Westlake, California 1956

This photograph, titled Westlake, California, was captured by Robert Frank, though we don’t know exactly when. The grey scale suggests a sense of time slipping away. It’s all about the journey of discovery, right? The composition, the arrangement of elements within the frame, guides your eye. It makes me think about how Frank is not just capturing a scene but also constructing a particular way of seeing the world. Look at the cars moving along the winding road, flanked by those houses, like identical blocks. It's a view that’s both mundane and unsettling. It reminds me a little of Ed Ruscha’s photos of Los Angeles. Both are interested in the everyday landscapes of America. Frank offers us an image that invites us to look beyond the surface and consider the deeper layers of meaning embedded in the everyday. It’s as if the photograph is asking us, “What do you see?”