Eroded Rock Point Lobos Analysis

Initially, the most striking feature of Eroded Rock, Point Lobos, a gelatin silver print by Edward Weston, is its relationship between positive and negative space. The photo’s subject is an eroded rock, whose rough, raised plateaus create a light positive space and emerge from smooth, blackened sections of the eroded rock which create the image’s negative space. These sections of eroded rock envelop the plateaus in languid serpentine lines, almost as though the plateaus are land masses cast between black rivers. The 1942 photograph, which is currently on display at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, encapsulates Weston’s aesthetics and revolutionary interest in abstraction through photography. The most prominent plateau formation within the image occupies the majority of the top half of the photograph. However, at the top center of the photograph a darker, eroded u-shaped loop of rock carves into the main formation, creating a kidney bean-like shape. Within these darkest darks of the eroded sections of rock, are streaks of the photograph’s whitest whites, which create movement within the photograph. The most dynamic portion of the image is the lower third, especially the lower right, where the highest contrasts exists. Though dynamism exists, many of the photograph’s compositional elements …show more content…
For this reason, as is typical with this group’s work, Eroded Rock is sharply in focus. The photograph was taken from directly above and its framing makes it difficult to get a sense of a scale, which the subject’s indiscernibility contributes to as well. This, in turn, contributes to Weston’s ability to abstract natural forms through his framing and use of composition. In terms of his own process, Weston accessed his compositional eye as a regularly exercised muscle; on composition, he