Gift of Richard and Lois Zakia
Barbara Morgan often photographed dancers in motion. She used their movements and gestures to show energy and emotion. In this image she uses a similar approach to photograph fellow photographers Ansel Adams and Beaumont Newhall. The two men pose and move around Morgan’s studio, with one caught in midair as they play with camera equipment.
Adams and Newhall were both important figures in the world of photography. Adams is best known for his dramatic black-and-white landscape photographs of the American West, especially Yosemite National Park. Newhall was a photographer as well as an art historian, curator, and writer. By photographing the two men together, Morgan captured a moment within the community of photographers in which she worked.
Morgan preferred artificial light to natural light because it gave her greater control over the look of a photograph. In Ansel Adams and Beaumont Newhall in Barbara Morgan’s Studio, she uses light and shadow to create patterns across the scene, while the men’s gestures and body language add energy and movement. By carefully controlling these elements, Morgan transforms a traditional portrait into an expressive image.
Light is the shape and play of my thought … my reason for being a photographer.
tags: black and white, shadows
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