Guggenheim 49--Pennsylvania 1955

This is a photographic contact sheet made by Robert Frank, maybe in Pennsylvania. Frank’s approach is interesting. He isn't trying to hide anything, the process is all there. The sprocket holes are there, the film rebate numbers, all that good stuff. Looking closely at the images themselves you see a grainy tonality, almost like a wash. The sequence of images shows an ongoing narrative of donkeys and their handlers. The animals in particular are well observed, their characters shining through. Frank isn’t trying to create a perfect image. It's about capturing moments in time. Frank was a big influence on artists like Nan Goldin and Larry Clark, who also used photography to document their lives and the world around them. It’s this quality that makes Frank's work so compelling – a sense of spontaneity, an ongoing visual conversation.