First View of the Yosemite Valley from the Mariposa Trail
1865/66
Medium
Albumen print
Dimensions
Image/paper: 39.9 × 52.4 cm (15 3/4 × 20 11/16 in.); Mount: 47.4 × 61 cm (18 11/16 × 24 1/16 in.)
Classification
albumen silver print
Department
Photography and Media
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
105101
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
In the 1860s, Carleton Watkins was the first to document the untouched wilderness that would become Yosemite National Park. Transporting his fragile equipment on mule or carriage through difficult terrain, Watkins used a "mammoth-plate" camera whose glass negatives measured up to 18 by 22 inches and yielded remarkably detailed prints of the same size. He favored spectacular compositions with dramatic spatial depth. In this photograph, Watkins depicted Yosemite Valley's immense span through the r...
About the Artist
Carleton Watkins · 1829–1916
Carleton Watkins (1829–1916) was an American photographer whose majestic landscape photographs of the American West, particularly of Yosemite Valley, rank among the most important images in the history of photography. Born in Oneonta, New York, he moved to California during the Gold Rush era and learned photography in San Francisco in the late 1850s. In 1861, Watkins made his first trip to Yosemi...