11th Street story 20 1951

This is Robert Frank's ‘11th Street Story 20,’ a strip of film. I can just see Frank out on the street, looking, looking, looking through the viewfinder. He shoots so fast, in this super casual way. I feel like I'm looking at a page of contact sheets. The ordinary and the everyday are really interesting to him. Look at the variety, the different depths of field, and the range of light. It's the world seen in glimpses and fragments. Frank had an eye for the gritty reality of life, and he was able to capture it with such honesty and immediacy. You can see him wrestling with the frame, figuring out what to focus on, what to leave out. It’s all about the edit, right? It’s like he’s saying, “Here’s what I saw, what do you see?” In a way, he is inviting us to participate in the act of seeing.