Image scanned from a transparency and color-corrected by Pat Cagney.

Monolith, The Face Of Half Dome, Yosemite Valley, Ca

Artist Ansel Adams (American, 1902-1984)

Date1927

MediumGelatin silver print

DimensionsOverall, Image: 19 1/4 × 14 1/2 in. (48.9 × 36.8 cm)
Overall, Support: 27 7/8 × 21 7/8 in. (70.8 × 55.6 cm)
Overall, Frame: 30 × 24 in. (76.2 × 61 cm)

ClassificationsPhotography

Credit LineGift of Dr. and Mrs. T. Lane Stokes

Object number82.127

Terms

Cliff
Yosemite National Park
California

On View

Not on view

DescriptionThis is a photograph of a view in Yosemite National Park, California.

Label TextAnsel Adams American, 1902–1984 Monolith, the Face of Half Dome, Yosemite Valley, California, 1927 Gelatin silver print, ca. 1980 This photograph appeared in Adams’s first portfolio along with Lodgepole Pines (to the left), but the image shows an entirely distinct artistic approach. To make the image, Adams climbed to a peak that provided an expansive view of Half Dome. Knowing that the yellow filter on his lens would make the sky appear gray, he swapped to a red filter, giving the sky the arresting darkness that matched the intensity of his feeling that day. Adams called this technique of composing a photograph in his mind “visualization.” As he explained it, “I had been able to realize a desired image: not the way the subject appeared in reality but how it felt to me and how it must appear in the finished print.” Gift of Dr. and Mrs. T. Lane Stokes 82.127