Florida 19 1958

This is Robert Frank’s “Florida 19,” a photographic print, and it presents us with a window into his working methods. Think of it as a kind of sketch, raw and full of potential. I’m drawn to the indexical quality of the photographic contact sheet: the texture of the film, the sprocket holes, and the way the images are arranged sequentially. It demystifies the process, revealing the artist's selection process. This is the raw material, the artist's eye at work, editing and framing the world. Consider the strip of images showing a souvenir stand and then, later in the sequence, a passing car with a person's profile visible in the window; the ordinary suddenly elevated, infused with feeling. Frank reminds me a bit of Garry Winogrand and his street photography, a kind of visual anthropology, spontaneous, open to the unexpected. It’s a conversation about seeing, about the choices we make when we frame the world.