The Leading Figures of Environmental Photography, Brian Foster and Ansel Adams

Land and water pollution became a global issue due to the massive increase in population over the last 50 years from 3.55 Billion people to currently 7.2 Billion in 2019. This sudden boom in the population caused a severe increase in plastic production all across the world. Newer photographers like Bruce Foster and Mandy Baker have done projects on pollution to spread awareness about the social issue. Ansel Adams is an environmentalist photographer known mostly for shooting landscapes, his visual art shows the viewer how much cleaner and seemingly pollution free the photo seems back in 1938 before water population was a troubling issue. In this photo Ansel Adam shows the crystal clear lake water in Yosemite revealing a perfect reflection of the mountain in the background back in 1938. Bruce foster on the other hand, had photographed the pollution washed ashore from the Mangawhai Estuary for his 2015 pollution project known as “Intertidal”. Lastly the photographer Mandy Barker heavily used photoshop to create a pitch black abyss and photoshop the discarded cigarette lighters in this abyss seemingly floating around just as if the photo was taken deep under the water. All three artists show a story of the history of water pollution, from old to new, they show the impact that the worlds boom in population had on to the environment roughly 50 years ago.

Ansel Adams was an american historical photographer known for his black and white landscape images in the western parts of the United States. Born in San Francisco 1902, Adams was given his first camera at age 12 and began his photography journey joining the sierra club, an environmental organisation founded in May 28th 1892 based in the US. This club helped Adams gain an interest in shooting landscapes and other environmental photography. Alfred stieglitz was also a heavy influence in Ansel Adams work as he was one of the first gallery owners in New york to exhibit his work in 1936. Ansel Adams has taken this photo in the high country in Yosemite, a place where he frequently took landscapes all his life. This photo was taken in black and white as it was the standard and only method of photography back then. In this photograph “Cathedral peak and lake” taken by Ansel Adams in 1938 he shows us how pure and clean the world was a mere 50 years ago with the clearest almost mirror like water surface of the lake. As pollution truly became an issue in the late 1900’s as technology advanced throughout society with things such as machinery and factories becoming more common in companies mass producing plastic and other packaging materials. In this photo, Ansel Adams has used a large depth of field shot with a fast shutter speed with an overall sharp focus while also capturing the clouds and the lake in focus freezing this moment in time. He has chosen to take the photo from his eye level giving a sense of realism as this is what the viewer would see from his or her own eyes if they were there themselves. He has used the natural lighting of the sun for this photograph as it is behind him lighting up everything in his shot. For Adams framing he had chosen to take the photo with just enough left over space between the top cut off of the photo and the peak of the mountain. He has also applied the rule of thirds to his composition placing the peak of the mountain two thirds into the image. Ansel Adams has take the image from this specific spot showing the crystal clear lake water in the mid ground in the middle section of the image and the clouds at the top section behind the mountain as almost empty space so that the image didn't seem overly cluttered or having too much going on etc. He used this lake and the trees not only because of his environmental focus but to use as leading lines directing the viewer's attention to the mountain in the background contrasting against the cloudy sky making the peaks the focal point of the image.

Bruce Foster is a contemporary New Zealand based photographer born in 1948 in Whanganui NZ. In 1970 Foster had obtained a Bachelor's degree in Engineering at the university of auckland and then a Masters in Philosophy at the school of fine arts in 1979 studying under artists such as John B. Turner and Tom Hutchins, this is also were Bruce Foster got his inspiration for his more popular photographs. Living in Wellington Foster has many outlets to put out his work expanding his following base. This piece of work i have chosen to analyse is under his 2015 project “intertidal”. This project explores the environmental changes and pollution growth over the last 800 years on the coastline of the Mangawhai Spit on “a small stretch of the North Auckland coastline” to spread awareness on the world’s current marine pollution situation. In this image Foster has photographed a large sand mound with dried kelp and plastic entangled together washed up onto the land from the ocean. He has framed this photograph by having the sand mound aligned in the centre of the composition as the focal point with all the kelp in frame with more sand from the beach above and below the subject matter to give the image depth and to give the viewer a feeling of being there. He has shot this photograph using a deep depth of field capturing the entire mound and everything behind it in focus. This image has a very limited colour range of the contrasting black and gold sand and the brown kelp entangled with the white plastic. This quite dull colour range helps the image seem more dramatic in its entirety. Bruce Foster took this image from his eye level creating a realistic view of what you would see from your own eyes if you were there yourself. The image is slightly zoomed in, to focus entirely on the mound of sand whilst also keeping it realistic. This was done because of his intent on showing and comparing the environmental state in this area currently to what it originally was back when there were significantly less people on earth.