Ansel Adams Photo Exhibit

The Lake County Discovery Museum, located in Lakewood Forest Preserve in Wauconda, Illinois, houses displays depicting the history of Lake County in a fun learning environment. It also displays the nation’s largest permanent exhibition on the history and significance of postcards. Finally, temporary exhibits in the special exhibition galleries take inspiration from art, history and popular culture.

The current exhibit is a national touring exhibition featuring works by celebrated nature photographer Ansel Adams (1902-1984) and runs through January 8, 2012. Today after hiking 5 miles in the preserve, we visited the exhibit which is comprised of 70 of his photographs. Below is his self-portrait photo...

Born and raised in San Francisco, Adams took his first photograph at the age of 14 using a Kodak Box Brownie while on a family holiday in Yosemite National Park, and by the 1930s, he was a famous American photographer and on the way to becoming internationally acclaimed. He tied his two great loves of photography and the outdoors into a reputation as celebrated photographer and vocal environmentalist and devoted his life to capturing the changing beauty of the natural world, from the monumental in size to the smallest in stature. (The silver gelatin photographs in this exhibit are the Museum Set Edition from the Anne Helms Collection.)

This shot particularly appealed to me because last year, on a trip to Utah, I stayed in the town of Manti in the Temple View Motel, a small ma-and-pa place across the street from the magnificent Manti Temple (click to enlarge photos). Though not allowed to enter the structure, I was able to walk the grounds and observe and photograph it from all sides (though none as spectacular as Adams' shot of course!)

A few years ago I backpacked in Arizona's Canyon de Chelly and enjoyed seing Adams' photo of the famous White House Ruins...

Yosemite National Park was Adams' favorite area, and having camped there 4 days just 2 months ago, I loved seeing his photos of this majestic scenery...

Half Dome, Merced River, Winter

Vernal Falls

Moon and Half Dome

The exhibit runs through January 8th and a token charge of $6 is collected at the door, with a special price of only $3 for those over 55 and students between 18 and 25.  Children are $2.50.  For more info, go here.