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Life as synecdoche: Ansel Adams andthe expanding liberal democratictraditionDaniel L. Dustin a & Kelly S. Bricker aa Department of Parks, Recreation, and Tourism, College ofHealth , University of Utah , 250 South 1850 East Room 200, SaltLake City, UT, 84112-0920, USAPublished online: 16 Feb 2011.

To cite this article: Daniel L. Dustin & Kelly S. Bricker (2011) Life as synecdoche: AnselAdams and the expanding liberal democratic tradition, Leisure/Loisir, 35:1, 7-17, DOI:10.1080/14927713.2011.549191

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Leisure/LoisirVol. 35, No. 1, February 2011, 7–17

Life as synecdoche: Ansel Adams and the expanding liberaldemocratic tradition

Daniel L. Dustin* and Kelly S. Bricker

Department of Parks, Recreation, and Tourism, College of Health, University of Utah, 250 South1850 East Room 200, Salt Lake City, UT 84112-0920, USA

In The rights of nature: A history of environmental ethics (1989), Roderick Nash paintsa portrait of the United States’ expanding liberal democratic tradition – the extensionof ethics outward from self to other people to other living things and, ultimately, to theearth in its entirety. In this article, we examine the expanding liberal democratic tra-dition through the life of one individual, Ansel Adams, the renowned black-and-whitelandscape photographer. Adams captured the beauty of his country’s landscapes andimbued them with meaning that evoked a strong sense of place (Tuan, Y. (1977). Spaceand place: The perspective of appearance. Minneapolis, MN: University of MinnesotaPress) thereby influencing both the environmental movement and the politics of place.Adams’ story is a synecdoche, a representation of the larger story of twentieth-centuryenvironmentalism.

Keywords: Ansel Adams; black-and-white landscape photography; sense of place;expanding liberal democratic tradition

Dans le livre « Les droits de la nature : Une histoire de l’éthique de l’environnement »(1989), l’auteur Roderick Nash nous peint un portrait de la tradition et libéraleet démocratique américaine, et l’expansion de l’éthique du soi-même vers d’autrespersonnes et d’autres êtres vivants. Le but ultime de cette expansion de l’éthiqueselon Nash est la considération de la terre entière. Dans cet article, nous examinonsl’élargissement de la tradition démocratique libérale aux États-Unis à travers la vie duphotographe renommé Ansel Adams. Avec l’aide de photographe noir et blanc, Adamsa capturé la beauté des paysages de son pays et évoqué un sens d’appartenance (Tuan, Y.(1977). Space and place: The perspective of appearance. Minneapolis, MN: Universityof Minnesota Press), qui influence à la fois le mouvement écologique et la politique delieux. L’histoire d’Adams est une synecdoque, une représentation de la grande histoirede l’écologie du XXe siècle.

Mots-clés: Ansel Adams; photographie de paysage en noir et blanc; sens du lieu;l’expansion libérale et tradition démocratique

I don’t apologize for being an elitist. God knows, my background is about as democratic andlumpenproletariat as you could get. But it does seem to me that the world progresses onlythrough its special people, and that instead of resenting them, it’s time we acknowledge them.An Ansel Adams is worth ten thousand of us. We ought to admit that.

Stegner, W. (1982). “Wallace Stegner: The artist as environmental advocate,” interview byAnn Lage [tape recording], Regional Oral History Office, Bancroft Library, University ofCalifornia, Berkeley.

*Corresponding author. Email: daniel.dustin@health.utah.edu

ISSN 1492-7713 print/ISSN 2151-2221 online© 2011 Canadian Association for Leisure Studies / Association canadienne d’études en loisirDOI: 10.1080/14927713.2011.549191http://www.informaworld.com

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“Sense of place” embraces the meanings we attribute to geographic locations (Farnum,Hall, & Kruger, 2005; Fishwick & Vining, 1992; Kaltenborn, 1998; Relph, 1976; Stedman,2003; Tuan, 1977) and generally refers to “the extent to which an individual values or iden-tifies with a particular environmental setting” (Kyle, Graefe, Manning, & Bacon, 2003, p.250). Meanings that define an individual’s place attachment are said to encompass “ideas,values, and beliefs that order the world” (as cited in Farnum et al., 2005, p. 3). In this arti-cle, we demonstrate how Ansel Adams’ black-and-white landscape photography servesas a medium for ordering the world by developing shared meanings, facilitating placeattachment and creating a sense of place that influences the politics of place.

