Stanley Hayter's studio--Paris 73B 1951 - 1952

This is Robert Frank’s photograph of Stanley Hayter's studio in Paris. Look at the image and imagine him there, in the dark room, developing his film. I love the idea of a photographer making images of a painter's studio, with all the layers of experimentation and process visible. Film, like paint, can be pushed and pulled, exposed and re-worked, and Frank seems to be saying: 'look at this, this is how an image comes into being'. Hayter was an important printmaker, and you can see the etching press there, solid and heavy, like a sculpture in itself. And then the almost cinematic strips of negatives, like a storyboard from which he selected particular frames. He had to move around the space, focus, and be highly intentional, not unlike Hayter in his own studio. There’s a real dialogue happening here between artists, mediated by the creative impulse. It's all about looking, and making, and responding to each other's work across time and space.