The First View of the Mine, View Looking South, New Almaden

Artist Carleton E. Watkins (American, 1829 - 1916)

Date1863

MediumAlbumen print

DimensionsImage and sheet: 15 5/8 × 20 5/16 inches (39.69 × 51.59 cm)
Mount: 21 × 27 inches (53.34 × 68.58 cm)

Credit LineGift of Hallmark Cards, Inc.

Object number2005.27.246

SignedSigned on mount recto, lower right, in brown pen: "C. E. Watkins"

InscribedOn mount recto, lower right, in pencil: "The first view of the Mine View looking South"

MarkingsOn mount recto, bottom center, in pencil: "CEW.252.x"

On View

Not on view

Collections

Photography

Terms

DescriptionImage of a winding dirt road leading up to a mining camp near a rocky hillside; men stand near horses outside of stables with mountains in the distant background.Gallery Label

Gallery Label

Carleton Watkins was renowned for his majestic images of Yosemite, which he first visited in 1861, and for the unsurpassed artistry of his 18 x 22-inch mammoth-plate views. In addition to his studies of untouched nature, Watkins was employed to photograph various mining businesses in California. This photograph records the New Almaden Quicksilver Mine outside San Jose. This mine produced mercury, a primary reduction agent in the processing of gold and silver. Ever the artist, Watkins finds compelling visual form in this relatively mundane subject, creating an elegantly rhythmic composition and an exquisite sense of spatial recession.

Published References

"The Quicksilver Mines of New Almaden," Harper's New Monthly Magazine 27:157 (June 1863): 33; Peter E. Palmquist, Carleton E. Watkins, Photographs 1861-1874 (San Francisco: Fraenkel Gallery, 1989).

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