Stephen P. Broker
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"Faced with the awesome spread and alienness of a newly settled continent, people
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wielded cameras as a way of taking possession of the places they visited." (
On Photography
, page 65)
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"Nature in America has always been suspect, on the defensive, cannibalized, by
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progress. In America, every specimen becomes a relic." (
On Photography
, page 65)
Photographer Carleton Emmons Watkins (1829-1916)
IA.
The Yosemite Valley from Inspiration Point
(Yosemite Valley, California: created date ca. 1865-66; New York Public Library Digital Gallery, Digital ID: 435022; albumen print)
Photographer Ansel Adams (1902-1984)
IB.
Moon and Half Dome
, 1960
The grandeur of Yosemite Valley was documented photographically by Carleton E. Watkins, Eadweard Muybridge, Timothy H. O'Sullivan, William Henry Jackson, and other important landscape photographers of the mid-nineteenth century. Their photographs contributed to the establishment of Yosemite as California's first state park in 1864. The return to federal jurisdiction of what then became Yosemite National Park followed several decades later. In the Watkins photograph that I have selected for use, the Valley is seen from Inspiration Point, appropriately named for the visitor to the Valley and for the viewer of the photograph. The rocky foreground gives way to a forested descent into the valley, and it draws the viewer into the scene. The picture is well framed by the rocky outcrop on which the photographer stands, by tall trees at the left and right, and by an undistracting, blank sky. The image beckons one to descend into the valley and follow the meandering river (largely obscured from view) through monolithic valley walls. With such a broad panoramic view, the eyes dart from El Capitan on the left to the Cathedral Rocks on the right, and they inevitably land on Bridal Veil Fall. A careful examination of the photograph reveals Half Dome in the hazy distance, beyond Glacier Point. Valley slopes are tree-covered, yet more barren areas suggest a significant degree of geological instability. The classical U-shaped valley carved by advancing and retreating glacial ice creates the image of massive ice flow in the geological past. In the present day as comprehended in ecological time, the meandering Merced River shapes and reshapes the valley floor. There is an intense geometry to this photograph, with the verticality of large conifers and the near-verticality of valley walls and Bridal Veil Fall. Rounded boulders in the foreground mirror Glacier Point and Half Dome in the distance. Triangular wedges of green extend from cliff faces to valley floor, positioned at right angles to the conical trees. The Sierra Nevada's Yosemite Valley is larger than life, yet it is no more than seven miles long and one mile wide. A 1958 U.S. Geological Survey map tells "The Story of the Yosemite Valley," as written by F. E. Matthes, in which one discovers "a chasm renowned the world over for its towering cliffs, its stately trees, and its delightful climate, but, above all, for its sublime waterfalls."
Ansel Adams created photographs of the Yosemite Valley from a similar vantage point, but his photograph
Moon and Half Dome
succeeds in conveying a sense of the massive scale of Yosemite Valley while confining its view to the shear wall of Half Dome. Two conifer trees visible in the lower right are most effective in giving a sense of scale. In this photograph, the subtle shades of black, gray, and white create a sublime mood. The moon is seen to rise over Half Dome as though it were a marble just having rolled off the upper slopes of the monolith on its way into the valley below. The moon's craters appear to be replicated in the top surface of the exfoliating Half Dome. The valley wall to the left of the scene is so blackened as to eliminate all detail but for the snow-streaked pinnacle of the cliff. Turn this shadow ninety-degrees, and you have the shadow that defines Half Dome's base. The dusting of snow that edges Half Dome's sinuous flanks is suggestive of experiments conducted in modern turbulence theory. Neither the Watkins view of Yosemite Valley nor the Adams view has people in view. Human figures would seem to present a greater intrusion in the Adams photograph. During Adams's lifetime, Yosemite Valley was transformed by an ever-increasing volume of human traffic. Adams decried the loss of wilderness in Yosemite through most of his years there.
Supplementary Photographs
Photographer Carleton Emmons Watkins (1829-1916)
Yosemite Valley from the Best General View
(Yosemite Valley, California: created c. 1865-1866, albumen print, The J. Paul Getty Trust
Mirror View -- El Capitan, Yosemite
(Yosemite Valley, California: created date 1861-1866; NYPL Digital Gallery, Digital ID: 435034; albumen print)
Photographer Eadweard Muybridge (1830-1904)
Falls of the Yosemite. From Glacier Rock. (Great Grizzly Bear.) 2600 feet tall. No. 36.
Created in 1872, published in 1873. California State Library, Picture Catalog, Call Number 1992-0051. Published by Bradley & Rulofson (San Francisco).
Photographer Charles Leander Weed (1824-1903)
The Valley From the Mariposa Trail
, 1860s (Yosemite Valley, California): Digital ID: 435071, New York Public Library Digital Gallery, Photography Collection, Miriam and Ira D. Wallacj Division of Art, Prints and Photographs/Humanities and Social Sciences Library
Photographer Ansel Adams (1902-1984)
Yosemite Valley, Summer
, c. 1936
El Capitan
, 1952
Thunderstorm, Yosemite Valley
, 1945
Half Dome, Merced River, Winter
, 1938
Half Dome and Clouds
, c. 1968
