Lot Essay
Please see lots 15 and 16 for approximately 16 x 20 inch vertical and horizontal versions of the image.
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We were in the shadows of the mountains. The light was cool and quiet and no wind was stirring. The aspen trunks were slightly greenish and the leaves were a vibrant yellow...I made a horizontal picture first, then moved to the left and made the vertical image at about the same subject distance. The majority of viewers of the horizontal image think it was a sunlit scene. When I explain it represented diffused lighting from the sky and also reflected light from distant clouds, some rejoin, 'Then why does it look the way it does?' Such questions remind me that many viewers expect a photograph to be the literal simulation of reality.
ANSEL ADAMS (1902-1984)
Aspens, Northern New Mexico, 1958
Details
ANSEL ADAMS (1902-1984)
Aspens, Northern New Mexico, 1958
gelatin silver mural print, printed c. 1970
title and Polaroid Collection accession number in pencil (on the reverse of the mount)
image/sheet: 20 3/8 x 26in. (51.5 x 66cm.)
mount: 20¾ x 26¼in. (51.5 x 66.6cm.)
Aspens, Northern New Mexico, 1958
gelatin silver mural print, printed c. 1970
title and Polaroid Collection accession number in pencil (on the reverse of the mount)
image/sheet: 20 3/8 x 26in. (51.5 x 66cm.)
mount: 20¾ x 26¼in. (51.5 x 66.6cm.)
Provenance
From the artist;
to Edwin Land, Polaroid Corporation;
Sotheby's, New York, Photographs from the Polaroid Corporation, June 21, 2010, lot 336;
to a Private Collection;
Christie's, New York, October 5, 2012, lot 329
to Edwin Land, Polaroid Corporation;
Sotheby's, New York, Photographs from the Polaroid Corporation, June 21, 2010, lot 336;
to a Private Collection;
Christie's, New York, October 5, 2012, lot 329
Literature
Adams, Examples: The Making of 40 Photographs, Little, Brown and Company, 1983, p. 60; Adams and Alinder, Ansel Adams: An Autobiography, New York Graphic Society/Little, Brown and Company, 1985, p. 174; Alinder ed., Ansel Adams: Letters and Images 1916-1984, New York Graphic Society/Little, Brown and Company, 1988, p. 314; Szarkowski, Ansel Adams at 100, Little, Brown and Company, 2001, pp. 104-105; Stillman, Ansel Adams: 400 Photographs, Little, Brown and Company, 2007, cover and p. 375; Stillman, Looking at Ansel Adams: The Photographs and the Man, Little, Brown and Company, 2012, p. 198
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