on in the real world at the time that he was making his work. The lone photographer out in the wilderness lugging his 4 x 5 camera and tripod on his shoulder is it romantic vision and I wonder if that version or version of a photographer still even exist today. With a Instagram and iPhones everyone’s a photographer of course, and I’m not going to beat that dead horse any further. The dedication to the craft that Ansel Adams exemplified should still garner respect. However, I think that the medium has moved so far beyond what Adams was showing us in his photos, the majesty of nature the pristine landscapes the almost mythical views that he shared with us. I think you could possibly make photos like that still today but my question is: why would you do it? That’s not to say that all art and in general and photography specifically needs to deal with the harsh realities of human life on this dying planets however Adams work in my mind belongs even more so on a postcard or a calendar. Because ultimately those images sure world that in my mind is nothing but a fantasy. One that would be better served by a painter with oils and canvas. The technical achievements that Adams showed throughout his life end up looking like nothing but pretty pictures to my jaded, 21st Century eyes. I’ve heard enough photographers wax poetic about “Moonrise Over Hernandez, New Mexico.” Take a ride through that area today and that “fantastic scene” of a full moon over a sleepy high desert town…well it just feels like about as far from reality as you can get. And trust me, if I hear the origin story of that image one more time, with the legendary “no light meter” hook, I think I’ll drink a warm mug of D-76.

Still, I would be remiss if I did not give some credit to Mr. Adams. He certainly elevated public and collector’s attention towards fine art photography. He also, in some ways, liberated photographers who followed him. No longer did we need to pursue the epic location, the sublime vista, the perfect composition, the sharply focused negative, the full tonal range print. My own reckless abandon… taking sharp blades and flames to my negatives, surely has old Ansel spinning in his grave.

One steaming mug of D-76, please!

One steaming mug of D-76, please!

I certainly don’t mean to take a hammer and chisel to the feet of a monumental photographer, but at the same time this exploration has given me the opportunity to reassess where Ansel Adams work and reputation belongs. With tongue firmly planted in my cheek, I’ll just say that I won’t be spending any of my cash on an Ansel Adams calendar or coffee mug anytime soon.

Worth A Thousand Words: Richard Avedon

Richard Avedon was probably the most highly regarded fashion photographer from the 1950s through the end of the 1970s. He was also highly regarded as a fine art, portrait photographer. It always seem to me that the two worlds that Avedon worked in were at odds with each other. Yet as I browse through the pages of his seminal book “In The American West” I realize that many of the same techniques that Avedon used to create his signature fashion work is also applied to these “fine art“ portraits.

I looked through this book with more critical eyes recently, with a particular bias against the work; feeling that it is manipulative and exploitative. To my eyes it has a definite agenda of showing a cross-section of the American population of the western states in the early 1980s as a rogues gallery of drifters, laborers and misfits. In some ways, it seems that Avedon is presenting a manipulative freak show to an art world elite.


At same time, as I look through this work, my mind drifts to the work of August Sander, the great portrait photographer of early 20th-century Germany. While similarities exist between the two photographers, there are glaring differences as well. Most obvious to me, there is a deep sense of respect that I feel exists in Sanders’ work that I feel is vacant from the work of Avedon in the American West series. Perhaps Avedon’s choice of using a blank, white backdrop for his series makes the Sander’s photos feel more of the time and place they were taken. Less clinical, more empathetic.

I remember first coming across the “In The American West” book when I was in college in the 1980s. In some ways Avedon’s photos were a revelation. I realized quickly that it explored a whole other America, quite different from the faces and places that I was familiar with in the New York / New Jersey area. There are many memorable portraits in the book, but there is one in particular that still today holds a certain power over me.


I will focus now on the photo of Carl Hoefert, an unemployed blackjack dealer from Reno, Nevada. The photo is dated August 30, 1983. While I was no doubt celebrating my birthday (most likely with a quart of Budweiser on the bleachers at Berkeley Park in Dumont, NJ) Avedon was setting up his 8 x 10 camera and shooting this intriguing portrait. 

photo by Richard Avedon


Avedon’s standard approach shows the subject roughly from the waist up against a white background. The lighting is diffused; there are no sharp shadows. The film edge let us know that this is a sheet of large format film (and as I learned later this was shot with an 8 x 10 camera.) When Avedon traveled around the US west for this project, the camera was attended to by a group of photo assistants. I also learned that Avedon would stand near the front of the camera with the shutter cable release in his hand; having a conversation with his subjects, who did not know exactly when the photograph was being taken. 

One of the first things that catches my eye in this portrait of Carl Hoefert is the texture of his face. His weathered skin, his furrowed brow, the wave of his hair, the strong vertical ridges in his neck, the slight clench of his left hand. His right hand gently tucked into a pocket, like someone hiding an ace, perhaps. All are given extraordinary detail thanks to the 8 x 10 camera. Then there is his dress. He’s wearing a striped jacket that features a chevron-like pattern that is at odds with a garishly patterned, polyester shirt. So much texture, so much to read into this appearance, and how it is presented.

As is the case with much of this series, Avedon treats his subject like a specimen, something to be studied and scrutinized. It is also telling that these photos were all printed much larger than life size, all the better to see every unglamorous detail. Because of this, I can’t help but feel that he is taking advantage of (some might say exploiting) his subjects. Case in point: no one ever smiles in Avedon’s portraits. I think this is really important because if Carl Hoefert was smiling I think we would react completely differently to this photograph. Additionally, the fact that he is titled (labelled as) an “unemployed blackjack dealer in Reno” is already skewing our perception of him and again, I think that’s exploiting this person. I don’t feel any empathy coming from the photographer. 

At the same time, Avedon’s series is not without merit. Some critics consider the project his magnus opus. He most definitely opened up an unexplored world of “otherness” to an audience to whom the subjects were no doubt unfamiliar; people you might never have come face-to-face with. On the streets of New York City it’s easy to ignore the homeless, the poor, the crazed wanderers, the drifters… society’s casualties. You keep your head down and make your way to wherever it is you’re going. So in some ways, these portraits give us an almost voyeuristic opportunity to stare in the face of someone we would never have the opportunity to stare in the face of in real life. To study and really look, and of course, to judge. 

Ultimately, I can’t come to a clear conclusion about this work, and perhaps that’s why it is still carried so much intensity after almost 40 years. The viewer must reconcile our own feelings towards these people, as they stand as evidence of a complex, unvarnished, unromantic America. These people stand as casualties in some way or another, victims of a broken American dream. And it’s this last note that I think really connects with a contemporary viewer, because we know that the gulf between rich and poor, the haves and have nots, has only widened in the years since Avedon worked on this project. Right now on the streets of America’s cities are people who don’t look much different than those portrayed “In The American West.”