Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Though he was initially optimistic about the United States' society and culture, Frank's perspective quickly changed as he confronted
the fast pace of American life and what he saw as an overemphasis on money. He now saw America as an often bleak and lonely
place, a perspective that became evident in his later photography. Frank's own dissatisfaction with the control that editors exercised
over his work also undoubtedly colored his experience. He continued to travel, moving his family briefly to Paris. In 1953, he
returned to New York and continued to work as a freelance photojournalist for magazines including McCall's, Vogue, and Fortune.
Associating with other contemporary photographers such as Saul Leiter and Diane Arbus, he helped form what Jane Livingston has
termed The New York School of photographers (not to be confused with the New York School of art) during the 1940s and 1950s.
The Americans
With the aid of his major artistic influence, the photographer Walker Evans, Frank secured a Guggenheim Fellowship from the John
Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation[3] in 1955 to travel across the United States and photograph all strata of its society. Cities
he visited included Detroit and Dearborn, Michigan; Savannah, Georgia; Miami Beach and St. Petersburg, Florida; New Orleans,
Louisiana; Houston, Texas; Los Angeles, California; Reno, Nevada; Salt Lake City, Utah; Butte, Montana; and Chicago, Illinois.[4]
He took his family along with him for part of his series of road trips over the next two years, during which time he took 28,000 shots.
83 of these were selected by him for publication inThe Americans.[5]
Frank's journey was not without incident. He later recalled the anti-Semitism to which he was subject in a small Arkansas town. “I
remember the guy [policeman] took me into the police station, and he sat there and put his feet on the table. It came out that I was
Jewish because I had a letter from the Guggenheim Foundation. They really were primitive.” He was told by the sheriff, “Well, we
have to get somebody who speaks Yiddish." ... "They wanted to make a thing out of it. It was the only time it happened on the trip.
They put me in jail. It was scary. Nobody knew where I was.”[6] Elsewhere in the South, he was told by a sheriff that he had "an hour
to leave town."
Shortly after returning to New York in 1957, Frank met Beat writer Jack Kerouac on the sidewalk outside a party and showed him the
photographs from his travels. Kerouac immediately told Frank, "Sure I can write something about these pictures." He eventually
contributed the introduction to the U.S. edition of The Americans. Frank also became lifelong friends with Allen Ginsberg, and was
one of the main visual artists to document the Beat subculture, which felt an affinity with Frank's interest in documenting the tensions
between the optimism of the 1950s and the realities of class and racial differences. The irony that Frank found in the gloss of
American culture and wealth over this tension gave his photographs a clear contrast to those of most contemporary American
[5]
photojournalists, as did his use of unusual focus, low lighting and cropping that deviated from accepted photographic techniques.
This divergence from contemporary photographic standards gave Frank difficulty at first in securing an American publisher. Les
Américains was first published in 1958 byRobert Delpire in Paris, as part of itsEncyclopédie Essentielleseries, with texts by Simone
de Beauvoir, Erskine Caldwell, William Faulkner, Henry Miller and John Steinbeck that Delpire positioned opposite Frank’s
photographs.[7] It was finally published in 1959 in the United States, without the texts, by Grove Press, where it initially received
substantial criticism. Popular Photography, for one, derided his images as "meaningless blur, grain, muddy exposures, drunken
horizons and general sloppiness." Though sales were also poor at first, the fact that the introduction was by the popular Kerouac
helped it reach a larger audience. Over time and through its inspiration of later artists, The Americans became a seminal work in
American photography and art history, and is the work with which Frank is most clearly identified. Critic Sean O'Hagan, writing in
The Guardian in 2014, said "it is impossible to imagine photography’s recent past and overwhelmingly confusing present without his
lingeringly pervasive presence." and that The Americans "changed the nature of photography, what it could say and how it could say
."[1]
it. [ . . . ] it remains perhaps the most influential photography book of the 20th century
In 1961, Frank received his first individual show, entitled Robert Frank: Photographer, at the Art Institute of Chicago. He also
showed at the Museum of Modern Artin New York in 1962.
To mark the fiftieth anniversary of the first publication of The Americans, a new edition was released worldwide on May 30, 2008.
For this new edition from Steidl, most photographs are uncropped (in contrast to the cropped versions in previous editions), and two
photographs are replaced with those of the same subject but from an alternate perspective.
