Ansel Adams (1902-1984) Golden Gate Before The Bridge

Ansel Adams (1902-1984)
Golden Gate Before The Bridge, 1932
Gelatin silver print, probably printed between 1932-35; mounted, signed 'Ansel E Adams' in pencil on the mount, titled 'The Golden Gate' in pencil and the photographer's San Francisco studio label (BMFA Label 3) on the reverse, framed.
6 3/8 x 9 1/8 in. (16.2 x 23.2 cm.)
sheet 13 1/2 x 17 1/2 in. (34.3 x 44.5 cm.)
Literature
Liliane de Cock Morgan, ed., Ansel Adams (Hastings-on-Hudson, 1972), pl. 23
Ansel Adams: An Autobiography (Boston, 1985), p. 114
James Alinder and John Szarkowski, Ansel Adams: Classic Images (Boston, 1985), pl. 11
Mary Street Alinder, Ansel Adams: A Biography (New York, 1996), n.p.
Andrea G. Stillman, ed., Ansel Adams: California (Boston, 1997), pp. 16-7
Karen E. Haas and Rebecca A. Senf, Ansel Adams in the Lane Collection (Boston, 2005), pl. 21

Note
1932 was a momentous year for Ansel Adams as it marked the founding of Group f/64 – the photographic group with which he would be associated for the remainder of his career. Its landmark exhibition opened at the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum in San Francisco on 15 November and included work by fellow members Imogen Cunningham, John Paul Edwards, Preston Holder, Consuelo Kanaga, Alma Lavenson, Sonya Noskowiak, Henry Swift, Willard Van Dyke, Brett Weston, and Edward Weston.

In April 1932, Adams had awoken in San Francisco to find the sky awash with dense white clouds rolling across the Golden Gate. Collecting his equipment, including his 8 x 10-inch view camera, Adams dashed out to capture the expanse above the majestic strait. The resulting image, Golden Gate Before the Bridge, is a masterful example of Adams' ability to calculate exposure time. He took several images of this same scene using varied exposure times, relying exclusively on his own experience to gauge the natural light. Later that year, financed by print sales of this very image, Adams would purchase his first Weston light meter, which eliminated the need for guesswork in his exposure process.

Despite its title, Golden Gate Before the Bridge is not only a portrait of the strait, but it is also a tribute to the regal skies above it. With billowing clouds occupying nearly the entire frame, the image presages Adams' unwavering interest in capturing cloud formations in the decades to come. When he selected images for inclusion in the de Young exhibition, Adams chose three landscapes that he felt best represented his work, one of which was Golden Gate Before the Bridge.

Early prints of this image are scarce. Adams made this particular print sometime in the three years after he took the image, evidenced by the presence of his 'Photograph by Ansel Easton Adams, San Francisco' studio label on the reverse of the mount, which the photographer used between 1930 and 1935.