Charleston, South Carolina

Robert Frank American, born Switzerland

1955

Not on view

Returned to lender

This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.

Robert Frank moved to the United States in 1947 and, like so many other Jewish émigrés, was initially impressed by New York’s postwar optimism. By the mid-1950s, however, when the elation of the war’s end had worn off, Frank was well aware of America’s deep economic stratifications, growing conservative tendencies, and pervasive racism. He included this dramatic work in The Americans (1958/59), his landmark book of photographs that almost single-handedly changed the discourse of American photographic practice. Jack Kerouac, the Beat poet who wrote the introduction to the publication, commented that the photographer had "sucked a sad poem right out of America onto film, taking rank among the tragic poets of the world. To Robert Frank I now give this message: You got eyes."

Artwork Details

Overview

Signatures, Inscriptions, and Markings

Exhibition History

References

Title: Charleston, South Carolina
Artist: Robert Frank (American (born Switzerland), Zurich 1924–2019 Inverness, Nova Scotia)
Date: 1955
Medium: Gelatin silver print
Dimensions: Image: 8 1/4 × 12 1/4 in. (21 × 31.1 cm)
Sheet: 9 11/16 × 12 15/16 in. (24.6 × 32.9 cm)
Framed: 18 × 21 × 1 in. (45.7 × 53.3 × 2.5 cm)
Classification: Photographs
Credit Line: Promised Gift of Ann Tenenbaum and Thomas H. Lee, in celebration of the Museum’s 150th Anniversary
Curatorial Department: Photographs