The Shock of Robert Frank’s “The Americans” | Hacker News Reader

The Shock of Robert Frank’s “The Americans”

newyorker.com

This does look like a worthwhile book. Until someone invents a time machine for traveling to the past, collections like this are the next best thing.

Photographers have a POV, a narrative (not in the bad sense), but they have a story they want to tell.

A better way for this kind if thing is to look at people's shoebox collections. There is no ulterior narrative and it’s more personal to each producer. They’re not iconic, they don’t have the imprimatur of a known great, but they are an honest look at times and places.

> narrative (not in the bad sense)

What is the "bad sense"?

Surely personal photo collections also have a narrative, albeit one focused on the life of the photographer?

Of course people will have their interests’ POV, but it’s a vernacular or even naive.

When a photographer goes on a project which may end up as a book or exhibit in a gallery, it has no comparison to the vernacular POV. They may have statements, but typically have a predefined purpose and also will curate heavily. In a book like Frank’s you may see maybe 1% of the pictures taken during that project, if even that.

The bad sense of narrative is beside telling a story it has a known and purposeful bias.

In my youth I had a job converting old 8mm and 16mm home movies to video. About 25% were of people at Disneyland on a sunny day. In general they were completely biased towards bright happy moments, and I realized that old photos aren't a very good way to tell what peoples lives were like. In my family photos, there's a sense that people took pictures of things they were proud of--someone in a military uniform, a new car, etc.

No doubt, but that’s what’s important to people. Most aren’t going to Disney, and when they take pictures it’s not : “I want to showcase a particular narrative.” Most just want to keep memories of times _they_ feel are representative and important. Not what a photographer thinks is or should be important.

I think he means they have a "narrative" but that in itself is not inherently bad.

I found that a disappointing description of the work. Perhaps I'm missing the point, but I don't see enough description to match the brief mention of that photographic working being shocking, showing america as it really was, breathless etc. It just looked like unposed pictures of real people?

Absolutely. If I had a time machine, I would use it for these things, other than to predict sports, bet on winners, and become a billionaire.

What an impressive lack of imagination. There are far better uses for time travel than cheating at gambling.

You might have misread my comment, please read it again - I said I would NOT use it to cheat at gambling.

If that was what you meant to say, your meaning got garbled. "Other" isn't used to convey "not" but means something like "besides" or "in addition to". I suspect that the word you were looking for was "rather than" which means "instead of".

Aaah you might be right. Thanks for clarifying.

There's an excellent documentary about him, "Don't Blink."

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4779036/

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