Robert Frank is one of the most significant and influential Jewish photographers in the 20th century. He was known for his photobook, The Americans, which showed an outsider’s view of American society. What makes this photobook so special is the way Robert Frank approached it. In an interview, he talked about how it was his first time where he had the freedom of what he felt he could do, which was to document what he saw. Also he mentioned how he always had his camera on him, which allowed him to take pictures in the moment. 

Robert Frank also changed the way to think and take pictures; unconventional composition, blurry subjects, imprecise focus, and the usage of grainy films, which shaped how photographs are taken today. His photos also shifted the focus of photography from celebrity and idealized figures to focus on everyday people. He showed what actually happens in America behind all the public images. At first his photobook was heavily criticized by critics saying how the photos were considered low quality and flawed. This criticism was mostly due to the fact of how different The American was compared to other photo books. Robert Frank wanted to depict photographs that showed emotion and in order to do that he had to experiment with different techniques in photographing, printing, and presenting his work. This motivation came from his previous teacher Alexey Brodovitch. Robert Frank once said that Brodovitch “encouraged students to use blur, imprecise focus, large foreground forms, bleach negatives, radically crop and distort print, or print two photographs on top of each other, put gauze over lens of enlargers – to not capture facts of scene but to experience it”(1). But nowadays critics think of The American as one of the most iconic photo books from the 20th century, it redefined what a photobook could be and at the same time really showed the true colors of America. 

I personally chose this book because of how I connect with Robert Frank. I am currently in somewhat of a similar situation, a person that did not live in America before, visiting it to pursue a career/academics. Like him, I am considered an outsider in America. The whole idea of Frank going to America to take pictures of the people and environment motivated me to approach in a similar way where I won’t picture America as a whole but of the city of Ann Arbor. 

I chose those three photographs because those were the things Robert Frank found amusing when he was depicted in America. The concept of having the American flag everywhere is something I also see now in America. Also the Drive-in movie theater was something special that he found in America. I am hoping that I could take photographs about things that I find interesting and new in Ann Arbor like the Big House Stadium. 

Being an outsider like Robert Frank, I have a different perspective on American culture due to the fact that I grew up in a totally different place. Frank’s work really motivated me to try to portray Ann Arbor in a similar way to how he portrayed America in his photo book, which was through the people. I want to portray Ann Arbor also through the people by showing how diverse of a place it is. The best way to describe a certain place or situation is to focus on the people that are relevant to that location.

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“Fourth of July” – Jay, New York

Robert Frank

“Parade” – Hoboken, New Jersey

Robert Frank

“Drive-In Movie” – Detroit, Michigan

Robert Frank

As the title suggested, Most of the photos in The Americans were focused on the regular people rather than the infrastructure or celebrities. As mentioned before, Frank used unconventional techniques such as imprecise focus, manipulation of juxtaposition, large foreground forms, and printing the photos with extreme contrast. Also most of Frank’s photos were not staged. I am planning to take a similar picture where I will focus on the depicted diversity, in people, within Ann Arbor. I am planning to incorporate imprecise focus by taking pictures during the night time. I am also planning to incorporate large foreground forms by playing with the lens and trying to take the photos in different angles and positions. This would help add more background to the photo, setting a scene for the photo. I am planning to take the picture near Central Campus and I will be taking those photos next week(November 7 – 11). I will try to also take different photos that would have some common theme, which would help when it comes to organizing my portfolio. As I claimed before, the best method of describing a place is to take a picture of the people. My approach will focus on the people in the picture which would tell us more about the place rather than just taking photos of the place itself. Here is an example of a photo where Frank took of the people walking in a market. This photo was not staged and it explains a lot about the place (in this case New Orleans, Louisiana).

“Canal Street” – New Orleans, Louisiana

In this interview Robert Frank talks about what it takes to be a photographer and goes more in depth regarding his process and decisions when taking picture in America.

