Paris 34B 1951 - 1952

Robert Frank’s ‘Paris 34B’ is a photographic contact sheet, a matrix of moments captured on a roll of black and white film. This is a record not of a finished image, but of an artistic process; a step along the way. The rough surface texture and subtle greyscale range come from the specific chemistry of photographic development. Frank used this to his advantage, creating grainy, high-contrast images which broke from the smooth style of commercial photography. It's a radical aesthetic with an anti-establishment edge. Traditionally, contact sheets like this were workaday items, meant only to help photographers select images for printing. Here, Frank elevates the mundane, asking us to consider the artistic value of documentation, and to appreciate the raw reality of image-making. By doing so, he calls into question the way images are made and consumed, and reminds us of the labor involved in even the most seemingly effortless photograph.