From an interview in Vanity Fair, Robert Frank’s Unsentimental Journey, April 2008:
Quite provocative, eh? What value is there for the watcher, when all that is watched is equal?There are too many images. Too many cameras now. We’re all being watched. It gets sillier and sillier. As if all action is meaningful. Nothing is really all that special. It’s just life. If all moments are recorded, then nothing is beautiful and maybe photography isn't an art anymore. Maybe it never was.
For myself, that means that the dedicated photographer becomes more important. The photographer must not only see, but the images must be seen, and rise above the noise. Without that, it all becomes lost. While there is value for the creator, the real creator who is dedicated to creating, the value for the watcher diminishes because there is an overloading avalanche of information. Moonrise, puppy dog, Mona Lisa, lunch food on the plate, all the same, all delivered the same way.
"It is the same with him about photography. Digital photography destroys memory, he believes, with its ability to erase. Art school is another problem, teaching students to be blind. Editors are worse—they poke the artist’s eyes out. Photography: one minute it’s not art at all. Then perhaps it is. And then again it is not. That’s Robert Frank."
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