Bullfight--Spain 6 1952

This photographic contact sheet called Bullfight--Spain 6, was made by Robert Frank at an unknown date. A bullfight, eh? Contact sheets are fascinating, like a painter’s preparatory sketches but with the added pressure of capturing the ‘real’. Frank might have been seeking to capture the event's drama, but also a kind of truth about place and culture. The bullfight itself, framed in those small rectangles, might seem the obvious focal point. But what about the boy playing the guitar? Perhaps it's a future flamenco star in the making. I wonder if Frank felt the conflict of capturing such a loaded and controversial cultural event, or whether, like a painter with a loaded brush, he was simply chasing a certain feeling, one strip at a time. Like all good art, these are ongoing conversations.