"Oak Tree, Snowstorm"
Yosemite National Park, California

gelatin silver print mounted on cardboard

portfoliostamp, titled and signed by Allan Ross on verso

Ansel Adams made this image in 1948 using an 8x10" view camera. This towering oak at the western fringe of El Capitan Meadow was among his favorite subjects. Since Adams first photographed the tree, age has taken its toll and it succumbed to fire in recent years. However, the towering cliffs between Bridalveil Fall and Cathedral Spires that lurk in the mists behind the oak in this photograph remain as solid as ever. The Sierra Club published Oak Tree, Snowstorm in 1948, along with 11 other photographs by Ansel Adams, in Portfolio I. Later, Adams selected it for his Museum Set Collection, a retrospective portfolio of what he considered his strongest work, and it appeared in Classic Images, the book based on the Museum Set. The image is one of Adams' icons, and has also been published in Ansel Adams Monograph, the Portfolios of Ansel Adams, Yosemite and the High Sierra, and Yosemite.
(Ansel Adams Gallery)