Subway no number 1955

This is 'Subway no number', a contact sheet by Robert Frank, probably from the late 1950s. The whole point of a contact sheet is to show you everything, like a studio floor littered with sketches, stains and random thoughts. Frank's printing is contrasty and blown out, all strong light and deep shadow. Look at the strips of images of the subway windows, bleached out by the sun. Each frame is an attempt to capture something fleeting, a constant process of adjustment and re-evaluation. The smudges and scratches on the film become part of the story, the graininess like a raw, unfiltered emotion. The whole thing feels immediate, like a diary entry. It reminds me a little of the painter Cy Twombly, with the mess and the marks and the feeling of an artist's thought process caught in the act. Art is a conversation, a kind of call and response. There's no right answer, just different ways of seeing.