Yosemite Chess Shot (the Marina Photo)

This is one of my favorite photos ever. I took it in 1999 when I was shooting in Yosemite on spec for Patagonia catalogs. I met these two men from Argentina: Hector and Gatitio (the little cat).
 
I thought the Camp 4 chessboard was brilliant: made from bottles heading to the recycling center. Climbers went through garbage bins every day and collected bottles to turn in for pennies so they could stay in Camp 4 longer. These got temporarily repurposed into chess pieces. No doubt they eventually ended up at the recycling center.

I hung out with Hector, in Yosemite and Patagonia (the place), climbing and hiking and enjoying nature together. We fell in love, got married, and soon after, had a baby in 2000 that we named Marina. We wanted to have another person to join us on our adventures. So, I call this, "the Marina photo".

The photo ended up in a Patagonia catalog, in brand campaigns, in the book Unexpected (40 years of Patagonia photography) and in some of the Patagonia stores. It's considered to be an iconic Patagonia photo after all these years.
 
This is a 24" x 36" fine art print shipped directly to your door within 2 weeks from MPIX, a fine art photography printing company.