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V i sua 1 A Frank Photographer by Moira Carroll During the month of September. Presentation House Gallery will be exhibiting the work of photographer Robert Frank. Frank has had a long and prodigious career as a photographer and filmmaker. Originally from Zurich, Switzerland, he emigrated to the U.S. in 1947, working commercially for magazines such as Harpers Bazaar and Life in New York. Limited edition collections of his photography were also published during ihis time. In 1954. Frank was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship to travel around America, documenting his experiences and impressions. Like other members of the Beat generation of artists--such as his friend Jack Kerouac--Frank wished to explore the U.S. First-hand and to document it in a personal and improvisatory way. He used a Leica camera, which gave the work a casual, snapshot quality. The result of this road trip was his book The Americans, which he felt revealed aspects of American life that were normally overlooked. As a European, he felt that he could portray the country in a way that an American photographer could noL Frank's view of the U.S. was that it was "a powerful country but a very hypocritical country." Reviewers of The Americans found it to be critical of their society, but Frank defended the book, saying that "criticism can come out of love. It is important to see what is invisible to others." accurate documentary--disillusioned and brilliant." Mick Jagger thought the film's portrayal of sex and drug-taking on the tour was too graphic, and Frank has since been permitted to show this film only in retrospectives of his work. During the past twenty years, his films have taken a more personal focus and as he has said, "I became more occupied with my own life, with my own situation, instead of travelling and looking at the cities and the landscape. And I think that brought me to move away from the single image and begin to film, where I had to tell a story. And I guess I most often choose to tell my own story, or part of it. or make up some story that is related to my life." Robert Frank separated from his wife Mary and moved with artist June Leaf to Nova Scotia in 1969. He continued to make films, taught at the Nova Scotia School of Art and Design, and began taking photographs again. Frank's more recent photography, like his films, is more personal, focussed on his life in rural Nova Scotia. His move there has given him "time to think--lots of space around me and an ever unlimited distance through the sky and the sea." Frank now divides his time between New York and Nova Scotia, and he recently completed a film in Germany. This film, titled Hunter, will be included in a miniretrospective of his film works, which will be shown at the Pacific Cinémathèque September I7th & 18th. Robert Frank's photographs will be exhibited at Presentation House Gallery from September 10 to October 10. Moira Carroll is registered in the Studio program of Emily Carr College ofArt & Design. She worked at Presentation House during the summer. He works in a variety of media and styles. His pen-and-ink drawings range from the figurative to the abstract and the surreal. One of his greatest achievements has been the revival of ancient crafts by incorporating them into modem forms of art, as exemplified by his large felt hangings. He calls this style of combining the traditional with the abstract 'environmental modernism.' / Seyhoun's show at the Silk Purse, which opens September 28th and runs to October 10th. will be restricted to pen-and-ink drawings and watercolours executed on a recent trip to Europe. Let's hope that Nikookar Ramin and the West Vancouver Community Arts Council won't have to wait another 25 years to show some of his other work! Although they do like the arts, Arash and Omid Ramin have not taken after their artist mother. They are both enrolled in sciences at V.B.C. Silk Purse Nabs PreEminent Artist by Arash and Omid Ramin Persistence does pay off. It took her the better part of a year, but West Vancouver Community Arts Council board member Tahmineh Nikookar Ramin finally succeeded in convincing fellow artist Houshang Seyhoun to exhibit his works at the Silk Purse in honour of the Arts Council's 25th anniversary. Although he has an extensive reputation internationally, Seyhoun--like far loo many other Canadian artists--is less wellknown in Canada. He has lived here for ten years, having emigrated from Iran. In his home country, he is practically a national hero. Nikookar Ramin. who was also bom in Iran, says that "everybody knows him" --he designed a number of famous monuments (including one of Omar Khayyam) and was active in public life. Seyhoun has lectured (his areas of specialization include art. anthropology and architecture) and exhibited his work throughout the world. In 1972. he took part in an exhibit which also included the works of Salvador Dali and Picasso. In 1981. his painting was one of forty selected and displayed at the new Musée Hors du Temps in France, a museum of religious an. The French subsequently granted him honorary citizenship. 1 r Î * " "Political Rally--Chicago. 1955/56" In the late 1950s. Frank abandoned photography for filmmaking. He felt that he had said everything he could with a still camera and had become concerned about the increasing commercialization of his images. He produced several experimental films. Thefirst.Pull My Daisy (1959), combined fact and fiction and used Beat artists such as Allen Ginsberg, Peter Orlovsky and Jack Kerouac as actors. Other films, such as Conversations in Vermont (1969)--an encounter with his children. Pablo and Andrea--were more directly autobiographical. Frank also did documentary work. irKluding Cocksucker Blues, a film of a 1972 Rolling Stones lour. Ginsberg considered this film to be "a startlingly >