Cousin--Paris 15A 1949 - 1950

This is 'Cousin - Paris 15A' by Robert Frank. It's a photographic contact sheet, a collection of moments, captured and composed to form a new kind of image. Looking at this array of images, I think about Frank wandering around Paris, his camera his constant companion. Snap, snap, snap. Each frame a fleeting impression. He shot from the hip; the world's a blur, a fragment, but it comes together as a larger story of the artist and his life and interests. I imagine him in the darkroom, carefully arranging these little windows into his world. He must have spent ages trying to get the composition right. This process reminds me of the way painters arrange colors and shapes on a canvas. What does he want us to see? What does he leave out? The repetition of forms and motifs suggests this is all one big body of work, with ideas echoing down through the years. We are all of us influencing each other – photographers, painters, writers, all trying to make sense of the world and translate that into something meaningful.