EDWARD WESTON'S GOLDEN EYE THE HUNTINGTON CELEBRATES THE PHOTOGRAPHER WHO CAPTURED CALIFORNIA'S CHARACTER IN THE 1930S.

Byline: Linda Hutchinson Staff Writer

IN A COLLECTION of 15 years of journal entries released as ``Daybooks,'' the photographer Edward Weston (1886-1958) wrote, ``I see no reason for recording the obvious.''

Walk around the Huntington Library's exhibition ``Edward Weston: A Legacy'' and the word unexpected comes to mind - never obvious - whether it's the sensuous dunes of ``Oceano, 1938'' on the California Coast or the thought-provoking ``Rubber Dummies, MGM, 1939.''

``(Weston) was one of the pioneers of modernist photography, really establishing the fact that modern photography could be true to itself - that photographic qualities ... could be embraced and celebrated, rather than making a photograph look like a drawing or a print,'' says Johnathan Spaulding, associate curator at the Seaver Center at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County.

Many of the photos in the exhibition are from 1937-39, when Weston was the first photographer to receive a Guggenheim Fellowship. Known for his portraits, nudes and still lifes, Weston's approach to photography had always been painstakingly deliberate. With the grant as backing, Weston took his young lover and art subject, Charis Wilson, on a 20,000 miles road trip though the West.

During the two-year journey, the photographer learned to work ``quickly and freely,'' according to Theodore Stebbins in the book ``Edward Weston: Forms of Passion'' (Abrams; $45). Many of the photos from the trip were Weston's attempt ``to discover and depict life in unlikely places,'' writes Stebbins, including the deserts and the rocky coastline of California. The fruits of the trip were 1,400 negatives.

After the fellowship ended, Weston was then asked to shoot photographs for a special edition of Walt Whitman's ``Leaves of Grass,'' a project that took him across America to photograph the character and complexion of the nation. To Weston's dismay, this project was largely a failure, and he felt his photographs were poorly reproduced.

Later, Weston would make a gift to the Huntington of more than 500 photographs, the core of which came from the Guggenheim Fellowship. Weston hand-picked and printed the works himself, also including a number of still lifes created in the early 1920s and '30s that preceded the Guggenheim work, as well as 90 prints from the Whitman project. Interestingly enough, Weston, who considered nudes an important part of his work, did not include any in the donation.

``To actually have a photographer that selects and prints works that he considers the best in his career and donates them to an institution is every curator's dream,'' said the Huntington's curator of photography, Jennifer Watts. Watts co-curated the current show along with Jessica Todd Smith, the museum's curator of American art. Both agreed that it was nearly impossible to pare the works down to the 145 on display.

Leading with a selection of his still-life work, the remaining photographs are arranged by location - Death Valley, Oceano, the Southwest, Point Lobos, Yosemite, as well as the backlots of Southern California studio sets. A final section in the show displays selections from the Whitman book. When standing alone from the failed project, their true power is revealed.

Weston, says Smith, ``was not just a master of photography, but a really seminal figure in the perpetuation of photography as a fine art in this country.''

Spaulding believes that Weston's work offers an unusual perspective on the West.

``In many ways, he was ahead of his time in the way that he treated the landscape,'' said Spaulding. ``So many photographers looked at untouched nature. He look at both the developed and the undeveloped landscape and the relationship between people and nature, and that's become a very prominent theme of the last 20 years. But at his time, it was very much a pioneering vision that he had.''

But it's hard to get away from the fact that another prominent photographer, Ansel Adams, was also shooting pictures of the natural landscape. In fact, Adams and Weston were friends.

Spaulding, who also has expertise on Adams, compares the two. ``The affinities are clear; they were both pioneers, especially in what's come to be known as straight photography,'' said Spaulding. ``And both (offer) celebration of the Western landscape, but they had very different approaches.''

While Adams photographed a ``pristine landscape,'' said Spaulding, ``Weston looked at all varieties of landscapes - urban, rural, wild - the whole gamut.

``I think there are differences in the way they treated nature: Adams showed the glory, the grandeur of it all, sort of reverential. Weston was reverential in his way, but found other notes, things falling apart, the harshness, sometimes, of nature. He saw that as part of a totality - that bloom and decay were part of the same thing.''

Is Weston now getting his just due?

``Weston was not a publicist, not interested in trumpeting his work. He wasn't interested in commercial success, never had a business manager and never had that kind of approach to his career,'' said Spaulding. ``He's always been well-known in photography art circles, but he's never reached that inner circle of broad public consciousness. ... I think he was one of those artists that was so focused on his work that he wanted nothing to detract from that focus.

``I think Weston was a very prominent figure of California and the West, defining the region in its own terms.''

EDWARD WESTON: A LEGACY

Where: The Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens, 1151 Oxford Road, San Marino.

When: 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday; through Oct. 5.

Tickets: $10. Call [phone], www.huntington.org.

CAPTION(S):

4 photos

Photo:

(1) ``Shell,'' 1927 photograph by Edward Weston

(2) ``Pepper,'' 1929 photograph by Edward Weston

(3) ``Rubber Dummies, MGM,'' 1939 photograph by Edward Weston

(4) ``White Sands, New Mexico,'' 1941 photograph by Edward Weston

Copyright 1981 Center for Creative Photography, Arizona Board of Regents