Clearing Winter Storm, Yosemite National Park, California
1944, printed 1980
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
gelatin silver print
Dimensions
overall: 48.5 x 39.5 cm (19 1/8 x 15 9/16 in.)
Classification
Photograph
Department
CPH
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of Virginia B. Adams
Accession Number
1986.3.7
Art Historical Context
**Clearing Winter Storm, National Park, California** (1944, printed 1980) is a masterful gelatin silver print by Ansel Adams, capturing a fleeting moment of nature's drama in California's Yosemite Valley. Shot amid a dissipating winter storm, the reveals jagged granite peaks piercing through parting clouds, with rays of sunlight illuminating mist-shrouded cliffs and valleys below. Adams, a pioneering photographer of the American West, immortalized Yosemite across decades, advocating for its preservation as a national park. This work exemplifies Adams' "straight photography" approach and his i...
About the Artist
Ansel Adams
Ansel Adams, born on February 20, 1902, in San Francisco, California, grew up as the only child of Charles Hitchcock Adams, a businessman and astronomy enthusiast who tutored him at home, and Olive Bray, with whom he had a distant relationship. A hyperactive child prone to illness, Adams struggled in formal schooling and was educated by private tutors and his father until graduating from eighth gr...