Children and family A1 1951

This is 'Children and family A1' by Robert Frank; we don't know exactly when it was made, but we do know it was made with film. I'm always fascinated by the work that happens off the painting, and I wonder what Frank's outtakes would tell us. I can imagine him wandering around with his camera, looking for just the right light, the right alignment of elements. He was trying to capture something real and fleeting, that messy business of family life. You can feel the artist's eye searching, framing, deciding what to keep and what to leave out. I wonder, did he feel like he was ever getting close to capturing the essence of his subjects, or was it always just out of reach? These frames remind us that every artist is in conversation with the world and with other artists. Each image is an experiment, an attempt to pin down something elusive, but ultimately, it's the process of searching that matters.