Ansel Adams is considered one of America’s most famous and influential photographers because of his luminous black-and-white images of the west, especially the U.S.’s national parks like Yosemite. An exhibition currently at Downtown Cincinnati’s Taft Museum of Art through Sept.16.The primary exhibition of 42 gelatin silver prints comes from the collection Michael Mattis and Judith Hochberger, and is being circulated by Art2Art Exhibits. The Taft has added 10 additional ones, loaned by Cleveland Museum of Art and collectors Connie and Jack Sullivan.
While it’d be a mistake to call any one image in Ansel Adams: A Photographer’s Evolution the standout, since he made so many that are memorable, but one that is certainly extremely famous is “Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico.” The mere thought of a “moonrise” is special, something rarely experienced, and to witness it in an otherwise dark sky in a rural landscape that is one of our country’s most beautiful and otherworldly is extraordinary.
According to Wikipedia, Adams came across it in 1941, while hired by the federal government. The administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt actively supported the arts. His secretary of the interior, Harold Ickes, hired Adams to photograph lands that his department administered to be used at its new museum. Adams, with his son and a friend, came across the scene in late afternoon. He first published it late 1942 in U.S. Camera Annual 1943. It went on to become iconic; it is said some 1,300 prints were made during his life. (He died in 1984.)
The Taft actually has two. There is a vintage print, made in the 1940s, from the Mattis/Hochberg collection, and a later print from the 1970s that is in the Sullivans’ collection. The Taft uses the two to show how Adams’ aesthetic changed with time — he began enlarging images and printing with higher contrast. Over time, “Moonrise’s” sky became jet-black and its clouds brighter.
The Taft is at 316 Pike St., Downtown. For more information, visit taftmuseum.org.
This article appears in Jun 27 – Jul 4, 2018.