Steidlville

After completing The Americans in 1958, Robert Frank put aside the single image and concentrated throughout the 1960s on film-making. He only returned to still-photographs in the 1970s, using a Polaroid camera with black-and-white positive/negative film. He frequently layered the images with text, which he inscribed by hand onto the Polaroid negative. Frank found that these works allowed him more freedom to “destroy that image, that perfect image”. In recent years Robert Frank has worked almost exclusively with Polaroids, exploring the collage and assemblage possibilities of the instant photograph. Seven Stories brings together sequences of single images Frank has been compiling to create books of new work. As always the photographs and stories relate to Frank’s life and milieu, his homes in Mabou and New York, or a trip to China or Spain. This collection of small books is a new stage in the practice of this remarkable artist who continually challenges the limits of photography and film and strives to avoid repeating himself.

Book 1: China, 20 pages with 20 photos
Book 2: Early Europe / Red Lake, 16 pages with 15 photos
Book 3: Flies / Pools, 12 pages with 6 photos
Book 4: Objects, 14 pages with 7 photos
Book 5: Objects / Photos, 20 pages with 11 photos
Book 6: People Story, 22 pages with 15 photos
Book 7: Story Rooms / Windows, 20 pages with 19 photos