Adams’ story reflects the theme of leisure, space and social change in several ways.First, Adams photographed landscapes that are enjoyed by millions of people for theirleisure-related benefits. His most renowned black-and-white images are of national parks,wilderness and other undeveloped natural areas. Second, Adams is widely acknowl-edged for his photographic genius in manipulating light to influence the viewer’s senseof space and attachment to place. Third, Adams’ photographs, such as the nineteenth-century paintings of the American West, have influenced the politics of environmentalpreservation. They have promoted social change. Finally, Adams’ life story illustrates thepotential for creative artists to shape the relationship between leisure, space and socialchange.

Methodological lens

We employ a biographical approach to history in this work (Nash & Graves, 2007).We explore one individual’s life – Ansel Adams’ – based on the underlying assumptionthat examining his life can serve as a window unto the life of twentieth-century envi-ronmentalism. Our method assumes that an individual story can serve as a synecdoche,a representation of a much larger story. Nash and Graves pioneered this biographicalapproach in telling the story of the United States’ history by recounting the biogra-phies of a select few of its most celebrated individuals. Although this biographicalapproach to history has been criticized (e.g. a top–down approach when limited tofamous people), it has also been deemed useful for portraying the “big picture” (Coops,2000).

To achieve our aims, we reviewed Adams’ writings as well as the literature relevantto his life, to the photographic art form, to sense of place and to the politics of place.The common thread guiding our reading was what has been written about Adams, thephotographer; Adams, the concerned citizen; and Adams, the environmental activist. Whatfollows are the results of our inquiry framed by Adams’ life story. Upon conclusion of itstelling, we leave the reader with our thoughts about the relationship between the creativearts and leisure, the power of creative art (in itself, a leisure activity) to affect our sense ofspace and the potential of creative art to influence social change.

The life of Ansel Adams

Early years

When Ansel Adams came into the world on 20 February 1902, it was a far different placefrom the world he left on 22 April 1984. “When I was young I could not imagine thatthe resources of the earth were anything but inexhaustible,” he said in his autobiography,written in the twilight of his life.

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When it was built in 1903, our family home was surrounded by sand dunes; they soon disap-peared completely under housing developments. From our house I looked toward the pristineMarin hills that seemed eternal; suddenly in 1934, there was the Golden Gate Bridge withits steady stream of automobiles into and out of the city. My placid environment was for-ever changed. Was this to be the inevitable reality for twentieth-century man? (Adams, 1985,pp. 112–113)

Questioning the wisdom of a rapidly expanding, Western, industrialized civilizationat the expense of pristine nature would become a principal focus, both literally andfiguratively, for Adams over the course of his lifetime. He saw himself as a prophet:

Sometimes I think I have a prophet complex, because I am constantly looking for the qualityof prophecy in art. That thing which is concerned more with life and the world in both nowand in the time to come – not just in the now . . . . What I call the Natural Scene – just nature– is a symbol of many things to me, a never-ending potential. (Adams, 1985, pp. 159–160)

How best to represent this potential stored in the Natural Scene became Adams’ lifelongobsession.

Born into the hustle and bustle of San Francisco at the turn of the twentieth century,Adams’ childhood was full of play and discovery. It was also tumultuous. At 5:12 am on18 April 1906, when he was 4 years old, the peace and tranquility of his seaside existencewas shaken to its core by an earthquake measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale. Soon thereafter,an aftershock tossed Ansel against a backyard fence, resulting in the broken nose thatmarked him for the remainder of his days. His father, who had been away on businesswhen the San Francisco earthquake struck, returned home to find his family safe, althoughshaken, and the house largely intact.

