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Late Work
Adams preferred that his works were referred to as “extracts” from the world around him as opposed to “abstract”. Late in Adams’ life, Edwin Land, head of Polaroid, marveled that his friend had chosen photography—the most representative artistic medium—to create his own brand of abstraction that transformed the familiar and everyday into something unexpected. Many of his photographs from the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, reflect a different approach. Adams often printed his late photographs on a larger scale and in more graphic, higher-contrast black and white. He also became influenced by the abstraction and flatness of modernist painting and printmaking. In 1975, Adams decided to stop printing from his earlier negatives. He made relatively few new photographs in this period, focusing instead on teaching, producing books, and speaking out on behalf of the environment. Adams died on April 22, 1984, at the age of 82.  Adams captured this aerial view of the famously tangled Los Angeles freeways while photographing for Fiat Lux, a publication commissioned by the University of California to celebrate its centennial. The most extensive of all his commercial projects, Fiat Lux took Adams, alongside Nancy Newhall, three years to complete, and it resulted in several thousand negatives. Ansel Adams, American; Freeway Interchange, Los Angeles, 1967; gelatin silver print. The Lane Collection. ©2007 The Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust.  On his way to Santa Fe from Monument Valley, Utah, Adams came upon this grove of aspens. This work is one of two of the most spectacular photographs of Adams’ late career. Drawing on his extraordinary technical expertise, he enhanced the contrast between the silvery-bright tree trunks and the dark tangle of woods in an otherwise rather cool, shadowy landscape. Ansel Adams, American; Aspens, Northern New Mexico, 1958; gelatin silver print. The Lane Collection. ©2007 The Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust. Left corner image: Ansel Adams, American; Rose and Driftwood, San Francisco, ca. 1932; gelatin silver print. The Lane Collection. ©2007 The Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust. |