# Ansel Adams ![[2025-08-13_Ansel_Adams.png]] Ansel Easton Adams (February 20, 1902 – April 22, 1984) was an American landscape photographer and environmentalist, widely considered the most important landscape photographer of the 20th century. Born in San Francisco, Adams suffered a broken nose during the 1906 earthquake aftermath that remained crooked for life. At age 14, he received his first camera during a visit to Yosemite National Park, sparking a lifelong devotion to the Sierra Nevada. Initially trained as a pianist with professional aspirations, Adams shifted to photography around 1930. He developed the revolutionary Zone System with Fred Archer, a technical method for controlling exposure and development to achieve desired tonal ranges. In 1932, Adams co-founded Group f/64 with Edward Weston and Imogen Cunningham, advocating "pure" photography with sharp focus and full tonal range. He married Virginia Best in 1928, inheriting her family's studio in Yosemite (now the Ansel Adams Gallery). A passionate conservationist, Adams used his photography to advocate for wilderness preservation, joining the Sierra Club in 1919 and serving as its director for 37 years. His iconic black-and-white images of American wilderness, including "Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico" and "Clearing Winter Storm, Yosemite," remain among the most recognizable photographs in American art. ## Quotes <!-- QueryToSerialize: LIST FROM #type/quote AND [[Ansel Adams]] WHERE public_note = true SORT file.name ASC --> <!-- SerializedQuery: LIST FROM #type/quote AND [[Ansel Adams]] WHERE public_note = true SORT file.name ASC --> - [[A great photograph is one that fully expresses what one feels, in the deepest sense, about what is being photographed]] - [[You don't take a photograph, you make it]] <!-- SerializedQuery END --> ## Books <!-- QueryToSerialize: LIST FROM #books AND [[Ansel Adams]] WHERE public_note = true SORT file.name ASC -->