One of the things I am looking forward to next week when I head to California for the opening of my show at the Just Looking Gallery in San Luis Obispo is the couple of days beforehand that we will spend in Yosemite National Park. I have never been there but know well the iconic images of its beauty from the photography of the great Ansel Adams. While he is known for many photos of other locales, his images of the Yosemite Valley have come to be most closely associated with his name.
Adams (1902- 1984) first encountered Yosemite as a teen on a family excursion on which he carried his first camera , a Kodak Brownie. He was smittten by the spectacular landscape and the light as it filtered through the valley. He would return over and over through the coming years, his prowess as a photographer growing. He eventually married a local Yosemite girl, Virginia Best, whose father ran Best’s Studio there. She inherited the studio in 1935 and she and Adams ran it until 1971. It is now called the Ansel Adams Gallery , where his work and the photos of other great contemporary photographers are shown and sold. The gallery is still in the hands of the Adams family.
I’ve always loved his images of the grandeur of the Yosemite Valley and have formed my own idealized version of how the place might be in my mind through them. I am hoping that reality lives up to expectations that have grown over many years. I f any place can do this, I believe it might be Yosemite.
Redtree Times 
Some of my California friends who go there often have mentioned that this is a good time of year to go – fewer tourists. They do acknowledge that even with tourists, it’s still magnificent. Enjoy!
Yes, I have heard that this is a good time to avoid the crowds.
Iconic indeed. Yosemite appears on California’s entries into both the “50 State Quarters” series (2005) and the “America the Beautiful” series (2010). It’s also featured on new California driver’s licenses.
If you’re looking for something to read on the plane, check out John Muir’s “My First Summer in the Sierra” or, more to the point, “How Best to Spend One’s Yosemite Time“.
Thanks, Al.
Simply amazing how that man could create a black and white photograph that is even more stunning than it would have been in color. The black and white highlights Adam’s marvelous eye for form, shape, pattern and design. He painted with a camera.
There really is something about black and white that brings out the dramatic essence in photos or film, especially when the subject matter is spectacular to begin with.