Henry Frank: Father Photographer

Robert Frank’s father, Henry, was both the proprietor of a bicycle shop in Zurich, and a keen amateur photographer. Father – Photographer makes public for the first time a selection of Henry Frank’s photographs including landscapes, family portraits, still-lifes and cityscapes. When Robert Frank immigrated to the United States in 1947, a wooden box containing his father’s stereophotographs was one of the few objects he brought with him. In 2008 that box and the fragile photographic glass plates within it were hand-escorted to Steidl in Gottingen, where they were scanned in tri-tone in preparation for this book. Designed by Robert Frank, Father – Photographer reveals Henry Frank to be both a talented photographer and a keen traveller. His pictures include snow-capped Alps and lakes in Switzerland, views of Venice, Pisa and Florence, and depictions of his family and friends including the young Robert. Henry Frank also reveals a passion for modern means of transport in images of aeroplanes, ships, hot-air balloons, and a car fair at the Grand Palais in Paris. Father – Photographer is a revelation of the unknown photographer Henry Frank, a historical photographic document of the early twentieth century, as well as a new chapter in Robert Frank’s ongoing bookmaking.