Lower East Side Restaurant, New York City 1946

This photograph, taken by Godfrey Frankel, shows a Lower East Side restaurant menu. The words jump out in white chalk against a dark background, like a stream of consciousness of available options – browned hash, franks and beans, knockwurst and cabbage. The surface of the window is visible, reflecting the street outside. It’s like two worlds are being brought together, the interior and exterior of the scene. The lettering is so gestural, the writing a real material presence. My eye is drawn to the ‘pigs foot and cabbage’ in the middle of the board, the thick white line running underneath the text, grounding the words, giving them weight. This makes me think of other artists who documented everyday city life, like Walker Evans, who understood that even mundane subjects, such as a restaurant menu, could speak volumes about a particular time and place. There's a real sense of nostalgia at play here, a feeling that the world is transient and ever-changing. What will restaurants of the future look like?