Pirkle Jones (1914 – 2009)

The former National Academy for the Arts fellow and San Francisco Arts Commission honor recipient, recorded the beauty and culture of California. His sensitivity to the the land reflected the tradition of Ansel Adams, Edward Weston and Minor White, all of whom he knew well. His work is held by numerous museums and collectors. The major archive of his work is held at the University of California Santa Cruz.

Born in 1914 in Shreveport, LA, Jones’ career began with the purchase of a Kodak Brownie when he was seventeen years old, commenced in the 30’s when his photographs were both published and exhibited internationally in Pictorialist salons and publications. He served for four years in the US Army during WWII, with the 37th Division at Guadalcanal, Munda, and Bouganville in the South Pacific. In 1946, after his war service Jones entered the first class in photography at the California School of Fine Arts (now the San Francisco Art Institute). There he met a community of artists—among the instructors were Ansel Adams, Minor White, Edward Weston and Dorothea Lange, – that would help to shape and define his career. Jones also worked as Ansel Adams’ assistant (1947-1953) and the two photographers forged a life-long friendship. Dorothea Lange approached him in 1956 to collaborate on a photographic essay Death of a Valley. The essay chronicled the demise of the Berryessa Valley, which disappeared when the Monticello Dam was completed. Jones and Lange photographed during the community’s final year, as a way of life experienced for generations came to an end. Jones later described the project with Lange as “one of the most meaningful photographic experiences of my professional life.” In 1958, Pirkle Jones was documenting the building of Candlestick Park and the Paul Masson Winery in Saratoga, California for the architect John Bolles. In 1959, collaboration with Ansel Adams developed to produce an expanded essay on “The Story of a Winery” completed in 1963; illustrating the growth of a new industry as well as telling the story of winemaking. The pair produced a group of images that ultimately became a publication and an exhibition, which the Smithsonian Institution toured.

Pirkle Jones engaged in several collaborations with his late wife, the writer-photographer Ruth-Marion Baruch, over the course of their 49 year marriage. In 1961, the pair was drawn to a small, forgotten town located on the banks of the Sacramento River and the former gateway to the gold country. Entitled Walnut Grove: Portrait of a Town, it became an essay of discovery for both photographers and was exhibited at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. A landmark documentary series began in 1968 when Ruth-Marion was introduced to Kathleen Cleaver, wife of Black Panther party leader Eldridge Cleaver. Jones and Baruch photographed the Black Panthers from July through October 1968 in the Bay Area with the goal of “creating a better understanding of the Black Panthers.” An exhibition at the De Young Museum drew over 100,000 people. The two photographers overcame many obstacles to produce The Vanguard: A Photographic Essay on the Black Panthers,” which was published by Beacon Press in 1970. Seasoned by that experience, Pirkle found himself drawn to a houseboat community on the Sausalito waterfront, known as Gate 5. A mecca for free-spirited people seeking alternative life-styles, Gate 5 became a unique photographic odyssey for the mature photographer. Ever drawn to his own backyard, Jones’ mature eye also captured candid street scenes and workers at their jobs, the great city of San Francisco and the grand northern coast of California. In the last two decades, Pirkle Jones returned to the challenge of nature, to create order in the mysterious and chaotic natural world, which he has inhabited for so long. In 1978 he produced a Rock series followed by a Salt Marsh series and then by the Mt. Tamalpais series . He has been on an interior voyage of discovery and he wrote, “After all these years I [had] finally found some things in nature in which I could find some satisfaction…Images that I feel are my own. “Pirkle Jones: Sixty Years in Photography” the artist’s retrospective, of more than 120 works was mounted by the Santa Barbara Museum of Art in 2001, with the companion book Pirkle Jones California Photographs published by Aperture. A documentary by filmmaker Jane Levy Reed, Pirkle Jones Seven Decades Photographed debuted in 2009.

The work of Pirkle Jones is featured in these exhibitions.

(Select the image to view the exhibition page)

Pirkle Jones & Friends

Contrasts

Story of a Winery

Viewpoints

Death Of A Valley

The work of Pirkle Jones is featured in these Theme collections.