                             My Photos                                                                        Robert Frank

Final Selection

Analysis:

After capturing 800 photos with the Panasonic Lumix that I borrowed from the university, from State Street down to the Big House stadium, I ended up selecting 22 photos that through my own perspective define the city of Ann Arbor.

By taking my own photos, I learned how hard and tedious the process might be. Robert Frank ended up using 1 out of 300 photos that he captured. So I realized that I had to take a lot of photos. For example, I ended up taking around 75 photos of the people wearing UMich merch in front of the Big House stadium, in which I selected a few, one of them being the Wolverine photo because I loved the pattern of the blanket the lady had wrapped around her. Robert Frank throughout his process, he learned so many different things about America and its culture. I also learned so many things about Ann Arbor during my own process. For example, I first experienced game day at the Big House and learned how big college football really is here in Ann Arbor. I also learned how to be patient while capturing a photo, waiting just for the perfect time to capture a photo. At first, I was really impatient about capturing photos, thinking that I could capture all my photos in just one day but later I found out that it is a long process that is full of patients. Timing was also an important aspect of capturing photos. For example in the Maize and Blue photo, I was walking with the crowd heading towards the Big House and I noticed that a man was consistently looking back which I saw was a perfect opportunity to capture a photo. That photo was one of my favorites and later realized that it was really similar to the photo Looking In,” which captured a group of jews wearing hats in a ship. The similarity was how all of them in the photo were wearing the same hat similar to the people in the photo that I took. 

I learned how hard it is to find that perfect photograph. I also learned that there is some luck involved either being at the right time in the right location or photos just lucky turning out better than I expected. The Thanksgiving photo is a perfect example of how lucky I was. I was randomly walking by the diag when I saw those couples standing right in front of the M block in the diag. This photo ended up being one of the best ones I took and it’s all due to luck. I also learned how it is hard to capture photos that would relate to each other. That part I really struggled with because I couldn’t think of the way to relate the photos that I took. 

The timing and angles where Robert Frank took his photos seemed to be perfect. As mentioned before, it was hard to capture the perfect photo. Also Robert Frank took close-up photos of people, which I found really hard to do because I was too shy to take these types of photos. That’s why most of my photos were from far away. The only close-up photos I took were of people’s backs and not of their faces which was the opposite of what Robert Frank did. The closest photo I took of a person’s face was in the Maize and Blue photo, where I knew that person was going to look back since I saw him constantly doing it before while we were walking to the Big House Stadium. Although my photos were not as close to Frank’s photographs, I did incorporate similar photos, like the photo of the American Flag. Frank captured and demonstrated photos where it had the American flag, either in The Fourth of July photo or the one from the parade. I also took pictures of the M block flag since I saw it as frequently as the American across Ann Arbor. Another similar technique that I tried to incorporate was capturing moving objects. You could see that in Frank’s photo like the one he took of the senior citizen seated on the bench. You could see in the M Bus photo, I tried to capture the bus while it was passing by.

During the whole process, there were things that worked and didn’t work. For example, What worked really well was the photos that I took during the game day. I was surprised about how people were laughing and smiling when I was taking photos of them, initially I thought they would shout at me and make me delete the photo. Another thing that worked well was how everything came together. I initially thought that I would be presenting my selected photos like how Frank did with his photobook, but I approached presenting my photos in a different way which was dividing them in sections like what Weegee did in The Naked City. If you noticed in the gallery, I grouped the similar photos together. This really helped organize and relate the photos to one another which was a challenge I encountered. Another thing that worked well was how the photos I took in front of the Big House turned out. I did not expect it would be that good. Although the photos turned out to be amazing, I had a hard time selecting the ones I want to present in my gallery. An example of something that didn’t work was the photos that I captured at night. I initially thought of taking photos at night but it turned out really blurry and was not worth selecting, compared to the photos I captured in the morning and afternoon. Although I ended up using some photos I took at night like the one in State Street, I disregarded most of them when I was selecting my photos for the gallery. 

