Paris 53B 1951 - 1952

Robert Frank created ‘Paris 53B’ using photography, a process that chemically imprints light onto a sensitized material. Here, we see strips of black and white film mounted on a larger black card, which allows us to peek behind the curtain of Frank’s artistic process. The film's materiality, with its sprocket holes and frame edges, influences how we perceive these captured moments. Photography, unlike painting or sculpture, is inherently tied to mechanical reproduction and the commodification of images. Frank's loose, seemingly casual framing counters the slickness often associated with commercial photography. Consider the labor involved: from manufacturing the film itself, to Frank's work as a photographer navigating the streets of Paris, to the darkroom processes required to develop these images. The numbered annotations also point to an editorial process of selection, mediated by a commercial logic. By revealing the raw materials and process, Frank elevates the everyday into art, questioning the boundaries between high art and the working world.