A celebratory exhibit of The Americans, titled Looking In: Robert Frank's The Americans, was displayed in 2009 at the National
Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA), and at the Metropolitan Museum of Art
in New York.[8] The second section of the four-section, 2009, SFMOMA[9] exhibition displays Frank’s original application to the
John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation (which funded the primary work on The Americans project), along with vintage
contact sheets, letters to photographer Walker Evans and author Jack Kerouac, and two early manuscript versions of Kerouac’s
introduction to the book. Also exhibited were three collages (made from more than 115 original rough work prints) that were
assembled under Frank’s supervision in 2007 and 2008, revealing his intended themes as well as his first rounds of image selection.
An accompanying book, also titledLooking In: Robert Frank's The Americans, was published.
Films
By the time The Americans was published in the United States, Frank had moved away from photography to concentrate on
filmmaking. Among his films was the 1959 Pull My Daisy, which was written and narrated by Kerouac and starred Ginsberg,
Gregory Corso and others from the Beat circle. The Beats emphasized spontaneity, and the film conveyed the quality of having been
thrown together or even improvised.[5] Pull My Daisy was accordingly praised for years as an improvisational masterpiece, until
Frank's co-director, Alfred Leslie, revealed in a November 28, 1968 article in the Village Voice that the film was actually carefully
planned, rehearsed, and directed by him and Frank, who shot the film with professional lighting.
In 1960, Frank was staying in Pop artist George Segal's basement while filming The Sin of Jesus with a grant from Walter K.
Gutman. Isaac Babel's story was transformed to center on a woman working on a chicken farm in New Jersey. It was originally
supposed to be filmed in six weeks in and aroundNew Brunswick, but Frank ended up shooting for six months.
Frank's 1972 documentary of the Rolling Stones, Cocksucker Blues, is arguably his best known film. The film shows the Stones on
tour, engaging in heavy drug use and group sex. Frank said of the Stones, "It was great to watch them — the excitement. But my job
was after the show. What I was photographing was a kind of boredom. It’s so difficult being famous. It’s a horrendous life. Everyone
wants to get something from you.’’[5] Mick Jagger reportedly told Frank, "It's a fucking good film, Robert, but if it shows in America
we'll never be allowed in the country again." The Stones sued to prevent the film's release, and it was disputed whether Frank as the
artist or the Stones as those who hired the artist owned the copyright. A court order restricted the film to being shown no more than
five times per year, and only in the presence of Frank. Frank's photography also appeared on the cover of the Rolling Stones' album
Exile on Main St..
Other films by Frank includeMe and My Brother, Keep Busy, and Candy Mountain (the last was co-directed withRudy Wurlitzer).
Frank and Mary separated in 1969. He remarried, to sculptor June Leaf, and in 1971, moved to the community of Mabou, Nova
Scotia in Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia in Canada. In 1974, tragedy struck when his daughter, Andrea, was killed in a plane crash
in Tikal, Guatemala. Also around this time, his son, Pablo, was first hospitalized and diagnosed with schizophrenia. Much of Frank's
subsequent work has dealt with the impact of the loss of both his daughter and subsequently his son, who died in an Allentown,
Pennsylvania hospital in 1994. In 1995, he founded the Andrea Frank Foundation, which provides grants to artists.
Since his move to Nova Scotia, Canada, Frank has divided his time between his home there in a former fisherman's shack on the
coast, and his Bleecker Street loft in New York. He has acquired a reputation for being a recluse (particularly since the death of
Andrea), declining most interviews and public appearances. He has continued to accept eclectic assignments, however, such as
photographing the 1984 Democratic National Convention, and directing music videos for artists such as New Order ("Run"), and
Patti Smith ("Summer Cannibals"). Frank continues to produce both films and still images, and has helped organize several
retrospectives of his art. His work has been represented by Pace/MacGill Gallery in New York since 1984.[10] In 1994, the National
Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. presented the most comprehensive retrospective of Frank's work to date, entitled
Moving Out.
Bibliography
Books
Les Américains = The Americans
Paris: Delpire, 1958. French. Includes text in French by Simone de Beauvoir , Erskine Caldwell, William Faulkner,
Henry Miller and John Steinbeck about American political and social history, selected by Alain Bosquet. Part of
the Encyclopédie Essentielle series.
New York: Grove Press, 1959. Introduction by Jack Kerouac.
New York: Aperture; Museum of Modern Art, 1969. Revised and enlarged edition. With an introduction by Jack
Kerouac, a brief introduction by Frank, and a survey of Frank's films, each represented by a page of film frame
stills.
Göttingen: Steidl, 2008.ISBN 978-3-86521-584-0. Most photographs are uncropped compared with cropped
versions in previous editions, and two photographs are replaced with those of the same subject but from an
alternate perspective.
The Lines of my Hand.
