"I would never apologize for photographing rocks. Rocks can be very beautiful. But, yes, people have asked why I don’t put people into my pictures of the natural scene. I respond, “There are always two people in every picture: the photographer and the viewer.” That usually doesn’t go over at all."

“At one with the power of the American landscape, and renowned for the patient skill and timeless beauty of his work, photographer Ansel Adams has been visionary in his efforts to preserve this country's wild and scenic areas, both in film and on Earth. Drawn to the beauty of nature's monuments, he is regarded by environmentalists as a monument himself, and by photographers as a national institution. It is through his foresight and fortitude that so much of America has been saved for future Americans.”

“The only things in my life that compatibly exist with this grand universe are the creative works of the human spirit.”

“While the photos at the D.M.V. will still be taken in color, the engraving is done in grayscale, hence the Ansel Adams feel.”

“Yes, in the sense that the negative is like the composer’s score. Then, using that musical analogy, the print is the performance.”

“The herculean task of a photographer is to capture a momentary frame as beautiful in reality, as it would be in a dream.”

“His attacks on Reagan’s Secretary of the Interior, James Watt, have received so much attention that Watt was asked about the 'thunderous denunciations of his policies by Ansel Adams.' Watt replied with a shrug, 'Ansel Adams never took a picture with a human being in it in his life.' Adams’ friend photographer James Alinder responded, 'James Watt is no better historian of photography than Secretary of the Interior. Ansel Adams has not only made pictures of people, but his portraits form a major part of his photographic production.' In fact, the Carter Administration broke with tradition by having the Presidential portrait done not by a painter but by a photographer—Adams. Although the break with tradition was highly criticized, the Polaroid photo now hangs in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington.”