Photographer Frank honoured for life’s work

Zurich-born photographer Robert Frank is being given the Swiss Press Photo Lifetime Achievement Award.

It is the second time the SFr20,000 ($21,800) prize has been awarded – last year it went to René Burri, known around the world for his photograph of Che Guevara smoking a cigar.

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“Frank’s extraordinary work influenced 20th-century photography to a great extent,” the jury wrote, adding that his work The Americans could be seen as a documentation of an entire civilisation and remained a reference point for many other photographers.

Frank, 87, emigrated to the United States in 1947 and settled in New York. With support from the American photographer Walker Evans he obtained a grant to do a photographic trip across the US. In 1955 and 1956, he travelled through 30 states, amassing 28,000 images.

The Americans, the fruit of this journey, was first published in Paris in 1958 by Robert Delpire and a year later by Grove Press in New York. Beat writer Jack Kerouac contributed the introduction to the US edition, a factor that later helped boost its popularity.

As well as being one of the main visual artists to document the Beat poet subculture, Frank also made films, including a 1972 tour documentary of the Rolling Stones that was banned from being shown in public.

Later photography work included the more autobiographical book, The Lines of My Hand, and collages.

Frank will receive the award  on April 27 in Bern.