The Americans by Robert Frank, Signed Edition with Letter of Provenance

The Americans by Robert Frank 

Steidl – The Robert Frank Project, 2008 

Signed by Robert Frank 

Includes Letter of Provenance 

This is a rare signed edition of Robert Frank’s “The Americans” considered one of the seminal works in American photography published by Steidl, Gottingen in 2008 as part of The Robert Frank Project. From the publisher: “On May 15, 1958, the first edition of Robert Frank’s The Americans was published in Paris. Les Américains was part of a series of books which presented foreign countries through words and pictures. It contained Frank’s 83 photographs in the same sequence as all subsequent editions, with the image on the right hand page juxtaposed with texts from American social and political history, gathered by Alain Bosquet. The following year in the first American edition, the French texts were removed and an introduction by Jack Kerouac was added. Over the subsequent 50 years, The Americans has been republished in many editions, in numerous languages, with a variety of cover designs and even in a range of sizes. It is the most famous photobook ever published, and it changed the face of the medium forever. Robert Frank discussed with his publisher, Gerhard Steidl, the idea of producing a new version using modern scanning and the finest tritone printing. The starting point was to bring the original prints to Göttingen, Germany, where Steidl is based, from New York. In July, 2007, Frank visited Göttingen. A new format for the book was worked out and new typography selected. A new cover was designed and Frank personally chose the book cloth, foil for embossing and the endpaper. Most significantly, in the process of working out the layout of the photographs on the page, Frank chose to reproduce un-cropped examples of the photographs when available. Two images were changed completely from the original 1958 and 1959 editions. Then, on a sunny day in July of 2007, the presses started rolling and Robert Frank personally supervised the printing of this latest edition of The Americans.”  

Containing 83 black and white photographs and measuring approximately 8” x 7”, the book is a hardcover with a photographically illustrated dust jacket. The condition of the book is FINE in a FINE- dust jacket with a very minor crease on the lower left front. The book has been signed and dated by Robert Frank on the title page. As mentioned earlier, a Letter of Provenance will accompany the book. Signed copies of “The Americans” are very rare. This is a wonderful opportunity to obtain a signed copy of one of the greatest photobooks ever published.

Cited in all three reference works on photobooks: “The Book of 101 Books: Seminal Photographic Books of the Twentieth Century” by Andrew Roth, “The Photobook: A History” by Parr & Badger, and “The Open Book” by Andrew Roth.

Photographs of the book, signature page, Letter of Provenance, and examples of photographs contained in the book appear below. Please note that although the photographs appear digitized as thumbnails, they are viewable in the photo viewer by running your mouse over the thumbnail. You can also click on the thumbnail to open a separate window where the pictures are viewable as a slideshow.