Art21 Extended Play

Robert Adams | Working Along Freeways

by Wesley Miller | Dec 4, 2008

EXCLUSIVE: Robert Adams with photographs in his Oregon studio.

Robert Adams’s black-and-white photographs document scenes of the American West, revealing the impact of human activity on the last vestiges of wilderness and open space. An underlying tension in Adams’s body of work is the contradiction between landscapes visibly transformed or scarred by human presence and the inherent beauty of light and land rendered by the camera.

Robert Adams, (Left) “Untitled, Colorado,” early 1970s; (Right) “Adams County, Colorado,” 1973. © Robert Adams. Courtesy Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco and Matthew Marks Gallery, New York.

SEE: More images, videos, and news for Robert Adams.

LEARN: Robert Adams is featured in the Season 4 (2007) episode Ecology of the Art:21—Art in the Twenty-First Century television series on PBS.

DISCUSS: What do you think about this video? Leave a comment!

PHOTO | Robert Adams, (Left) Untitled, Colorado, early 1970s; (Right) Adams County, Colorado, 1973. © Robert Adams. Courtesy Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco and Matthew Marks Gallery, New York.

VIDEO | Producer: Susan Sollins & Nick Ravich. Camera: Bob Elfstrom. Sound: Doug Dunderdale. Editor: Steven Wechsler. Artwork courtesy: Robert Adams. Thanks: Matthew Marks Gallery & Fraenkel Gallery.

Contributor
Wesley Miller is the former curator at Art21. Miller co-curated the television series Art in the Twenty-First Century. He is also co-creator of the digital series New York Close Up.

 

Categories

Tags