Pueblo--Taos, New Mexico 1955

Robert Frank made this gelatin silver print, Pueblo-Taos, New Mexico, at some point in his career. The stark blacks and whites are heavy, the contrast almost palpable. It’s like he’s wrestling with the light, bending it to his will, revealing what he wants us to see. Look at the texture in the wood, the way it splinters and cracks. The sign is a rough hewn rectangle, the stenciled words warning us, in no uncertain terms, to keep out. The adobe walls in the background feel both solid and crumbling simultaneously. Notice the way the light hits the corner of that building, how it creates a sharp edge. It’s like a knife, cutting through the image, creating a sense of tension. Frank was a master of capturing the underbelly of American life, and this image is no exception. Like Dorothea Lange, he shows us the forgotten places, the spaces where the American dream seems to have stalled. But there’s also a beauty here, a raw, unpolished beauty. It’s in the way the light catches the adobe, in the simple geometry of the architecture, in the quiet dignity of the landscape.