El Capitan in Winter, Yosemite, June 20, 2014

Binh Danh, El Capitan in Winter, Yosemite, June 20, 2014, 2014, daguerreotype, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase made possible in part by the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment and the William and Christine Ragland Family Photography Endowment, 2025.3.4, © Bihn Dahn. Image courtesy of Binh Danh.
Copied Binh Danh, El Capitan in Winter, Yosemite, June 20, 2014, 2014, daguerreotype, image: 10 x 12 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase made possible in part by the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment and the William and Christine Ragland Family Photography Endowment, 2025.3.4, © Bihn Dahn. Image courtesy of Binh Danh.

Artwork Details

Title
El Capitan in Winter, Yosemite, June 20, 2014
Artist
Date
2014
Location
Not on view
Dimensions
image: 10 x 12 in.
Copyright
© Bihn Dahn. Image courtesy of Binh Danh.
Credit Line
Museum purchase made possible in part by the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment and the William and Christine Ragland Family Photography Endowment
Mediums Description
daguerreotype
Classifications
Subjects
  • Landscape — valley — Yosemite Valley
  • Landscape — park — Yosemite National Park
  • Landscape — California
Object Number
2025.3.4

Artwork Description

For this series, Binh Dahn traveled through California's national parks, making daguerreotypes of scenic vistas in a mobile darkroom. Danh's reflective, silver-toned plates draw on the visual legacy of photographers such as Ansel Adams and Carleton Watkins, pairing familiar Western vistas with surfaces that return the viewer's gaze.

Danh extends this lineage by weaving in his own narrative of memory, migration, and identity, shaped by his family's journey to the United States as refugees of the Vietnam War. "When I am thinking about landscape," he noted, "I am thinking about those who had stood on this land before me." As viewers approach the plates, their reflections appear on the surface, becoming part of the image and standing in relation to the landscape alongside Danh.