Robert Frank: Partida

Partida (departure) takes you on a journey through the attic of memories, glimpses, affections and peculiarities that inhabit Robert Frank's thoughts as he approaches ninety years-old. The photographs span most of his life as an artist. One, taken on the outskirts of Paris in the late forties is followed by a short poem and an interior of his house in Mabou that could have been taken yesterday. His wife, June Leaf, friends, acquaintances and colleagues look at his camera openly, warmly with all the wear and tear of life's journey visible.For the photographer there are intentional or, perhaps accidental references to the work of other well-known photographers. Is the human size ice cream cone cutout a reference to Garry Winogrand's well known image of a laughing woman holding a soft-serve cone in New York City? Are the two glazed donuts placed on a napkin a sly commentary on Edward Weston's food photographs? Does the potted plant in Zurich remind you of Imogen Cunningham's superb plant photographs? Do all the straight forward photographs of Frank's friends ask you to question the concept of the decisive moment? Is any moment the shutter opens the decisive moment? Maybe, maybe not.There is certainly an elegiac quality to the chapbook. Sadness and humor intermix, as do presence and loss, as do engagement and seeming casualness.A slender volume, a rewarding journey for those who care to climb on board.

Frank's recent work is challenging in its rejection of nearly all conventional expectations. Those who many years ago were puzzled by The Americans won't know what to make of these apparently random images, in which simple contingency seems the only formal principle. But Frank alerts us to the plain materiality of the world not to find it beautiful but simply compelling. Some of the portraits, however, are dramatic and effective in a more familiar way. Some Polaroids, but mostly 35mm black and white. A few color photos. And a few impromptu Frank poems. He remains at the cutting edge of photography's developing aesthetic.

I enjoy RF's work and all aspects/approaches to his work…..

Monsieur Robert Frank

as described and delivered on time.