Making a Photographer: The Early Work of Ansel Adams

An unprecedented and revealing examination of the early career of one of America's most celebrated photographers Ansel Adams (1902-1984), one of the most influential photographers of his generation, is famous for his dramatic photographs of the American West. Although many of Adams' images are now iconic, his early work has remained largely unknown. In this first monograph devoted to Adams' early career, Rebecca A. Senf argues that these early photographs are essential to understanding Adams's artistic development and offer new insights into many aspects of the artist's mature oeuvre. Drawing on extensive archival research, Senf traces the first three decades of Adams's photographic practice, beginning with a childhood amateur album and culminating in his Guggenheim-supported photographs of National Parks in the 1940s. Highlighting the artist's persistence in his career and his remarkable ability to learn from experience in image-making, this beautifully illustrated volume also examines the importance of the artist's environmentalism, including his involvement with the Sierra Club.

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