The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of April 20, 2024

Thunderstorm Over the Great Plains, Near Cimarron, New Mexico

Thunderstorm Over the Great Plains, Near Cimarron, New Mexico

c. 1961 (printed after 1965)
(American, 1902–1984)
America, 20th century
gelatin silver print
Image: 36 x 48 cm (14 3/16 x 18 7/8 in.); Matted: 55.9 x 71.1 cm (22 x 28 in.)
Gift of Photography in the Fine Arts 1965.333
© 2011 The Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust
Location: not on view

Description

One of the most important, well-known, and influential photographers of the 20th century, Adams is indelibly associated with visually stunning images of the unsoiled environment in the American West. This expansive scene is one of his iconic landscapes made around 1961 when he took a trip to Cimarron, New Mexico, visiting the Philmont Scout Ranch, which occupies some 137,500 acres of wilderness in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. From an elevated viewpoint, Adams celebrated the romanticized beauty and form and the ethereal western light of this vast, flat landscape. The irregular, white fluffy clouds, set off by the dark stormy sky, hover over the land like guardian figures.
  • Lee, Sherman E. "Year in Review." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 52, no. 9 (1965): 124-57. p. 157, no. 173 25152069
    Cleveland Museum of Art, Tom E Hinson. Catalogue of Photography. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1996. Reproduced: P. 77
  • Ansel Adams: A Photographer’s Evolution. Taft Museum of Art, Cincinnati, OH (organizer) (June 23-September 16, 2018).
    Contemporary Landscape Photography. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 26-August 14, 2011).
    Ansel Adams: Photographs from the Permanent Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 15, 1993-January 9, 1994).
    Selection of Photography from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Kenneth C. Beck Center for the Cultural Arts, Cleveland, OH (1979).
    Source Material for Studio Projects. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (June 20-August 27, 1972).
    Photograph Exhibition. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (July 13-September 19, 1971).
    Year in Review: 1965. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 27-November 14, 1965).
    Photography in Fine Arts. New York World's Fair, New York, NY (1965).
  • {{cite web|title=Thunderstorm Over the Great Plains, Near Cimarron, New Mexico|url=false|author=Ansel Adams|year=c. 1961 (printed after 1965)|access-date=20 April 2024|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1965.333