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Bridal Veil, Yosemite

Carleton E. Watkins

1866

From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art

Impressionism Realism Late 19th Century

Dominant colour

Bridal Veil, Yosemite is a 1866 by Carleton E. Watkins, a Impressionism work, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.

Who painted this?: Carleton E. Watkins
When & what style?: 1866 · Impressionism
Where can I see it?: Cleveland Museum of Art

About this work

You see a towering waterfall framed by jagged cliffs and dark trees. The mist looks almost touchable, hanging in the air like wet breath. Watkins made this photo huge—almost five feet wide—so you feel small standing in front of it. Early cameras couldn’t hold scenes this big, so he built a special one just for views like this. The size pulls you in, like stepping into the valley yourself. Look up more work by Carleton E. Watkins (American, 1829–1916) to see how he shaped how we picture the American West.

The story of this work

Overview

The grand scale of the American West was difficult to convey in early photographs, which were intimately scaled objects meant for the hand and the album. Starting in the late 1850s, a handful of photographers shooting landscapes and historical settings began producing “mammoth” prints, including the San Francisco-based Carleton E. Watkins. The seemingly gargantuan scale of these prints allowed a new, immersive relationship between the viewer and the image, enhancing that “you are there” feeling.