'Moonrise, Hernandez' Video

[Chris Kern]

The Ansel Adams Gallery recently produced a short video about the making of Adams' iconic Moonrise, Hernandez.  No information that hasn't been published before, but I thought the presentation was rather well-done—despite being essentially a sales pitch: the gallery is currently offering a large 1973 gelatin silver print of the picture.  (It's marked "price on request", but I think this is one of those instances where, as J.P. Morgan famously said, "if you have to ask, you can't afford it.")

[Rand47]

Thanks for sharing this.  One of my “supreme” regrets is that in the early 70’s, while visiting Carmel, CA.  The Photography West gallery had a 16x20 framed, signed,  Hernandez for $3,500.00.  I was a lowly firefighter at the time, making about $1,000.00 per month.  I “almost” bought it.  Dang....

Rand

[Zen8]

You should have. We went to see his show in Toronto about 10 years ago. I walked up to a poster size print of Moonrise and asked if they would take a cheque. The attendant said it was priceless.

I read all his books, built a 4x5 field camera kit from Bender and dabbled with the Zone System. I'm a big a fan and embarrassed to say I didn't know where Hernandez was. It will be 3 years this January. We were in a gift shop in Santa Fe and I was looking a print and someone said Hernandez was not far away. We went the next day and couldn't find anything. We went for lunch and I noticed a print hanging on the wall. The owner said that shot was taken by the abandoned gas station up the road.

We went there and then took a drive down to what I thought was the church. I'm assuming it was but it looks different to me structure wise. I kid you not. I have my camera in hand and a flatbed with hay bales and dogs pulls up. A guy with a cowboy hat says "you lookin for Ansel ese".  We chatted a bit and he said his grandfather owned that land and had to sell some of it. The part he sold is trailer park now.

To my point. One of his most famous shots and not even a marker to indicate the spot. These are just unedited snaps.

                                                     

[RSL]

http://www.russ-lewis.com/essays/WhyClicktheShutter.html

Which deals with a comparison between Moonrise Hernandez and Moonrise Yosemite Valley.

[Zen8]

The geo location from wiki is showing me this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moonrise,_Hernandez,_New_Mexico 

https://www.google.ca/maps/place/Hernandez,+NM+87537,+USA/@36.6606525,-108.5089166,869052m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x871822e49e99f499:0xe41240563c3631a9!8m2!3d36.0628!4d-106.1194685

[Zen8]

This is screen shot from goggle from where we ate. Not far from that geo location. I can't find that gas station. Maybe they tore it down.     

[Alan Goldhammer]

Thanks for sharing this.  One of my “supreme” regrets is that in the early 70’s, while visiting Carmel, CA.  The Photography West gallery had a 16x20 framed, signed,  Hernandez for $3,500.00.  I was a lowly firefighter at the time, making about $1,000.00 per month.  I “almost” bought it.  Dang....

Rand

I moved down to Bethesda in 1978 to do a fellowship in endocrinology at the National Institute of Health.  Harry Lunn, who popularized Adams and some other photographers to the general public, had his gallery in Georgetown.  Most of what was hanging were Adams prints and he did a brisk business.  It's interesting in the lnked obituary that Lunn ordered 1000 Adams prints at the time the photographer stated he would cease printing, buying them at an average cost of $300!!!

[Redcrown]

This showed up on Reddit:

The Art Institute of Chicago Has Put 50,000 High-Res Images from Their Collection Online

https://kottke.org/18/11/the-art-institute-of-chicago-has-put-50000-high-res-images-from-their-collection-online

Find the link there for the collection, then play with the filters for photography. A lot of Ansel Adams (not for download), but almost 300 other high-res downloads, mostly Stieglitz.

FYI, the website is either weak or getting hammered. Half my 10 attempted downloads failed with server error.