Ansel’s Tree, Spring (#4)

Though I wasn't looking for it, a familiar visage photographed by Ansel Adams jumped out at me one wintry morning as I drove along the Merced River into Yosemite Valley. Perhaps draping winter snow outlining its branches, no longer hidden by summer's verdant cover, manifested its unmistakable form even though it was very nearly adjacent to a road I had traveled many times. Because of the beautiful early morning light, I made a year long study of the tree. Even though this had been the site of one of my favorite Adams photographs, I felt that the scene had changed significantly enough, bank to branch, to make prints of my own, the best of which I feel is spring. The tree succumbed to the forces of age and its brothering stream in February of 2009. Yet, it survives thanks to photography, welcoming and vital, rooted among the shoulders of lichen-clothed granite boulders, its outstretched arms greeting the soft light of the warming morning sun. 4:5 aspect ratio. Negative #120020500302