Area grad working as photographer in famed Ansel Adams Gallery; living the Yosemite life

By Mark Flemming
Harbor Light Newspaper

“Surround yourself with things you want to shoot.”

Those are the words of Burt Lake native Gabriel Mange, and surrounding himself is just what he has done. For the past three years, Mange has been a staff photographer/photo instructor at The Ansel Adams Gallery in the picturesque Yosemite National Park in California.

Mange is the son of Wanda and John Mange, proprietors of W Wear in downtown Harbor Springs.

Still photography was not always Mange’s passion. Up until 2002 motion picture production had captivated his creative side, brought on by four years of video production classes at Inland Lakes High School. After graduating from high school, Mange set his sights on Lansing Community College’s (LLC) Motion Picture program.

“I knew I always wanted to go into motion picture production,” Mange said. “As a prerequisite at LLC you had to take photography so I kind of fell in love with photography doing that. From 2002 forward I really got into taking a lot of still photos. I still do the motion picture thing but now more still photos.”

After a professor at LCC, who worked first hand with Ansel Adams at the University of Arizona, turned him on to Adams’ work and the adventures of the West Coast, Mange made the big “leap of faith” to the West Coast. He landed himself in Yosemite National Park where he started ice climbing and meeting people around the area.

“I was introduced to the Ansel Adams Gallery by a couple of friends I met out there,” Mange said. “One of my friends I was ice climbing with knew Sarah Adams, Ansel’s granddaughter, and through her I got a job teaching photography and photo guiding at The Ansel Adams Gallery.”

The Ansel Adams Gallery, originally established in 1902 as Best Studio, was one of several artist studios established in the park around the turn of the century. The original mediums of the studio established by Harry Best and his wife Anne were paintings and painted photographs, some of which have even hung in the White House.

Adams did not come into the picture until 1920 when the aspiring concert pianist worked as a caretaker for the Sierra Club’s LeConte Lodge in the park. Adams would visit Best’s Studio to practice on the only piano in the park. On January 2, 1928 Adams married Harry Best’s daughter Virginia, just as Adams was beginning his career as a photographer.

After Harry Best passed away in 1936 Ansel and Virginia inherited the business and shortly thereafter began the photography workshop program, one of the first photographic education programs in the country.

It wasn’t until after 1971, when Virginia and Ansel turned the studio over to their son and daughter-in-law, that the studio’s name was changed to The Ansel Adams Gallery. The studio is now run by Matthew Adams, grandson of Ansel Adams, and has been in continuous family ownership for approximately 108-years.

“We (the gallery) have photo guiding, which is not necessarily teaching people photography but more taking people to different places at the right time of day. We talk with them and figure out what they are trying to achieve,” Mange said.

“We also do camera walks which are anywhere from half of a day to full day workshops in which we take people out and talk about the camera and how it works,” Mange added. “Then we do week-long workshops with printing and post production.”

Having a schedule of four days on and three days off allows Mange to explore the backcountry for several days at a time.

“I usually hike anywhere from 60 to 90 miles in three to four days,” Mange said. “I also have a couple of friends that are mountain guides out there that I have been going rock climbing with and they’ve been teaching me about the area, the ecology, the geography, how to read maps and all that good stuff. It’s been pretty cool.”

This past summer Mange spent several days climbing El Capitan, one of the premier ‘big wall’ climbs in the world. The approximately 3,000-foot tall vertical rock formation towers over the Yosemite Valley and is one of the most recognizable and most photographed points in the park.

“I’ve traveled most of the Sierras,” Mange said. “The Sierras are about 400-miles long and about 90-miles at its widest point and Yosemite is about the size of Rhode Island. It is this big glacial-formed valley carved out of granite, so it’s really different. Then you get into the higher elevations of Yosemite and there are big sheets of granite that form rolling hills and rugged mountain peaks. It’s really amazing. It’s an inspiring place to be.”

Mange explains that one of his main passions is just speed walking into the mountains, and usually with camera in hand, be it large format camera or a digital SLR.

“I did a lot of large format black and white stuff for a few years while I was at school and it was really appealing to me. Then I started scanning a lot of negatives to bring them into the digital environment,” Mange said. “I still shoot large format black and white photography, and I actually print them in Ansel Adams old darkroom at the gallery.”

Some photographers that have inspired Mange’s work include “Minor White, Brett, Cole and Edward Westonthose guys really turned me onto pursuing photography. Ernst Haas was one of my favorites as well but Charles Kramer and Minor White I would say have to be my favorite photographers.”

“I took a master printing workshop last summer with Charles Kramer,” Mange said. “It was a five-day course in digital printing so I learned a heck of a lot about getting your image the way you want it to look so that really turned me onto digital color work.”

The Ansel Adams Gallery is currently holding an exhibition showcasing the work of its staff photographers, including Mange, which started March 1 and runs through April 13, 2010. The gallery is not limited to the photographic medium however; it also showcases pottery, sculptures, paintings, books and more. To learn more about the gallery visit www.anseladams.com.

Mange and friend Edwin Santiago also started an awareness group, approximately one-year ago, to bring attention to people in need. Their first area of focus is bringing attention to people with hunger needs throughout the United States with the help of several partners and sponsors including the United Nations World Food Programme, Convoy of Hope, The Hunger Project, Buddah For You, The Meditation Initiative and Feeding America.

Currently Santiago and Mange are planning a through-hike of the Pacific Crest Trail, a 2,650-mile trail running from Mexico north to Canada. The hike will take them somewhere between four and five months to complete.

“We’ve been working on this project for about four or five months now planning the hike and getting some publicity along the way to meet us at different sections of the trail,” Mange said. “We will be wearing some logos of the groups we are representing to bring attention to those groups and educate the public on issues of hunger.”

The adventurers are now looking for people to pledge money to their cause.

“We’re trying to find some people to pledge like a penny a mile or a quarter a mile to raise money for these groups. 2,650-miles is the length of the trail so if people donated a penny a mile it would be $26.50 for the whole hike. A quarter would be approximately $664 for the whole hike and this money would go towards one of these groups,” Mange added.

To find out more about their awareness group, the hike and how you can help visit www.24awareness.com.

In parting Mange expressed a few words of inspiration to any aspiring photographer.

“Surround yourself with the things you want to shoot. If you want to shoot nature, be in nature all the time. If you’re getting out of high school and trying to pick a college, try to pick a spot where there’s a state park or national park close by. If you want to shoot portraits try to get an internship with a local portrait photographer. Internships are really cool things to learn from. Find a photographer that inspires you and approach them to see if they need any help.”

To learn more about Gabriel Mange and his photographic work visit www.gabrielmange.com

This is part of the March 10, 2010 online edition of Harbor Light Newspaper.

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