ADAM CLARK VROMAN No 762 00 Acoma (Burro and Horse Trail) 1899 Platinum Print 6.1x8.1 in. print on paper 6.5x8.25 in. ASG # ACV/1220 Pasadena Public Library title on verso pencil #922 Burro Trail Acoma In Negative LL 922

Vroman was interested in Japan, he collected Netsuke and here he intuitively applies one of Arthur Wesley Dow and Alvin Langdon Coburn design elements, the dragon pattern here of the shadow of the cliffs emphasizing the light upwardly ascending curving wall of the trail.

Provenance: John O'Hara Album.

Photographer and Bookseller Adam Clark Vroman (1856-1916) was the leading photographer of the Pasadena, California Arroyo Culture. He was the first important American photographer to use platinum prints to emphasize modernist tones and abstraction. He was the key Western American photographer using modern techniques and materials on living tribes and current traditions, rather than working in cultural preservation of a vanishing race. His landscape work is every bit as emotional as the later landscape work of Ansel Adams, Laura Gilpin, Edward Weston, and Paul Strand. In 1893 he moved to Pasadena and set up Vroman's Bookstore, still in operation, where he sold books as well as photography supplies. He photographed primarily in Arizona and New Mexico.

Andrew Smith Gallery has been the leading dealer and collector of Adam Clark Vroman since the first album if acquired in 1980. For a more detailed view of his life, work and materials:
https://www.andrewsmithgallery.com/exhibitions/misc/western/vroman.html

Excellent. Minor wear, light discoloration verso