Old Mission Church, Zuni Pueblo, N.M.
Timothy O'Sullivan
American, born Ireland. 1840–1882
Seasons of 1871, 1872 and 1873
An albumen silver print by Timothy O’Sullivan that records the adobe mission church at Zuni Pueblo, made to document the building and its people as part of 19th‑century surveys of the American West.
The photograph arrests you with the heavy, crumbling adobe façade—a two‑story porch topped by a bell and cross—tiny figures gathered in doorways and on the balcony, and a wide, sunbaked foreground that amplifies the stillness and scale of the place.
As part of O’Sullivan’s Western work, this image illustrates how early photography documented Indigenous communities and vernacular architecture, helping to shape historical and ethnographic views of the expanding American frontier.
Medium
Albumen silver print
Dimensions
7 15/16 × 10 13/16" (20.2 × 27.5 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Gift of Ansel Adams in memory of Albert M. Bender
Accession
87.1941.49
Palette
Exhibitions
