Paris 5B 1951 - 1952

This is Robert Frank's "Paris 5B," a contact sheet, probably made with a 35mm camera, sometime in the mid-20th century. The way the images are presented, all lined up on this one sheet, reminds me that photography is like a conversation with the world, a series of glances, each one a little different. Look at how Frank has marked some of the frames with blue pencil - almost like editing marks. I love that it's not just about the final picture, but about the looking, the choosing, the framing. It’s like sketching, searching for something elusive. The grainy black and white gives everything a kind of timeless feel, even though it's clearly a specific time and place. And that big '5' scrawled across the middle? It throws the whole thing off, makes it feel raw and personal. Frank was onto something, showing us not just the image, but the whole messy process of seeing. Think about artists like Gerhard Richter, who also played with photography, blurring the lines between documentation and art. It’s all part of this ongoing exploration of how we see, how we remember, and what it all means.