Willem de Kooning 6 1961

Robert Frank made this contact sheet photograph, titled Willem de Kooning 6. It’s a silver gelatin print. The sequential images offer a kind of loose narrative or stream of consciousness. There's a rhythm in the repetition, a back-and-forth that reminds me of the act of painting itself, where you’re constantly stepping back, re-evaluating, and making adjustments. I’m drawn to the contrast between the stark black and white tones. It's like the difference between an abstract expressionist painting and a pop art print. And then you notice how the different images are framed. Some are clear, some are out of focus, some even have black marker around them. The dark frames in particular almost create another picture within the picture. It’s a raw and unfiltered look at the life of another artist. The feeling I get is that of a conversation between artists, across the boundaries of different media. Like Jasper Johns’ use of serial imagery, it hints at the impossibility of ever capturing a single, definitive meaning.