Name/Title
Camera Obscura: View of the San Francisco Bay Bridge Inside a Pier 24 InteriorEntry/Object ID
2022.14Description
Photograph of a large bridge with a red ladder on the right.Context
Abelardo Morell’s vast body of photographic work explores the materiality of image-making, the history of photography, and human optics. Known for his camera obscura projects, which reference the origins of photography in early optical experimentation dating back millennia, Morell captures the seeming magic of photography in an era of rapid technological progress and the ubiquity of images. Produced by blacking-out a room or creating a darkened space with a small hole to allow light from outside to pass through, the interior space of the camera obscura becomes a site for viewing the external world upside down. Once lenses were introduced into the equation, early natural scientists ostensibly unlocked the key to understanding human optical perception and in turn paved the way to the technologies that would become the camera. "View of the San Francisco Bay Bridge" was created using the aforementioned camera obscura technique, but, in this case, Morell used a prism to present the image of the San Francisco Bay Bridge right side up, which is in turn captured using vibrant color film.Acquisition
Accession
2022.14-16Source or Donor
Thomas WilsonAcquisition Method
GiftCredit Line
Gift of Thomas J. Wilson and Jill M. Garling