Fontana, California 1983

Robert Adams made this photograph of Fontana, California, without a date, using black and white film, in a way that feels both matter-of-fact and deeply poetic. The palette here is a study in greyscale, the soft gradations feel akin to drawing. The photograph is divided into distinct zones: the dark, textured earth in the foreground gives way to a long stretch of highway, and beyond that, a hazy horizon punctuated by telephone poles and palm trees. There's a sense of endlessness. Look closely at the way the light catches the telephone poles on the left, how they march into the distance, each one a little fainter than the last. This reminds me of the work of the Bechers, but there is a definite human quality that separates it, which reminds me of the New Topographics movement. Adams’ work never gives us easy answers, which is what makes it so compelling. He seems to suggest that beauty and decay can exist side by side, inviting us to find our own way of seeing the world.