From the bus 42 1958

Robert Frank’s ‘From the bus 42’ shows a black and white photographic contact sheet. It’s a raw, almost diaristic, look at the world. The composition is fragmented, film stills laid out in rows like a comic strip, yet it feels less like a narrative and more like a collection of fleeting impressions. Look at the grainy texture, the high contrast - the blacks are deep, the whites almost blown out. It's rough, immediate, honest. Frank isn't trying to pretty things up. There’s an unpolished quality, you can almost hear the clatter of the camera, the rumble of the bus. The shot of the car, framed by the window, feels particularly poignant. It’s a classic Frank motif: the automobile as a symbol of American freedom, yet seen through a screen, slightly removed, tinged with melancholy. It reminds me a little of Garry Winogrand, but more vulnerable somehow. I think of art not as a singular statement, but as an ongoing conversation.