[Trees in Calaveras Grove]
ca. 1878
![[Trees in Calaveras Grove] by Carleton E. Watkins](https://images.artheonmuseum.org/met/ph/thumb/trees-in-calaveras-grove-732813.webp)
Medium
Albumen silver print from glass negative
Dimensions
Image: 12.5 x 12.5 cm (4 15/16 x 4 15/16 in.), circular Album page: 24 x 25.1 cm (9 7/16 x 9 7/8 in.)
Classification
Photographs
Department
Photographs
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Gilman Collection, Gift of The Howard Gilman Foundation, 2005
Accession Number
2005.100.556 (15)
Tags
Art Historical Context
In the late 19th century, E. Watkins, a American photographer, captured the awe-inspiring grandeur of California's ancient giant sequoias in *Trees in Calaveras* (ca. 1878). This intimate circular albumen silver print, measuring just 12.5 x 12.5 cm, showcases towering trees in the famed Calaveras Grove—now part of Calaveras Big Trees State—highlighting their immense scale against a forested backdrop. Watkins, renowned for his Yosemite expeditions, used photography to document the untamed American West, bringing the sublime beauty of its natural wonders to urban audiences. The medium, an album...
About the Artist
Carleton E. Watkins · 1829–1916
Carleton E. Watkins (1829–1916), one of America's pioneering landscape photographers, was born on November 11, 1829, in Oneonta, New York, the eldest of eight children to carpenter John Watkins and innkeeper Julia. Drawn by the Gold Rush, he arrived in San Francisco in 1851 at age 22 alongside childhood friend Collis Huntington, who later became a railroad tycoon. Initially working as a carpenter ...