LONDON 1951-1952

Frank made several trips to London in the early 1950s, and lived there with his family during the winter of 1951-52. His eye was drawn to the two extremes of the English class system, photographing business-like bankers walking purposefully through the City, but also the coalmen, street musicians and ragged children who played in the ruins of the blitz. The atmospheric conditions of the city play a significant role in these images. Frank was fascinated by the thick fog that cloaks the streets, muting the sharp contrasts of black and white into an all-enveloping haze.

The bankers, always walking swiftly through the frame, seem to cut through this miasma. Each is locked into his own thoughts, the fog suggesting a visual metaphor for this palpable sense of isolation from their surroundings. In one of the most striking images, a coalman lifts a heavy sack while a preoccupied city gent walks past: representatives of two parallel worlds pressed alongside each other, each failing to acknowledge the other exists.

It is the children who seem the freest and most vibrant figures in this urban landscape. While the bankers resolutely ignore Frank's camera, the children meet his gaze, and appear expressive and alert to their surroundings.