Bridalveil Fall

More About the Image:

When first coming into Yosemite most visitors, Ansel as a young lad included, see the valley set out before them with towering domes and sheer cliffs ornamented by one silvery strand of water: Bridalveil Fall.  Arriving in Yosemite for the first time in 1916, Ansel’s earliest recollection was ‘emerging at Valley View – the splendor of Yosemite burst upon us and it was glorious.  Little clouds were gathering in the sky above the granite cliffs, and the mists of Bridal Veil Fall shimmered in the sun.’ (AB pg. 42)  Inciting the mood of that day, this image made in 1927 shows a glorious torrent of backlit water contrasting with the dark, glossy granite to create a wonderfully three-dimensional space, the foreground giving us safe grounding by acting as a buffer and inferring a distance.  Even with this suggestion of distance, the rush of the is palpable thanks to the careful attention Ansel paid to capturing the light passing through the changing and churning densities of water, epitomizing the power of nature.  The train of water along the right-hand side completes the veil-like effect and showcases why the indigenous tribes of Yosemite referred to this waterfall as Pohono, or ‘Spirit of the Puffing Wind.’  This image would be included in the book Sierra Nevada and The John Muir Trail and Yosemite and The Range of Light.  In 1958, Virginia and Ansel Adams started a series of photographs named The Special Edition of Yosemite series.  These photographs, made from Ansel’s negatives, but printed by a trusted assistant, were meant as more meaningful and treasured mementos than what was available for visitors at other shops around Yosemite Valley.  The inaugural series was made up of only a small selection of images, Bridalveil Fall being one of them.  At the end of his life, Ansel communicated the significance of this image by including it as one of the variants in his last major project, The Museum Set.