Monolith, the Face of Half Dome
Original Photograph Negative: 1927
Artist: Ansel Adams
Original Photograph Negative: 1927
Artist: Ansel Adams
Half Dome is undoubtably the trademark mountain of Yosemite. Ansel Adams photographed it numerous times in a varying degree of conditions, times of year and day. He also photographed from a number of perspectives: Inspiration Point, Glacier Point, the Valley Floor, the High Sierra, and perhaps most famously, from the Diving Board in 1927. Ansel had made a trip to that ‘magnificent slab of granite’ years before and recognized a photograph of Half Dome from that perspective would have potential. (AB pg. 59) But finally, in April of 1927, Ansel, his fiancée Virginia Best, best friend Cedric Wright, Arnold Williams and Charlie Michael headed to the Diving Board to attempt Ansel’s vision. The day would be paramount for his career as his success with Half Dome that afternoon led to his philosophy about visualizing the photograph in situ before snapping the shutter. Years later in 1978, after a full, hard-earned career as one of the preeminent photographers and masters of the medium, Ansel stood with his photographic assistant John Sexton in Yosemite looking up at Half Dome from the valley floor. Reminiscing about that fateful day in 1927, and with laughter in his voice, he relayed to John, ‘Maybe I should have just stopped then.’ (LAA pg. 51) Monolith, the Face of Half Dome, would be included in Ansel Adams’ Portfolio 3, his book Yosemite and the Range of Light, would grace the cover of his biography, The Eloquent Light, and was specified as one of his ten ‘biggies’ (images that had to be included within each purchased set) in The Museum Set.
On the chilly spring morning of April 10th, 1927, Ansel Adams set out along Yosemite’s LeConte Gully to capture an image of the striking sheer face of Half Dome, one of Yosemite National Park’s most iconic natural features. Though Ansel knew their route well, having spent four teenage summers as the keeper of the Sierra Club’s nearby lodge in Yosemite Valley, his companions—his fiancée Virginia Best and three close friends, including his lifetime friend and fellow wilderness photographer Cedric Wright—picked carefully along the steep gully in the icy shadow of nearby Grizzly Peak.
On the chilly spring morning of April 10th, 1927, Ansel Adams set out along Yosemite’s LeConte Gully to capture an image of the striking sheer face of Half Dome, one of Yosemite National Park’s most iconic natural features. Though Ansel knew the route well, having spent four teenage summers as the keeper of the Sierra Club’s nearby lodge in Yosemite Valley, his companions—his fiancée Virginia Best and three close friends, including his lifetime friend and fellow wilderness photographer Cedric Wright—picked carefully along the steep gully in the icy shadow of nearby Grizzly Peak.
On the chilly spring morning of April 10th, 1927, Ansel Adams set out along Yosemite’s LeConte Gully to capture an image of the striking sheer face of Half Dome, one of Yosemite National Park’s most iconic natural features.
