Working in the fields with Mount Williamson in the background.
Everyone is familiar with Ansel Adams’ great landscape photographs but in 1943 Ansel traveled to Independence California at to document the Manzanar War Relocation Center and the Japanese Americans interned there during World War II. The photos he took are now part of the Library of Congress’ Ansel Adams collection documenting Manzanar.
“The purpose of my work was to show how these people, suffering under a great injustice, and loss of property, businesses and professions, had overcome the sense of defeat and dispair by building for themselves a vital community in an arid (but magnificent) environment…All in all, I think this Manzanar Collection is an important historical document, and I trust it can be put to good use.” ~Ansel Adams
Football practice.
What really makes this collection rare is that Ansel focused on the people taking many portrait and daily life shots. The collection features not only scans of the prints Ansel made but the original black and white negatives as well to give viewers an idea of the technique involved in making the final prints.
Sam Bozono, Policeman.
Take a look at the whole collection on the Library of Congress website and if you get a chance head over to Manzanar.
Monument in cemetery at Manzanar.
Photo by Ansel Adams courtesy of the Library of Congress.