THE SILVER MIRROR:

Yosemite and photographic art are intrinsically linked.  During the mid-19th century, Yosemite itself was as much a far-away fairy-tale land to the population as it was sculpted from time-hardened granite; at the same time, the medium was in its relative infancy as a modern, almost mystical mirror that still prompted fears fueled in Victorian superstitions.  However, as time progressed, the proverbial proof of Yosemite’s existence would be revealed by Carleton Watkins and his mammoth plate albumen photographs.  These images spurred early conservation efforts by politicians due to both their spectacle and their veracity in promoting the West’s unique wild spaces.  Yosemite and photography were symbiotic objects of wonder and curiosity.

Since then, Yosemite has been the subject of most forms of photography, from those early albumen prints by Watkins, to the digital, drone and artificial intelligence renderings of the present day.  However, early daguerreotypes of Yosemite would have been rare, and if they were made, it is likely most have been lost to time or misfortune; and as technology within the medium progressed, their aesthetic beauty in reflecting an intricate landscape of equal splendor was neglected due to the tides of modernity.  For example, by the time Yosemite Valley was (re)discovered around 1851, the daguerreotype was already beginning to fall out of favor with practitioners who preferred less expensive alternatives.  The daguerreotype also produces a singular original image, and as photographic methods evolved to provide multiple prints from one original negative, the commercial demand for these reproducible materials surged.  As a result, a contemporary relationship between the great valley and the earliest photographic process never truly materialized.