More About the Image:
In the autumn of 1937, Ansel traveled to the southwest. With friends and patrons, including Georgia O'Keeffe and David McAlpin, the group circumnavigated the Four Corners region, spending part of that time in the Dolores River Canyon in Colorado toward the end of the journey. Writing to Alfred Stieglitz on September 21st, 1937, Ansel expressed that he was making work that was 'more subtle' and that 'perhaps I am on the verge of making a really good photograph.' (L pg. 100) Spared of any visual embellishments, his image of bare aspen trunks, dancing like exuberant sprites in a moment extemporaneous jubilation, was made just a few days later in the pre-dawn light. John Szarkowski, the preeminent Curator of photography, would later refer to it as a 'fugue of aspens.' (LAA pg. 201) At the end of his life, Ansel communicated the significance of this image by making it one of the variants in his last major project, The Museum Set, and it would later be included in the posthumous exhibition and eponymous book, Ansel Adams at 100.