Tokyo: Yugensha. Deluxe, slipcased edition. Edition of 1000 copies, 500 featured the slipc
ase photograph of
"New York City, 1948", 500 featured the slipcase photograph of "Platte River
, Tennessee".
New York: Lustrum Press, 1972. Paperback.
New York: Pantheon. ISBN 9780394552552.
Flower is… Yugensha, 1987. Edition of 1000 copies, 500featured "Champs-Élysées, 1950 [Fleurs]" tipped onto the
front cover, 500 featured "Metro Stalingrad" itpped onto the front cover.
Flamingo. Göteborg, Sweden: Hasselblad Center, 1997. ISBN 9783931141554. Catalogue for Hasselblad Award
exhibition, Hasselblad Center, Goteborg, Sweden.
London/Wales. Published in collaboration with theCorcoran Gallery, Washington, D.C., for an exhibition held May
10-July 14, 2003.
Films
Don't Blink – Robert Frank(2015). Documentary directed by Laura Israel.
Filmography
Year Name Notes
with Alfred Leslie. Adapted from a Jack Kerouac play, starring Allen
1959 Pull My Daisy
Ginsberg.[11]
1961 The Sin of Jesus
1963 O.K. End Here
A film about Julius Orlovsky (Peter Orlovsky's brother) and his mental
1965/1968 Me And My Brother
illness.[12]
Conversations in
1969
Vermont
1969 Life-Raft Earth
1971 About Me: A Musical
1972 Cocksucker Blues controversial film about theRolling Stones' 1972 tour.[13]
1975 Keep Busy with Rudy Wurlitzer.
1980 Life Dances On
Energy and How to Get
1981 with Rudy Wurlitzer.
It
1983 This Song For Jack
1985 Home Improvements
Exhibitions
Awards
[3]
1955: Guggenheim Fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.
1996: Hasselblad Foundation International Award in Photography from the Hasselblad Foundation.[40]
2002: Edward MacDowell Medal, MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, NH.[41][42]
, Halifax, Canada.[43]
2015: Doctor of Fine Arts, honoris causa,Nova Scotia College of Art and Design University
References
1. O'Hagan, Sean (7 November 2014). "Robert Frank at 90: the photographer who revealed America won't look back"
(https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2014/nov/07/robert-frank-americans-photography-influence-shadows)
.
The Guardian. Retrieved 27 December 2014.
2. Woodward, Richard B. (1994-09-04)."Where Have You Gone, Robert Frank?"(https://www.nytimes.com/1994/09/0
4/magazine/where-have-you-gone-robert-frank.html)
. The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331 (https://www.worldcat.o
rg/issn/0362-4331). Retrieved 2018-01-04.
3. "Robert Frank" (http://www.gf.org/fellows/all-fellows/robert-frank/). John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation
.
Retrieved 5 July 2015.
4. Lane, Anthony (14 September 2009)."Road Show: The journey of Robert Frank's "The Americans. " " (http://www.ne
wyorker.com/reporting/2009/09/14/090914fa_fact_lane). The New Yorker. Retrieved 27 December 2014.
5. Dawidoff, Nicholas (14 July 2012). "The Man Who Saw America"(https://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/05/magazine/ro
bert-franks-america.html?_r=0). The New York Times Magazine. Retrieved 15 September 2015.
6. Gefter, Philip (12 December 2008). "Snapshots from the American Road(https://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/14/arts/d
esign/14geft.html)."The New York Times. Retrieved 5 July 2015.
7. Ladd, Jeffrey (9 May 2012). "Master of the Photobook: Robert Delpire's Long and Legendary Influence"
(http://time.c
om/3788403/robert-delpire/). Time. Retrieved 14 September 2015.
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9. "Looking In: Robert Frank's "The Americans"" (http://www.sfmoma.org/exhibitions/382). San Francisco Museum of
Modern Art. Retrieved 27 December 2014.
10. "Art: Evoking the World of Some Great Painters" (https://www.nytimes.com/1984/11/02/arts/art-evoking-the-world-of-
some-great-painters.html?pagewanted=all), The New York Times
11. Glaister, Dan (2005-05-20). " 'Lost' Kerouac play resurfaces after 50 years"(https://www.theguardian.com/world/200
5/may/20/usa.books). The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077 (https://www.worldcat.org/issn/0261-3077). Retrieved
2018-01-04.
12. "Movie Review: 'Me and My Brother' Opens"(https://www.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=9D0CE6D8153DE134BC4
B53DFB4668382679EDE). NYtimes.com. 1969. Retrieved 2018-01-04.
