11th Street story 14 1951

Robert Frank made this gelatin silver print, "11th Street story 14," at an unknown date. What strikes me about this work is the way the film strip becomes a kind of readymade collage element, like Kurt Schwitters maybe, but Frank is a photographer. The materiality of the film is so present: we see the sprocket holes, the numbering, and the grainy, high-contrast images themselves. It's a document of a document, right? I love the way Frank lets the process show, embracing the imperfections and the raw, unedited quality of the film. Look at the handwritten "14" scrawled across the top strip. It's like he’s saying, "This is it, folks, the real deal." Frank’s work reminds me of other photographers like Garry Winogrand, who also captured the messy, unposed reality of street life. There's a sense of immediacy and a willingness to embrace the accidental, but it's also so self-aware. It's like he's saying, "Art is everywhere, you just have to look for it."