197
Robert Frank
In Flagstaff, Arizona
- Estimate
- $6,000 - 8,000
$6,300
Lot Details
Gelatin silver print, likely an early print.
1955
11 1/2 x 8 in. (29.2 x 20.3 cm)
Signed, titled and dated in ink in the margin; annotated 'U.S. 66 Arizona' in pencil on the verso.
Specialist
Full-Cataloguing
Catalogue Essay
This image, made in Flagstaff, Arizona, on one of Robert Frank’s cross-country trips was considered by Frank for inclusion in The Americans. In Sarah Greenough’s definitive Robert Frank’s The Americans: Looking In she documents Frank’s process for grouping and sequencing the images in the book, reproducing his arrangements of work prints on the walls of his studio. This image appears in the grouping reproduced as plate 66, within a sequence that included telephone poles and streetcar cables as a dynamic visual motif.
Provenance
Robert Frank
Swiss | 1924As one of the leading visionaries of mid-century American photography, Robert Frank has created an indelible body of work, rich in insight and poignant in foresight. In his famed series The Americans, Frank travelled the United States, capturing the parade of characters, hierarchies and imbalances that conveyed his view of the great American social landscape.
Frank broke the mold of what was considered successful documentary photography with his "snapshot aesthetic." It is Frank's portrayal of the United States through grit and grain that once brought his work to the apex of criticism, but has now come to define the art of documentary photography.
Browse ArtistFrank broke the mold of what was considered successful documentary photography with his "snapshot aesthetic." It is Frank's portrayal of the United States through grit and grain that once brought his work to the apex of criticism, but has now come to define the art of documentary photography.