Adams’ boyhood was interrupted repeatedly with illnesses and generally frail health.In the midst of various bouts with sickness, he took an interest in the piano, practiced dili-gently and developed his talent to a very high degree. Perhaps his life’s calling was goingto be that of a concert pianist? About that same time, his family took a much anticipatedsummer vacation to Yosemite National Park. For 12-year-old Ansel, it was just what thedoctor ordered. He was delighted in the sights, sounds and smells of Yosemite Valley, andafter several more trips to the park, he proclaimed that Yosemite had cured what ailed him(Adams, 1985). The bond young Ansel forged with Yosemite supports the assertion thatsense of place develops as one interacts with a place over time, accumulating and deepeningpersonal meanings, memories and feelings (Farnum et al., 2005).

On that first vacation, Ansel’s parents gave him a Kodak Box Brownie camera. He tookgreat interest in it and romped about the mountains photographing Yosemite in its grandeur.His teenage years were filled with repeated trips to Yosemite, accompanied by a growinginterest in the photographic medium. In 1919, he was hired as the custodian of the LeConteMemorial, the Sierra Club’s headquarters in Yosemite. Two summers later, he met HarryBest, owner of Best’s Studio in Yosemite Valley and painter of western landscapes. Mr. Bestallowed Adams to practice on his piano and to make the acquaintance of his 17-year-olddaughter, Virginia, an aspiring classical singer. After an on-again, off-again relationship,Ansel and Virginia married in 1928.

It was time for Adams to settle down and make a living for himself and his newly estab-lished family. Virginia soon gave birth to Michael and 2 years later to Anne. All the while,Adams remained conflicted over his competing interests in music and photography, and thetime had now come when he had to choose between them. On a visit to Taos, NM, in 1930,his decision was aided by examining some negatives taken by the renowned photographer

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Paul Strand. As Adams (1985) recounted it, “My understanding of photography was crys-tallized that afternoon as I realized the great potential of the medium as expressive art.I returned to San Francisco resolved that the camera, not the piano, would shape my des-tiny” (p. 88). It would be to the world’s great benefit that Adams chose photography, thoughmusic would complement and inform his photographic genius throughout his lifetime.

The creative artist

Photography was little understood and even less appreciated as an art form in the first halfof the twentieth century. Encouraged and supported by San Francisco’s patron of the arts,Albert Bender, Adams travelled to New York City to meet Alfred Stieglitz, the world’sleading photographer of the day and husband of artist, Georgia O’Keeffe. After an awk-ward introduction, Stieglitz carefully studied the photos offered by Adams and gave hisapproval. As Adams (1985) described it, “Stieglitz gave me the confidence that I couldexpress myself through that art form” (p. 102).

Photography as a creative process is often misunderstood. To the layperson it mayappear to be a simple click of the shutter that captures the world as we see it. Tounderstand that highly accomplished photographs are really the products of the artist’simagination requires some consideration. Adams (1985) referred to this creative process as“visualization,” and he credited Stieglitz with the best definition of it. In Stieglitz’s words:

I have the desire to photograph. I go out with my camera. I come across something that excitesme emotionally, spiritually, aesthetically. I see the photograph in my mind’s eye and I com-pose and expose the negative. I give you the print as the equivalent of what I saw and felt.(Adams, 1985, pp. 61–62)

“As with all art,” Adams continues, “the photographer’s objective is not the duplicationof visual reality . . . ” (p. 110).

They may deny it vociferously, but artists burn with a need to convey by implication theirpersonal conception of life and potential beauty, transcending all the laws, dogmas, practicalaspirations, and the instincts of self-preservation. They, along with the scientists, poets, andphilosophers, illuminate the world rather than exploit it. (Adams, 1985, pp. 110–111)

When creating a photograph, Adams began with inspiration, an individualistic sphereof enthusiasm that resonated within. From there, he pointed out his need to “illuminate” hisfind to a broader audience and to place it into a social context. In this way, he was able toconnect people to places they had never visited. From a socio-cultural perspective, Adamsuniquely conveyed shared meanings and symbols, which are common to different peoplein a particular cultural group (Yung, Frieman, & Belsky, 2003, as cited in Farnum et al.,2005). Adams’ photography thus gradually evolved into a tool for social change by creatingshared meanings of natural places in the American West, places that many Americansknew only through his black-and-white images. These meanings stemmed from Adams’own interpretation of the Natural Scene and not from photographs that duplicated reality.Adams was not reproducing nature through his photographs. He was recreating naturethrough his photographs (Bronowski, 1965). He was giving nature his own meaning.

