From the Bus, New York

Robert Frank, originally from Switzerland, immigrated to the United States in 1947. He is well known for his book The Americans, published in 1958. There is a sense of spontaneity in Frank’s photographs, which is also seen in the Beat Generation poets from the same period. In this series of photographs taken from a bus moving through New York City, Frank had only seconds to capture the moment. On these images, Frank said “The Bus carries me thru the City, I look out the window, I look at the people on the street, the Sun and the Traffic Lights. It has to do with desperation and endurance - I have always felt about living in New York. Compassion and probably some understanding for New York's Concrete and its people, walking... waiting... standing... holding hands... the summer of 1958”. These were the last still photographs Frank took before turning to film: in a way one could claim that these photographs are a premonition of his turn to the moving image.