Robert Frank Portfolio

Reproduced in facsimile, Frank's first-ever portfolio is back in print after over a decade

When Robert Frank (1924-2019) emigrated from Zurich to the United States in 1947, the aspiring young photographer brought along his portfolio of 40 photos to help him secure employment. This eponymous volume is the facsimile of that very object. It contains Frank's earliest original photographs, taken between 1941 and 1946, as well as the images of other photographers that he had retouched. We see images of rural landscapes in Switzerland juxtaposed alongside street scenes, antique shops, fine fabrics and the glowing lights of a cinema. Portfolio thus contains the seeds of a career of such scope and influence which even the ambitious, 23-year-old Robert Frank could not have anticipated. Designed by the artist in collaboration with Gerhard Steidl, the facsimile's softcover presentation in a cardboard envelope mimics the way Frank would have originally stored this crucial selection of his work. It is also, in a sense, his first photobook, providing a glimpse into his sequencing process that would produce such acclaimed publications as The Americans and The Lines of My Hand.