Adams underscored the importance of anticipation to this creative process:

Anticipation is one of the most perplexing capabilities of the mind: projection into futuretime. Impressive with a single moving object, it is overwhelming when several such objects

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are considered together and in relation to their environment. I believe that the mind, working atincredible speeds, is able to probe into the future as well as recall the past. Our explorations ofthe past support the present, and our awareness of the present will clarify the future. (Adams,1985, p. 62)

The impression Adams leaves us with is that the photographer is a creative artist, antic-ipating prints that capture what is beheld by the mind’s eye and then, when developed,offering up the prints as expressions of what ought to be – images of the here and nowthat reveal something of an imagined, idealized future. Interpreting Adams’ photographsthis way makes it easier to consider his work prophetic. He created his photographic art tomake it possible for us to envision a more harmonious world. His intent was to influenceour understanding of what could be. As Edwin Land, the head of Polaroid, characterizedthe impact of Adams’ work:

Each stage of human civilization is defined by our mental structures: the concepts we createand then project upon the universe. They not only redescribe the universe but also in so doingmodify it, both for our own time and for subsequent generations. This process – the revisionof old cortical structures and the formulation of new cortical structures whereby the universeis defined – is carried on in science and art by the most creative and talented minds in eachgeneration. (Adams, 1985, p. 260)

This shaping and mapping created in the mind’s eye and that which Adams defined byhis ability to anticipate and ultimately capture meaning promote “social places,” which arefamiliar across society. As Stokowski (2002) observes, “much of what a person knowsabout places, or feels about places, or does in places, is initially mediated by others”(p. 372). Adams intentionally created a venue for shared meaning and values. Reinforcingthis idea in her study of how differences develop between regions, Campbell (2003) identi-fied processes such as identity creation through the intentional efforts of artists and writers(as cited in Farnum et al., 2005). These processes suggest that there are social forces atwork such as art and creative writing that can attach people to places they have never vis-ited. Schroeder (2004), for example, found that people develop attachments to imaginedplaces, or places they envision transforming in the future. Other studies have found similarattachments to places that are not necessarily real or where people have had only limitedexposure (Galliano & Loeffler, 1999; Hammit, Buckland, & Bixler, 2004; Stedman, 2002).As we point out in our closing comments, this power of the creative arts to attach peopleto particular places they have never frequented is not something to be considered lightly. Ithas dual-edged implications.

Documentary photography

World War II interrupted Adams’ life as a commercial, and increasingly artistic, photog-rapher. Although an avowed pacifist, he wanted to do something to support the war effortbecause of his disdain for Hitler’s regime. He tried to enlist in the Armed Forces, but wasturned down because he was 40 years old with a wife and two children. The opportu-nity to serve came from a different direction. One of his close friends, Ralph Merritt, hadjust been appointed director of the Manzanar War Relocation Center near Lone Pine, CA.Manzanar was an internment camp for 10,000 Japanese-Americans feared to be loyal tothe Japanese Empire. Merritt wanted a photographic record made of Manzanar for poster-ity’s sake, and he invited Adams to do the job. Adams jumped at the chance. He describedMerritt’s charge thusly: “He proposed a photographic project where I would interpret the

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camp and its people, their daily life, and their relationship to their community and theirenvironment” (Adams, 1985, p. 219).

Adams (1944) delivered his photographic essay in the form of a book, Born free andequal: Photographs of the loyal Japanese-Americans at Manzanar Relocation Center, InyoCounty, California. To his dismay, many Americans labelled him “disloyal” and the bookwas vilified in many circles. People saw what was intended to be a story chronicling theviolation of Japanese-Americans’ civil rights as being un-American. Adams donated thecopyright of his photographs of Manzanar to the Library of Congress so that future gen-erations could judge for themselves whether Manzanar’s existence was justified (Dustin,2002/2003).

