"ADAMS HAD A GREATER IMPACT UPON CREATIVE PHOTOGRAPHY THAN ANY OTHER PERSON IN THIS CENTURY": ANSEL ADAMS' IMAGES, INSCRIBED BY HIM

ADAMS, Ansel. Images 1923-1974. Boston: New York Graphic Society, (1974). Oblong folio (14 by 17 inches), original half black cloth, photographic endpapers, original photographic dust jacket, original slipcase. $1250.

First trade edition of Adams' award-winning "ideal book, comprising his personal choice of pictures," boldly inscribed by him on the half title, "For John and Carol, Ansel Adams, 12-1-76," with 115 superb photolithographs of images.

"Ansel Adams had a greater impact upon creative photography than any other person in this century." Images 1923-1974 is his "first very-large-format book… In full control, Ansel produced his ideal book, comprising his personal choice of pictures, state-of-the-art reproduction, graceful words and elegant design. He selected the 115 photographs that he believed best represented the range of his vision, choosing (as he always did when it was up to him) a wide spectrum of portraits, details, abstracts and occasional quirky subjects, as well as a smattering of his grand landscapes… Images was both a great aesthetic and a commercial success, elected as one of the 50 Books of the Year by the American Institute of Graphic Arts and awarded first prize at the World Book Fair in Leipzig, Germany" (Alinder, 266, 307, 388). To Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Wallace Stegner, who authored the introduction, Adams' "mind and vision, his reverence, his delicacy and strength, will have the power to move and enhance and enlarge us as long as walls exist for photographs" (Miraculous Instants, 51-2). Images remains "one of the handsomest books of its kind ever made" (New York Times). With "First printing 1974" on copyright page. Issued simultaneously with a deluxe limited edition.

Fine condition.