UB surprised...
Robert Frank’s favorite image from his most famous work, the photobook The Americans, is a photograph titled San Francisco from 1956. It’s like a punch in the nose. He was shooting in a park above San Francisco and was sneaking up on an African American couple enjoying the view, and their privacy, when a stranger approaches from behind.
The thing is that Frank wasn’t surprised they turned around; you can much pretty assume he was hoping - even counting - on them turning around. Confrontations got his juices flowing. So maybe he made some noise, maybe not, but when they turned around, the African American man crouched down in a protective stance, eyes flashing hostility, the woman’s face warily asking “What are you doing??”, Frank was prepared to pounce. This white guy has entered their space and is taking something they were no offering. A moment of submerged feeling dragged into the daylight.
As the contact sheet shows, Frank very quickly made a gesture of photographing whatever was next to them, pretending he wasn’t really taking their picture. Then he walked away, and nobody got punched.
Frank has always said that he liked this photograph because of the candor on the couple’s faces and the intensity of their unguarded reaction to a stranger’s approach. He liked it because it is honest, and it is honest because reveals human feeling...
(From the book “The art and life of Robert Frank. American Witness” by RJ Smith, p. 1)
UB surprised...
Robert Frank’s favorite image from his most famous work, the photobook The Americans, is a photograph titled San Francisco from 1956. It’s like a punch in the nose. He was shooting in a park above San Francisco and was sneaking up on an African American couple enjoying the view, and their privacy, when a stranger approaches from behind.
The thing is that Frank wasn’t surprised they turned around; you can much pretty assume he was hoping - even counting - on them turning around. Confrontations got his juices flowing. So maybe he made some noise, maybe not, but when they turned around, the African American man crouched down in a protective stance, eyes flashing hostility, the woman’s face warily asking “What are you doing??”, Frank was prepared to pounce. This white guy has entered their space and is taking something they were no offering. A moment of submerged feeling dragged into the daylight.
As the contact sheet shows, Frank very quickly made a gesture of photographing whatever was next to them, pretending he wasn’t really taking their picture. Then he walked away, and nobody got punched.
Frank has always said that he liked this photograph because of the candor on the couple’s faces and the intensity of their unguarded reaction to a stranger’s approach. He liked it because it is honest, and it is honest because reveals human feeling...
(From the book “The art and life of Robert Frank. American Witness” by RJ Smith, p. 1)