Monument Valley, Arizona
1958, printed 1981
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
gelatin silver print
Dimensions
overall: 49.3 x 39.3 cm (19 7/16 x 15 1/2 in.)
Classification
Photograph
Department
CPH
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of Virginia B. Adams
Accession Number
1986.3.44
Art Historical Context
Behold the majestic sandstone buttes of Monument Valley, Arizona, captured in stunning black-and-white by legendary photographer Ansel Adams in 1958. This gelatin silver print, made from his original negative and editioned in 1981, measures 49.3 x 39.3 cm and exemplifies Adams's lifelong passion for the American West. Known for his epic landscapes of Yosemite and beyond, Adams ventured into the Southwest to document its raw, timeless beauty, transforming arid expanses into symphonies of light and shadow. Adams pioneered the Zone System, a meticulous exposure and development technique that all...
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...