13. "The Trouble With 'Cocksucker Blues'" (https://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/the-trouble-with-cocksucker-blues-
19771103). Rolling Stone. Retrieved 2018-01-04.
14. James, Caryn (June 10, 1988)."Movie Review, Hitting the Highway" (https://www.nytimes.com/movie/review?_r=2&r
es=940DE7DD143DF933A25755C0A96E948260) . NYTimes.com. Retrieved 2018-01-04.
15. Robert Frank: Photos (http://www.artic.edu/exhibition/robert-frank-photos-books-films), Art Institute of Chicago;
retrieved: June 24, 2017.
16. Ausstellungen 1976 (Exhibitions 1976) (http://www.kunsthaus.ch/de/ausstellungen/rueckblick/1970-1979/1976/),
Kunsthaus Zurich; retrieved: June 24, 2017.
17. Robert Frank. The Americans(http://www.jankesnergallery.com/jkgexhibitions/1989-frank-the-americans.html)
, Jan
Kesner Gallery; retrieved: June 24, 2017.
18. See de:Hasselblad Foundation Award.
19. Robert Frank: Storylines(http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-modern/exhibition/robert-frank-storylines), Tate
London; retrieved: June 24, 2017.
20. Robert Frank. Storylines(https://www.fotomuseum.ch/en/explore/exhibitions/21776_robert_frank_storylines),
Fotomuseum Winterthur; retrieved: June 24, 2017.
21. Robert Frank im Museum Folkwang Essen(http://www.ruhr-guide.de/kultur/kunst-im-ruhrgebiet/robert-frank-im-muse
um-folkwang-essen/14483,0,0.html), Ruhr-Guide. Onlinemagazine für das Ruhrgebiet, published on April 22, 2008;
retrieved: June 24, 2017.
22. Looking In: Robert Frank's The Americans(https://www.nga.gov/content/ngaweb/exhibitions/2009/frank.html),
National Gallery of Art; retrieved: June 24, 2017.
23. Robert Frank. Die Filme. Retrospektive(http://www.co-berlin.org/robert-frank-die-filme), C/O Berlin Foundation;
retrieved: June 24, 2017.
24. Exhibitions Archive (http://www.appletonmuseum.org/exhibits/archives/2010/110710.html), Appleton Museum of Art;
retrieved: June 24, 2017.
25. Robert Frank. From the collection of Fotomuseum W
interthur (http://mamm-mdf.ru/en/exhibitions/robert-frank/)
,
Multimedia Art Museum Moscow; retrieved: June 24, 2017.
26. Groundbreaking exhibition of photographs by Robert Frank sheds new light on his legendary work, The Americans
(https://museum.stanford.edu/news_room/frank.html)
, Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts; retrieved June
24, 2017.
27. Sabine Buchwald: Die anarchische Kraft des Fotografen. In der Akademie der Bildenden Künste sind Robert Franks
Bilder als gigantische Wandzeitung zu sehen. Der Katalog dazu ist eine besondere SZ, in: Süddeutsche Zeitung, Nr.
270, 24. November 2014, Seite R4.
28. Der Mann,der die Amerikaner sah, in: Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitungvom 9. April 2015, S. 38.
29. "360°-Panorama der Ausstellung"(http://graphtwerk.de/360-grad-panorama-halle-14-robert-frank-exhibition)
(in
German). Retrieved 2016-03-21.
30. Robert Frank: Books and Films, 1947–2016(http://www.museumdermoderne.at/de/ausstellungen/aktuell/details/md
m/robert-frank/), Museum der Moderne Salzburg; retrieved: June 24, 2017.
31. Robert Frank (http://www.h-gebertka.ch/kunst/aktuelle-ausstellungen/detail/calendar/2016/05/15/event/tx_cal_phpica
lendar/fotografie_film/), Heinrich Gebert Kulturstiftung Appenzell; retrieved: June 24, 2017.
32. Cruel and Tender. Fotografie und das Wirkliche (Cruel and Tender. Photography and the true)(http://www.kunst-und-
kultur.de/index.php?Action=showMuseumExhibition&aId=2077), Kunst und Kultur; retrieved: June 24, 2017.
33. Cold Play – Set 1 aus der Sammlung des Fotomuseums W interthur (Cold Play – Set 1 from the collection of the
Fotomuseums Winterthur(https://www.fotomuseum.ch/de/explore/exhibitions/21589_cold_play_set_1_from_the_coll
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34. I Wanna Be Loved By You: Photographs of Marilyn Monroe from the Leon and Michaela Constantiner Collection (htt
ps://www.brooklynmuseum.org/exhibitions/marilyn_monroe), Brooklyn Museum of Art; retrieved: June 24, 2017.
