Frank, Robert. The Pictures Are a Necessity: Robert Frank in Rochester, NY, November 1988, edited by William S. Johnson.

George Eastman House, 1989. Wraps, 220 pages.  Issued as Rochester Film & Photo Consortium Occasional Papers No. 2, January 1989.  Very good with 1/4 inch tear at top of front cover near spine and name of previous owner, photographer and photography educator Sally Davidson, at top right corner on title page.  Essays on Frank with transcript of interview/workshop. Extensive bibliography on pages 185 to 219.  Not issued with ISBN number. Scarce. Summary:

The Pictures Are a Necessity (1989), edited by William S. Johnson, is a unique "archival transcript" that captures the raw, unfiltered philosophy of Robert Frank during a rare public appearance at the George Eastman House. The book documents Frank’s interactions with students and curators, providing a vital counter-narrative to the polished "legend" of the man who redefined American photography.

Core Themes and Narrative

• The Rejection of the Icon: Throughout the discussions, Frank actively resists the "sanctification" of his seminal work, The Americans. He argues that a photographer must constantly "destroy" their past successes to remain creatively honest.

• Necessity vs. Art: The title reflects Frank’s core belief: he didn't take pictures to make "art," but out of a biological and psychological necessity. The book explores his transition from still photography to experimental film as a search for a more "truthful" (if less perfect) medium.

• The Dialogue of the Outsider: Frank’s voice is that of the eternal immigrant. He discusses the "Look" of America from the perspective of someone who remains perpetually unassimilated, valuing the "mistake" over the "masterpiece."

• Robert Frank (1924–2019) was a Swiss-born American photographer and filmmaker whose groundbreaking, idiosyncratic vision fundamentally redefined 20th-century documentary photography and visual storytelling. Born in Zurich to a Jewish family, Frank trained in photography before emigrating to New York City in 1947, working as a fashion photographer for Harper's Bazaar before embarking on travels across South America and Europe. Securing a prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship in 1955, he spent two years driving across the United States, taking over 28,000 photographs that culminated in his masterpiece photobook, Les Américains (first published in France in 1958 and as The Americans in the U.S. in 1959, featuring an introduction by Jack Kerouac). With its raw, grainy, tilted compositions and unvarnished focus on racial division, alienation, diner subcultures, and consumerism, The Americans initially drew harsh hostility from critics for subverting classical photographic decorum, yet it became a defining visual anthem of the Beat Generation and a cornerstone of modern documentary practice. In the late 1950s, Frank largely turned away from still photography to pioneer experimental cinema—directing seminal avant-garde films such as Pull My Daisy (1959) and the unreleased Rolling Stones tour documentary Cocksucker Blues (1972)—before returning to personal photographic collages and multimedia construction later in life, cementing an enduring legacy as one of the most transformative and uncompromising figures in photographic history.