Katherine Anne Porter--Bed story for "Harper's Bazaar" P1 1962

This is a photographic contact sheet by Robert Frank, a sequence of exposures showing the writer Katherine Anne Porter in bed. The material here is crucial: not just the photographic paper, but the film itself, presented as a matrix of images. Frank has drawn on the surface, marking his selection of images for publication. This is a record of a process, not a finished work in itself. Think about the social context. In the mid-20th century, magazines like *Harper's Bazaar* were a primary vehicle for photography. This was applied art, pure and simple, made to the specifications of an editor. But the contact sheet gives us insight into the photographer's method, the way he shoots many frames to get the right image. Frank’s method democratized photography by suggesting the decisive moment comes not from technical skill, but from the brute force of the shot. That is what makes this object so compelling. It collapses any distinction between art and the making of it.