23rd Street weddings--New York City no number c. 1953 - 1954

Robert Frank’s photographic contact sheet, 23rd Street weddings--New York City no number, shows a sequence of black and white images, probably captured on the streets of New York. The images, arranged in strips, are not presented as individual works, but as raw material, a part of the photographic process. The high contrast and grainy texture gives the image a stark, documentary feel. Look at the strip in the middle, you can see people seated outside a building, perhaps a restaurant. The repetition of images creates a sense of time passing, like frames from a film. Frank's work reminds me a bit of Garry Winogrand, another street photographer who captured the energy of city life. Both artists shared a knack for finding the extraordinary in the everyday. Art isn’t always about the perfect, polished image, sometimes it’s about showing the messy, unfiltered reality of life.