35. American Beauty. Photographs of the American Social Landscape 1930s–1970s(https://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/exhibiti
on/american-beauty/), National Gallery of Victoria; retrieved: June24, 2017.
36. Some Tribes (https://christopheguye.com/exhibitions/some-tribes/introduction)
, Christophe Guye Galerie; retrieved:
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38. Staff Picks 2010 (http://www.howardgreenberg.com/exhibitions/staff-picks-2010), Howard Greenberg Gallery;
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39. Humanos. Acciones, Historia y Fotografía(http://www.centrodeartealcobendas.org/humanos-acciones-historia-fotogr
afia), Centro de Arte Alcobendas; retrieved: June 24, 2017.
40. "Robert Frank" (http://www.hasselbladfoundation.org/robert-frank/en/). Hasselblad Foundation. Retrieved
26 December 2014.
41. "Medal Day History" (https://web.archive.org/web/20170701000000/http://www .macdowellcolony.org/events-MedalD
ay-History.html). MacDowell Colony. Archived from the original (http://www.macdowellcolony.org/events-MedalDay-H
istory.html) on 1 July 2017. Retrieved 20 November 2015.
42. "MacDowell Medal winners 1960-2011"(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/theatre/theatre-news/8447621/MacDowel
l-Medal-winners-1960-2011.html). London: The Daily Telegraph. 13 April 2011. Retrieved 20 November 2015.
43. "Doctor of Fine Arts Honoris Causa of NSCAD University"(https://steidl.de/News/Doctor-of-Fine-Arts-Honoris-Causa
-of-NSCAD-University-1232344756.html). Steidl Verlag. Retrieved 2017-10-14.
Sources
Philip Gefter, Snapshots From The American Road, The New York Times, Dec. 14, 2008.
Further reading
Alexander, Stuart. – Robert Frank: A Bibliography, Filmography, and Exhibition Chronology, 1946-1985 (Center for
Creative Photography, 1986). OCLC 16798695
Gefter, Philip. - Photography After Frank(Aperture, 2009). ISBN 978-1-59711-095-2
Green, Jonathan. – American Photography: A Critical History 1945 to the Present(Abrams, 1984). Chapter 5, "The
Americans: Politics and Alienation."ISBN 0-8109-1814-5
Janis, Eugenia Parry and Wendy MacNeil, eds. – Photography Within the Humanities (Addison House, 1977).
"Robert Frank" (transcript of a talk and interview conducted atWellesley College on 14 April 1975), pp. 52–65.
ISBN 0-89169-013-1
Leo, Vince. – "Robert Frank: From Compromise to Collaboration." Parkett, 1994, Issue 42, pp. 8–23.
Papageorge, Tod. – "Walker Evans and Robert Frank: An Essay on Influence" (Yale University Art Gallery, 1981).
ISBN 0-89467-015-8
Penman, Ian. – Robert Frank: Storylines(Steidl, 2004). ISBN 3-86521-041-4
Sandeen, Eric. – Picturing An Exhibition(University of New Mexico Press, 1995). Chapter 5, "Edward Steichen,
Robert Frank, and American Modernism."ISBN 0-8263-1558-5
Tucker, Anne and Philip Brookman, eds. –Robert Frank: New York to Nova Scotia (Museum of Fine Arts - Houston,
1986). ISBN 0-8212-1623-6
Bibliographies
External links
Robert Frank, Pace/MacGill Gallery
Robert Frank on IMDb
Robert Frank’s Masterpiece: “The Americans” at 50
Robert Frank at the Art Institute of Chicago
Looking In: Robert Frank's "The Americans", National Gallery of Art, 2008
Elson Lecture 2009: Robert Frank, National Gallery of Art
Robert Frank Collection Guide, National Gallery of Art, 2014 (with "more than 430 images")
"Seeing Beauty in Our Shadows Robert Frank's 'The Americans,' unpopular when first published, has shaped the
way America looks at itself,"The Wall Street Journal, September 19–20,2009
Robert Frank on National Public Radio
'Walker Evans and Robert Frank: an Essay on Influence' by Tod Papageorge
Nericcio, William Anthony. – Cinematography, Photography, and Literature: Robert Frank's Aesthetic T
riptych
(MOPA, San Diego, 2000). (An online essayon Pull My Daisy with illustrations and film-clip.)
'Robert Frank: Dissecting The American Image' by Jno Cook
Illustrated book review of The Americans
Works by or about Robert Frankin libraries (WorldCat catalog)
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