The artist as environmentalist

Following World War II, Adams became more and more involved in environmental issuesthrough his deepening association with the Sierra Club and his working relationship withthe National Park Service. He was called on frequently to photograph the nation’s scenictreasures, and his work complemented the aims of an expanding environmental movementthat also questioned the wisdom of a rapidly expanding, Western, industrialized civilizationat the expense of the Natural Scene. In Adams’ (1985) own words, “ . . . I never intention-ally made a creative photograph that related directly to an environmental issue, though I amgreatly pleased when a picture I have made becomes useful to an important cause” (p. 1).

Unlike more strident environmentalists like the Sierra Club’s Executive Director, DavidBrower, who Adams greatly admired, Adams took a more balanced approach to environ-mental causes. He was, in this sense, moderate in his thinking about how best to safeguardthe Natural Scene. When, for example, the Pacific Gas and Electric Company proposedbuilding a nuclear power plant on the Nipomo Dunes, south of Pismo Beach, CA, in theearly 1960s, Adams, who was now on the Sierra Club’s Board of Directors, supported theselection of an alternative site at Diablo Canyon. He made his position clear in the SierraClub Bulletin (Siri & Adams, 1967) and then years later in his autobiography:

I believed that if we strongly opposed a project we should make an effort to propose an alterna-tive. . . . I am certainly biased to the natural scene, but I also recognized the need for electricalpower. The problem as I saw it was to maintain a balance of use, thereby assuring that the trulyimportant areas would stand a better chance of protection. (Adams, 1985, p. 126)

Adams had expressed similar feelings upon his first exposure to the territory of Alaskawith his 14-year-old son, Michael, years earlier. After touring much of Alaska’s wildernessaccompanied by then Governor Ernest Gruening, Adams had time to reflect on the futureof what was to become the 49th state:

During that wet and quiet month I had a lot of time to think and to consider fully my beliefsabout conservation and the environment, prompted by the great problems facing Alaska. WhileAlaska’s population was only a few hundred thousand people, the land area was immense andits potential wealth enormous. Governor Gruening was aware of the dangers of uncontrolledexploitation and wisely balanced the pressures. I agreed with his position that Alaska must notstagnate; its development should be carefully regulated; its wildness and beauty preserved andits principal assets and resources utilized with great care. (Adams, 1985, p. 243)

Inevitably, Adams, and other moderate members of the Sierra Club, clashed withBrower, the uncompromising idealist, resulting in a leadership struggle within the

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organization. In 1969, Brower resigned as the Sierra Club’s executive director to founda more activist association, Friends of the Earth. Two years later, Adams, too, gave up hisseat on the Sierra Club’s Board of Directors because of age and mental fatigue. He was 69years old. In retrospect, Adams stood by his fundamental convictions:

The human condition is part of the world’s structure and a balanced approach to the environ-ment and its significance to humanity is essential. I did not then, and do not now, believe inbig stick tactics; our reason for being is not to destroy civilization but to assist in guiding itto constructive attitudes. With the perspective of time I feel that education of the public inthe vast, inclusive problems of the environment will have the most rewarding effects. (Adams,1985, p. 126)

Over the years, Adams’ photographs often served as an educational tool for protectingthe landscapes he personally cherished. His early photographic essay, Sierra Nevada: TheJohn Muir Trail (Adams, 1938), was instrumental in convincing Congress to pass the KingsCanyon National Park bill in 1940 (Gherman, 2002). The effectiveness of that book ledto additional opportunities to employ his art in support of environmental causes. Yearslater, for example, Adams received a Guggenheim Fellowship to document the conditionof the national parks. In 1976, Adams shared his findings with President Gerald Ford. Heencouraged the protection of additional acreage within the national park system and acrosswildlife refuges throughout the United States (Gherman, 2002). For these efforts and forhis life’s work, Adams received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1980, the highesthonour bestowed on a US’ civilian.

