More About the Image:
Ansel Adams took several trips to Monument Valley in the mid-twentieth century. He composed traditional landscapes, worked there with color and even made a well-known self-portrait. This image falls in the former category with a high horizon line and elongated foreground that creates an appropriate depth and vastness to the desert scene. Rabbit Brush, Narrowleaf Yucca and sage dot the expanse like mini flora buttes that reflect and challenge the visual dominance of the sandstone monoliths in the distance. A uniformity is resolute across much of the scene; the even light, repetitive features and influence of scale by the camera position make the space seem infinite.
So wrote Ansel Adams, whose photographs of the varied and rugged landscapes of the region have imprinted upon the imaginations of millions around the world. Beyond Yosemite and the High Sierra, the Southwest was one of Ansel’s best-loved regions of the country.In fact, it was a trip to Taos, New Mexico in the 1930s that led Ansel to cross paths with photographer Paul Strand, who helped inspire him to make photography his life’s work. The rest, as they say, is history.
