Castle Rock Trail, Capitol Reef, Utah 1962

Minor White’s photograph captures a cluster of rocks somewhere along Castle Rock Trail, Capitol Reef, Utah. He made this small print, a gelatin silver print, at some point in his lifetime. The surface is full of subtle textures, tiny crystals glinting out from the stone, and the rough edges of the rocks contrasting with the organic pattern of what looks like roots clinging to one of the larger boulders. Look at the top left, there's a little hollow in the rock with some other smaller rocks placed inside. It's like a tiny hidden sculpture. The light is raking across the surface, creating deep shadows, so even though the palette is grayscale, the rocks feel super tactile, like I could reach out and feel the cold, hard stone. White was interested in capturing a kind of spiritual essence, and you can see some of that searching in his work. I'm thinking of Alfred Stieglitz and the way he photographed clouds, finding a kind of sublime abstraction in nature. With this work, White invites us to find the sublime in the cracks between the rocks.