n the late 1940s, Edwin Land pioneered the invention of instant film and founded the Polaroid Corporation.
When Land befriended famous photographer Ansel Adams, the inventor and artist combined their skills to create unique works of art.
Today the Palmer Museum of Art will open its newest exhibit, Ansel Adams and Edwin Land : Art, Science, and Invention -- Photographs from the Polaroid Collection, to celebrate the collaborations of these two artistic pioneers.
"Both Adams and Land were geniuses in their own way," said Joyce Robinson, museum curator. "Land invented the technology, and Adams worked for him as a consultant testing out the new inventions."
The exhibition will feature over 80 of Adams' prints including black-and-white Polaroid prints, rare examples of the photographer's early commercial work, vintage enlargements of two of Adams' most famous images -- Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico (1941) and Moon and Half Dome, Yosemite National Park (1960) -- as well as photomurals of the American landscape.
"During the school year, our exhibits are geared toward students and faculty," said Dana Kletchka, curator for education. "However, during the summer we want to reach out to a broader audience that includes those who attend the Arts Festival and parents who are visiting because of summer session."
The traveling exhibit, set up by the Polaroid Corporation and Palmer, is just one of the stops on its tour. The exhibit gives visitors a chance to see Adams on a different scale, experimenting with Polaroid, which back then was as revolutionary as the digital camera is today, Robinson said.
"Adams, through his work, was not trying to show us how the scenes he took looked, but was trying to show us how they felt," she said. "Visitors will see the Ansel Adams they know and love with the expansive vistas and mural-sized photos, but they will also see him experimenting with Polaroid technology and photos on a smaller scale."
Many of the pictures are accompanied by letters Adams wrote to Land critiquing the new products he was trying out, and there are examples of how the different exposures came out when Adams took his pictures.
"Although Adams spent a lot of time in the dark room adjusting his photos, he always said that photographers should visualize the end scene before they take the shot," Robinson said. "Adams always wanted people to see the Polaroid camera as a real aesthetic tool and not a toy."
In addition to the exhibit, adults can participate in a workshop on the "zone system," created by Adams.
Get in the "Zone" will be held noon to 3 p.m. Saturday, July 28 with artist Christopher Campbell. He will discuss the zone system in terms of color and digital printing and will lead the group on a photo-taking trip around campus.
The workshop is free.