The expanding liberal democratic tradition

In the preface to Ansel Adams: An autobiography, published soon after his death in 1984,Adams began:

I think I have something to give my readers of the flavor of a good part of the twentieth centuryas seen through a life of creative experience. The worlds of nature and of people have beenclosely involved; a fact not too clear in the general opinion as I have chosen to stress thenatural scene above other directions in my photography. (Adams, 1985, p. vii)

Throughout his long career, Adams faced critics who insisted his work was irrelevant to thetimes in which he lived. Along with Edward Weston, he was accused in the 1930s of beingirrelevant because he was making photographs of aesthetic content and not documentingthe world’s deteriorating social condition (Adams, 1985, p. 197). Four decades later, in1973, Adams faced similar criticism from a hostile group of student photographers in NewYork City, who also felt that his work was out of touch (Adams, 1985). The country was,after all, in the midst of Vietnam War, Watergate and Richard Nixon’s downfall. Adamsheld his ground, insisting that he was equally concerned with photography and the humancondition.

What has become increasingly clear with the passage of time is that Adams was forwardlooking and imaginative in his thinking and in his art. His personal life, like the life oftwentieth-century America, was a gradual awakening to the realization that humankind isinextricably bound up with nature and that the welfare of each is irrevocably bound up withthe welfare of the other. Perhaps one of the most profound impacts of his work upon theimagination is that there is no “other” and that there is no such thing as “humans apart.”This fundamental ecological insight took much of the twentieth century to dawn on the

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American public, a public much indebted to Adams for helping see the light. It is as if,through his artistic gift, he helped the citizenry dream a more hopeful future, vivid in itsblack-and-white detail, a dream that inspires us to this day.

Although some would argue that sense of place refers to specific places (Kaltenborn,1998), Adams was able to infuse some of the wildest landscapes with more generalizedpolitical and conservation-centered meaning, relevant to past, present and future gen-erations. Indeed, many studies have shown that people with increased place attachmentdemonstrate a greater concern for the ecological well-being of a general area or landscape(Farnum et al., 2005). Adams’ work exemplifies this broader sense of attachment, whichhas been made evident by widespread appreciation of his art and the increased recognitionof the influence of his photographs on conservation and environmental protection.

Adams understood the never-ending tension between the need for material goods andservices to make the American standard of living possible and the need for the NaturalScene to make the spiritual growth and development of human beings possible. He broodedover what to do about this tension just as all conscientious citizens do. He described thetension clearly when speaking of the national parks:

The National Parks represent those intangible values which cannot be turned directly to profitor material advantage, and it requires integrity of vision and purpose to consider such impalpa-ble qualities on the same effective level as material resources. . . . The pressures of a growingpopulation, self-interest, and shortness of vision are now the greatest enemies of the NationalPark idea. The perspectives of history are discounted and the wilderness coveted and invadedto provide more water, more grazing land, more minerals, and more inappropriate recreation.These invasions are rationalized on the basis of ‘necessity.’ (Adams, 1985, p. 246)

Were he alive today, Adams would likely challenge the American public to rethink thedistinction between needs and wants and what constitutes right desire (Dustin, McAvoy, &Schultz, 1991). He would likely encourage the citizenry to engage in a soul search.

Through Adams’ body of work, we are thus reminded of the cultural/symbolic aspectof place, the less tangible values defined through emotions such as awe, inspiration, captiva-tion, sublimity, brilliance and wildness. Meanings developed through Adams’ photographicart are created and shared. Meanings for some places are transformed into action, andmeanings for other places cultivate a deep appreciation of what has been or what might befor future generations. His photos draw us into the politics of place, whereby stakeholders,not actually present in the landscape, create their own meanings and values and are inspiredto act on them.

