Family in Provincetown 2 1958

Robert Frank made "Family in Provincetown 2" using gelatin silver print, capturing a moment, or rather, multiple moments, on a single sheet. It’s a contact sheet, right? So, it's got all the outtakes, the almost-theres, the ones where someone blinked. I love contact sheets because they reveal the choices, the editing process that Frank went through. You know, it's like seeing a painter’s underpainting, the ghost of decisions past. In each frame, a slightly different version of the same scene unfolds. I imagine Frank, eyes squinted to the viewfinder, chasing the ephemeral quality of family, the fleeting expressions and gestures that define it. I wonder about his relationship to this family, were they close? Were they aware of being photographed? There’s a certain vulnerability in leaving all these frames visible, an honesty about the process of image-making itself. He’s not just presenting a perfect image; he's showing us the messy, imperfect reality of capturing life. And isn’t that what family is all about? Imperfect, messy, but full of fleeting, beautiful moments.