Over his 65-year career, photographer Brett Weston (American, 1911 – 1993) made hauntingly beautiful black and white images that blurred the line between representation and abstraction. Weston’s nuanced tones, imaginative framing, and keen focus on form helped him depict diverse landscapes intimately and attentively, alongside the genre’s most prolific makers, including Ansel Adams, Imogen Cunningham, and the artist’s father, Edward Weston.

Brett Weston split his time between homes in California and Hawaii and traveled extensively to Alaska, Japan, Mexico, Oregon, and South America in search of dramatic environments upon which to focus his lens. This selection highlights the breadth of imagery that makes up his practice, from panoramic vistas of farmland to highly detailed close-ups of rock, lava, and sand. Taken together, they reveal the artist’s extraordinary ability to render natural and manmade forms into otherworldly rhythms of texture, line, and shadow.

The Museum is grateful to the Brett Weston Archive for their generous gift of photographs by the artist. Additional support provided by Steve Lingeman.