My approach of taking pictures evolved from my original idea. I originally thought of depicting the city of Ann Arbor was to focus on the people, rather than the surrounding environment. I ended up doing a mix of both because I realized that it was hard to consistently take photos of people. For example, I took photos of people wearing maize and blue colors that represent the university and I also took pictures of State and East Washington Street. I also took pictures that focused both on the place and people, like the ones I captured in front of the Big House Stadium. Another original idea I had was to take the same photo day and night(like at the Diag) and try to relate them together. I chose not to be consistent with that specific theme since most photos I took were not worth selecting. An alternative approach I took was to take photos of the same place but one during Thanksgiving, when the campus is empty, and one after thanksgiving, when students are back and campus is busy. Another original idea I had before I started to take photos was to take indoor photos. Frank had a few photos of people and objects where they were indoors. The problem that I encountered was that I realized I did not have enough time to take both outdoors and indoors photos. Rather than doing both, I ended up just focusing on outdoor photos. 

What was liberating about this process is the fact that I could’ve depicted Ann Arbor in any way. For example, on my first day of taking photos, I just walked around Central campus and started to take random pictures that I thought depicted Ann Arbor. And throughout the process of taking random photos, I knew what I wanted to capture and which photos I should take again. The fact that I had the freedom of walking around and taking pictures and selecting the photos and how I present them makes that whole process liberating. 

Robert Frank talked, in one of the interviews, about the freedom and liberty he had while taking photos in America. He mentioned how he had so much liberty to experiment with his photography and to truthfully depict America through his own lens. And based on my short ended experience that I had depicted Ann Arbor, no one really complained or was against me taking photos of anything. Actually one incident while taking photos in front of the Big House stadium, a man came up to me and asked in a humorous tone if he looked good in the photo. Honestly I was terrified when he approached but after he asked that question, I couldn’t help but to smile and laugh. Although I ended up not selecting that photo, this encounter really gave me a confidence boost that helped me later.

After experiencing this process for only 2 weeks, it really made me appreciate Robert Frank’s work even more. His outsider perspective really motivated me to capture the city of Ann Arbor through my own perspective. By doing this project, it really showed me how different America was back when Frank was capturing it. Frank had a strong emphasis on race, which was a bigger issue back then due to segregation. Although my photos are different from the ones in The Americans, both were taken from an outsider perspective. 

Throughout the process my thesis did actually change. I initially claimed that the best way to picture a community or place was through the people. I ended up changing it because I realized how also the environment is a really big factor and how having a photo with the people interacting in that environment really reflects on the place itself.  

Overall I really enjoyed this process. It made me learn more about Ann Arbor and at the same time experience what it’s truly like to be a photographer.

1. Robert Frank’s “the Americans”: Timeless Lessons Street Photographers Can Learn. EK. (2017, February 17). Retrieved December 10, 2022, from https://erickimphotography.com/blog/2013/01/07/timeless-lessons-street-photographers-can-learn-from-robert-franks-the-americans/%C2%A0
2. How Robert Frank’s book the Americans redefined American Photography. Widewalls. (n.d.). Retrieved December 10, 2022, from https://www.widewalls.ch/magazine/robert-frank-the-americans-albertina
3. Magazine, S. (2008, November 1). Robert Frank’s curious perspective. Smithsonian.com. Retrieved December 10, 2022, from https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/robert-franks-curious-perspective-83745762/
4. Gefter, P. (2019, September 10). Robert Frank Dies; pivotal documentary photographer was 94. The New York Times. Retrieved December 10, 2022, from https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/10/arts/robert-frank-dead-americans-photography.html
5. Mag, T., & Reilly, L. (2015, January 1). Robert Frank: The photographer who captured America’s dark side. Mental Floss. Retrieved December 10, 2022, from https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/584699/robert-frank-photographer-captured-america-dark-side
6. YouTube. (2018). YouTube. Retrieved December 10, 2022, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9kMwnmrL5FM%C2%A0.