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Lot Essay
Frank has always been a poet of happiness, but he has come to make art that answers first and last to the unprincipled disrupters and destroyers of the prospect of joy. We can sometimes feel the force of will trying to overcome the impediments to happiness. One of the ambiguous message he writes to himself on a photograph is 'Look out for hope' (W. S. Di Piero, 'Hold Still – Keep Going: The Later Photographs', Moving Out, Scalo, New York, 1994, p. 277).
In 1972 at the age of 48, Robert Frank published his first retrospective book, The Lines of My Hand, which was dedicated to his children and ‘Friends now gone forever.' This dedication emphasizes the intimate nature of the book, which is filled with a curated selection of deeply personal photographs— each an homage to devotion, loss, and grief. The book was an outlet for Frank, an opportunity to channel the evolution of these overwhelming, disorderly states of mind. Each illustration was clearly carefully considered, and the present lot was included in the 1989 edition.
Frank’s evocative work from the 70s and 80s— which fills the pages of The Lines of My Hand—is a complete visual change for the artist. For the first time Frank incorporates his own private text and overlaps fragments of photographs and collages, creating more conceptual and abstract scenes. These images delicately reveal his vulnerability.
In 1972 at the age of 48, Robert Frank published his first retrospective book, The Lines of My Hand, which was dedicated to his children and ‘Friends now gone forever.' This dedication emphasizes the intimate nature of the book, which is filled with a curated selection of deeply personal photographs— each an homage to devotion, loss, and grief. The book was an outlet for Frank, an opportunity to channel the evolution of these overwhelming, disorderly states of mind. Each illustration was clearly carefully considered, and the present lot was included in the 1989 edition.
Frank’s evocative work from the 70s and 80s— which fills the pages of The Lines of My Hand—is a complete visual change for the artist. For the first time Frank incorporates his own private text and overlaps fragments of photographs and collages, creating more conceptual and abstract scenes. These images delicately reveal his vulnerability.