Edward Weston is an early 20th century photographer from Illinois. He had an early start to photography, his first image making beginning when he was sixteen and consisting of images of his aunt's farm and the parks in Chicago. It was in 1906 that he first had a photograph published, his image making an appearance in Camera and Darkroom. When he moved out to California that same year, he worked "as a surveyor for San Pedro, Los Angeles and Salt Lake Railroad", where he worked as a itinerant photographing capturing images of children, pets and funerals. After shortly retuning to Illinois for formal training, he was employed in Los Angeles "as a retoucher [for] the George Steckel Portrait Studio" before moving onto the Louis A. Mojoiner Portrait Studio in 1909. it was here that he demonstrated his abilities at lighting and posing for portraiture work. This lead to him opening his own portrait studio in Tropica, California, in 1911. He has had articles written about him and has "authored many articles" about himself as well. Weston became one of the founding members - along with Ansel Adams and three other famous photographers - of "Group f/64 in 1932". This optical term was chosen " because they habitually set their lenses to that aperture to secure maximum image sharpness of both foreground and distance".

Weston has become recognisable for his work in a "soft-focus, pictorial style" of "high key portraits" that has won him "many salons and professional awards". It was when he visited a Steel Plant that his style changed and the visit "marked a turning point in Weston's career". He "renounced his Pictorialism style with a new emphasis on abstract form and sharper resolution of detail". These new, industrial images were described and "true to reality". His styles changed once again in 1926 when he started photographing "natural forms, close-ups, nudes and landscapes", of which he is most famous for and why I am researching him in relation to my project. He also shot "many photographs of rocks and trees at Point Lobos, Calfironia," in 1929. He created a series of "nudes and sands dunes in Oceano, California," in 1936 that is "often considered some of his finest work." 

These images are a part of his "series of monumental close-ups of seashells, peppers, and halved cabbages". In these images he was able to capture and bring out " the rich textures of their sculpture-like forms". I chose to look into these images of Weston's instead of the work on trees and rocks in 1929 because I am interested in his style of working with close up photography. He uses lowkey lighting in this series, the effects of this technique especially evident in the photographs of the shells. The exaggerated highlights and shadows created in this type of lighting make for a dramatic and intense mood, something I would like to take into my own work. You can also see the effect of the f/64 aperture in these images. Although it hadn't been 'invented' yet, you can see the beginnings of its style and aesthetic coming through in Weston's earlier work to the group invention.

This is Weston's famous photograph of a pepper. Whilst no two things are the same, I like the utter uniqueness of this pepper and I can see why he would want to photograph it. It almost looks like either a panoramic photo or has a fish-eye lens effect (which would be highly unlikely given his style of photography) because of the way the lines of the surface beneath the pepper curve around it. This curving effect looks to frame the pepper and adds depth to the image as well as making it seem to almost pop out at you. The whole image has a very interesting dynamic.

Reference: