Robert Frank

signed, titled, and dated in ink on the image, framed, 1978

This print, a montage of two strips of negatives on one sheet of double-weight Agfa paper with a surface sheen, is in generally very good condition. In raking light, the following are visible: 2 small creases near the right image edge; one-inch crescent-shaped crease in the right middle frame; 5-inch diagonal crease that appears to break the emulsion along the upper left edge; and 2 small creases that appear to break the emulsion in the lower left corner. The margin corners are bumped, and the edges are worn. There are 2 square-shaped hinge remnants on the reverse of the print. Written in pencil on the reverse of the print is '98396' and 'RF 401.' On the reverse of the mat, there is a Michael Shapiro Gallery, San Francisco, label, with printed credit, title, and date.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

Following the publication of The Americans in 1955, and his From the Bus series of 1958, Robert Frank began to move away from still photography to concentrate on filmmaking.  In 1959, Frank collaborated with Alfred Leslie on his first film, Pull My Daisy, one of the most influential independent films ever made.  The more fluid narrative of film was a logical next step for an artist sensitive to the relationships between images, a photographer who had always sequenced his images to enhance their meaning. 

Soon after moving to Mabou, Nova Scotia, in the early 1970s, however, Frank returned to still photography, but with a difference.  Informed by his experiences as a filmmaker, his visually autobiographical Lines of My Hand of 1972 utilized film negatives to create photographs comprised of multiple images. As Sean O'Hagan reported in The Observer in 2009, Frank once said that the focus of his later work 'had shifted from being about what I saw to being about what I felt.'

To that end, Frank photographed familiar and personally meaningful subjects—Mabou landscapes, his domestic surroundings in Mabou and New York that sometimes included wife June Leaf or son Pablo, and occasionally familiar images, as in the case of the present print where Hoboken from The Americans series is included.  A portion of the photograph's title—'Life Dances On . . .' —is the same as that of a short film Frank produced in 1980.