In the end, Adams would probably remind us that the ability to anticipate the futureis one of our special gifts as human beings. “What will become of us?” he might ask. Hewould likely turn to the poetry of his much admired friend, Robinson Jeffers, for an answer.In his autobiography, Adams characterizes Jeffers thusly:

Jeffers was a dramatist, deeply concerned with the ebb and flow of humanity in the chaos ofan inhuman cosmos, writing of the eternal realities of the natural world where man is but anaccidental phenomenon. He promised a future when man will go the way of all species andthe eternal domains of nature will persist magnificently without him. There are sheep by thebillion, but the shepherds are few. And the shepherds in the modern capitals of the world maylead us either to pasture or to slaughterhouse. Jeffers saw man as inseparable from nature; thusman must conduct himself accordingly or he is doomed. (Adams, 1985, p. 70)

Ansel Adams dedicated his life to shepherding his fellow citizens to pasture.Through the evolution of his photography, he widened his focus from the civil rights of

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Japanese-Americans to the rights of nature in concert with the nation’s expanding liberaldemocratic tradition. His ethical consideration helped precipitate the nation’s ethical con-sideration. His black-and-white images inspired people everywhere to ponder a more hope-ful future rooted in richly felt senses of place. He wanted the viewer to identify with thelandscapes portrayed in his photographs and work for their protection. He understood thehealing power in nature, and he saw his work as an antidote to the troubled human condi-tion. His photographic genius was grounded in his belief that the fate of humankind is inex-tricably bound up with the fate of the Natural Scene. We are, in that sense, one and the same,and Ansel Adams would trust that we possess the wisdom to conduct ourselves accordingly.

Leisure, space and social change

Ansel Adams is by no means the only creative artist to influence the politics of place, andphotography is by no means the only creative art form germane to a discussion of leisure,space and social change. In the United States, the national park idea was greatly influencedby nineteenth-century painters who captured the sublimity of the Natural Scene on canvasin ways that proved compelling to public policy-makers who themselves had never travelledin the West (Adams, 1975; Runte, 1997). More recently, a coffee-table book of photographsand written text, called This is dinosaur: Echo Park Country and its magic rivers, ignited anational furor in the United States over the prospect of building a dam on the Green Riverwithin the confines of Dinosaur National Monument (Stegner, 1955). About that sametime, Wallace Stegner (1969), a Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, penned his memorable“wilderness letter,” in which he characterized pristine nature as the “geography of hope,” ametaphor that resonates still with the American public. These examples illustrate the powerof creative art, when applied to leisure contexts, to influence the way we think about leisurespaces and our subsequent inclination to safeguard them. These examples also reinforceSchroeder’s (2004), Stedman’s (2002), Galliano and Loeffler’s (1999) and Hammit et al.’s(2004) claim that creative art can attach people to places they have never visited.

The creative artist’s power to make us care about places we have never been, and thento move us to action to protect those places, also illustrate the potential of creative art toserve as propaganda. Some historians have viewed Adams’ photographs of the Japanese-American internment camp at Manzanar that way (Baker, 1990), although the vast majorityof historians have not (Embrey, Hansen, & Mitson, 1942; Irons, 1983; Levin, 1995; Stanley,1994; Unrau, 1996; Weglyn, 1976). In similar fashion, Adams’ vision of a more har-monious relationship between people and nature must be filtered through the prism of aparticipatory democracy where differing opinions about what should and should not bedone are worked through in the give-and- take of legislative processes.

Evidence of the power of the creative arts to influence our sense of leisure spaces andeffect social change is perhaps most apparent in films. From Deliverance (1972) to Nevercry wolf (1983) to A river runs through it (1992) to Into the wild (2007), films set in leisurecontexts have shaped, for better or worse, our perceptions of leisure spaces. They fuel con-versations about life imitating art, and they cause us to be rightfully concerned about themeanings that are communicated on screen to millions of “unsuspecting” viewers. As tech-nology advances, and as city dwellers disengage more and more from direct associationswith nature, the power of films and other creative art forms to educate people, rightly orwrongly, about the ecology of their lives should be of critical concern to leisure studiesscholars. Getting the story straight is important (Dustin, 2002/2003).

The challenge for Western, industrialized civilization is to rediscover its connectedness,its embeddedness and its reliance on the Natural Scene for its continued sustenance. As

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evidenced by Ansel Adams’ story, the power of the creative arts to open up the imaginationand inspire us to consider new and different ways of seeing, relating to and being in theworld should not be underestimated. It is a power worthy of significantly more leisurestudies scholarship.

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