Billiards no number 1955 - 1956

Curator: This gelatin silver print by Robert Frank is called "Billiards no number", and dates from between 1955 and 1956. It depicts a series of contact sheets, capturing several billiard games. Editor: There's an immediate grittiness to this—it's rough, unfiltered. You can see the edges of the film, the sprockets… It reveals the labor, the making. Not this pristine object, but the raw stuff of photography itself. Curator: Frank was known for capturing ordinary scenes of American life, but presenting them with a critical edge. Billiards halls were common spaces, often male-dominated. To show the image on a contact sheet feels documentary. Editor: Documentary, yes, but consider the process: Each frame, developed in a darkroom, a testament to analog labor. It asks: How was this image materially produced, circulated, and consumed? What's fascinating here is the visibility of it all—normally hidden aspects brought to the surface. Curator: True. Frank challenged the sanitized images that permeated mainstream media. By embracing the flaws of his medium and subject matter, he offered a counter-narrative, influencing generations of photographers. But can we really say it's a celebration of "making" when its rawness also mirrors the isolation felt by many Americans? Editor: Perhaps, or maybe both can coexist. I’d argue it pushes the boundary. This photograph reminds us that images are not neutral carriers of truth, but rather the products of specific historical and material conditions. That billiard table, those men gathered... It's all processed through film, chemicals, and then viewed on paper. Curator: Yes, seeing those processes, brings out a sort of awareness about the ways the American Dream was built up in popular discourse versus its daily realities, not glossing over that tension or friction. Editor: I think you’ve hit the bullseye on that. It makes me wonder what stories are left untold, in more ways than one.