Photos of Ansel Adams Worth $200 Million Sold for $45

Ansel Adams photographers that are estimated to be worth about $200 million were unknowingly purchased by one very lucky garage sale shopper. About ten years ago, Rick Norsigian was fulfilling his passion for choosing items that were unwanted by others and put up for sale in a garage sale. He came across photographs by the father of American photography, Ansel Adams and bought them.

Norsigian, who lives in Fresno, California and considers himself a painter, turned into a multi-millionaire in a matter of seconds. He made a deal for the Ansel Adams photographs a decade ago by negotiating two small boxes down from seventy dollars to forty five dollars. According to a Beverly Hills art appraiser, these photographs are now estimated to be worth at least $200 million.

The boxes Norsigian purchased contained sixty five glass negatives created by the world-wide known nature photographer, Ansel Adams in the early period of his career.

David W. Streets, the appraiser and art dealer who will hosting an unveiling of the photographs at his Beverly Hills, California, gallery today, Tuesday, July 27, 2010 stated, "It truly is a missing link of Ansel Adams and history and his career." Streets also said that the Ansel Adams photographs were "reported to be taken between 1919 and the early 1930s, well before Ansel became nationally recognized in the 1940s. Experts believe, according to CNN, that the negatives of these photographs were destroyed in a darkroom fire that destroyed 5,000 plates back in 1937.

Streets also stated, "This is going to show the world the evolution of his [Ansel Adams] eye, of his talent, of his skill, his gift, but also his legacy. And it's a portion that we thought had been destroyed in the studio fire."

No one knows how these famous pieces of high worth Ansel Adams artwork made their way from the Adams collection 70 years ago, to being bought in the 1940's from a warehouse salvage in Los Angeles, California to being sold in a Southern California garage sale in the year 2000. And we can only guess that the household that sold the artwork is not happy about what they gave up.