Cowboys VII
September 1954
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
contact sheet
Dimensions
overall: 25.3 x 20.3 cm (9 15/16 x 8 in.)
Classification
Photograph
Department
CPH
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Robert Frank Collection, Gift of Robert Frank
Accession Number
1990.28.2078
Art Historical Context
**Cowboys VII** by Robert Frank, created in September 1954 offers a rare glimpse into the working process of one of the 20th century's most influential photographers. This contact sheet—a grid of small, unedited proof prints from a single roll of film—measures 25.3 x 20.3 cm and captures Frank's raw encounters during his early years in America after emigrating from Switzerland in 7. As a medium, the contact sheet is especially revealing, laying bare the immediacy of street photography and the artist's methodical selection of decisive moments from everyday scenes. Frank's Cowboys series evokes...
About the Artist
Robert Frank
Robert Frank (1924-2019) was a Swiss-American photographer and documentary filmmaker whose revolutionary approach to documentary photography fundamentally transformed the medium and influenced generations of artists. Born in Zurich, Switzerland, on November 9, 1924, to a middle-class Jewish family, Frank began his photographic apprenticeship in 1941, working with commercial photographers before im...