(Select the image to view the theme page)

Abstraction – B&W

American West

Animals

Artists

Landscape – B&W

Portraiture – Male

Seascapes – B&W

Still Life – B&W

Urban Landscapes – B&W

Water

Pirkle Jones - Forged His Own Identity While Collaborating with Ansel Adams and Dorothea Lange

Pirkle Jones was a student in the first class taught by Ansel Adams at the California School of Fine Arts in 1946, but their relationship quickly moved beyond that of student-teacher and became a lasting friendship and professional collaboration. When Jones married fellow student, Ruth-Marian Baruch, in 1949, the ceremony was held in Adams’ living room.READ ENTIRE ARTICLE

Grape Picker, 1956

The photographs of Pirkle Jones were hung near that of his friend and mentor in Ansel Adams: Before and After, an exhibition co-curated by the Booth Western Art Museum and Lumière. This show displayed over 25 Adams prints that place the master photographer in the context of art history. The 106 print exhibition featured four by Pirkle Jones.

The exhibition included prominent photographers that preceded Adams, as well as younger photographers, such as Jones, who were influenced or taught directly by Adams. The exhibition was on view from November of 2015 – April of 2016.

Jones became Adams’ assistant in 1949 and was part of an influential circle of Bay Area photographers that included Imogen Cunningham, Minor White, Edward Weston and Dorothea Lange. In 1952, Jones began a 28-year career teaching at the California School of Fine Arts, which is now known as the San Francisco Art Institute. Jones also taught at the Ansel Adams Workshops.

Worker, Saratoga, 1958

When Adams was commissioned to document wine-making at the Paul Masson Vineyards in California in 1958, he asked Jones to join the project. The resulting body of work by both men depicts the planting and harvesting of grapes, portraits of workers, wine, and the architecture of the winery. The Smithsonian organized the photographs into a traveling exhibition called Story of a Winery in 1962. An online version of Story of a Winery is available on our Exhibition Page.

Dorothea Lange was another photographic luminary who played an important role in Jones’s career. In 1956, Lange asked Pirkle Jones to collaborate with her on The Death of a Valley project.

The Last Memorial Day, 1956, From: Death of a Valley

Their work depicts in heartbreaking detail the end of the Berryessa Valley: the exodus of its inhabitants, human and animal, abandoned possessions and the submersion of the land itself, which took place once the Monticello Dam was completed. The valley was destroyed to provide water for the Solano County. The land was considered to be some of the most fertile in the region, but the government engineers saw it as a natural site for a dam.

Dorothea Lange, McKenzie Store, 1956

Jones and Lange photographed during the community’s last year, as a way of life experienced for generations came to an unnatural end. Jones later described the project with Lange as “one of the most meaningful photographic experiences of my professional life.”

Though Adams and Lange have garnered more acclaim within the canon of photography, the work of Pirkle Jones stands solidly on its own merit.

“Some (critics) acknowledge the debt owed to both of these camps (Adams and Lange) yet fail to look further. To understand the full range of Pirkle’s images and the issues that have continually interested him, however, it is necessary to acknowledge a complex and idiosyncratic visual sensibility,” wrote Tim Wride in the Aperture monograph, Pirkle Jones California Photographs. “And while this sensibility may have been informed and abetted by those whose work is better known, Pirkle’s images have, nonetheless, a strength and conviction that is visually sophisticated, intellectually grounded, emotionally charged and unique.”

Jones, who passed away in 2009 at age 95, did not go unappreciated by the photography community during his lifetime. His most notable subjects ranged include the natural world, the San Francisco counter culture scene, the Black Panthers, migrant workers and even treasures found at local flea markets. His work has been shown in numerous solo and group shows across the United States and abroad.

“I think that Pirkle Jones is an artist in the best sense of the term,” Adams once wrote of his colleague. “His statement is sound and resonant of the external world as well as of the internal responses and evaluations of his personality. His photography is not flamboyant, does not depend upon the superficial excitements. His pictures will live with you, and with the world, as long as there are people to observe and appreciate.”

Pirkle Jones' 100th Birthday

January 2, 2014

Pirkle Jones was born on January 2nd in 1914.

The former National Academy for the Arts fellow and San Francisco Arts Commission honor recipient, recorded the beauty and culture of California. His sensitivity to the the land reflected the tradition of Ansel Adams, Edward Weston and Minor White, all of whom he knew well.

Lumière’s inaugural exhibition was titled: Pirkle Jones and Friends.

© Pirkle Jones

AJC, Dead-On, First Try

Pirkle Jones and Friends, Gallery Talk with Jennifer McFarland