Robert Frank's "My Fathers Coat"

I was 16, just started my BTEC Foundation at college in Guernsey when I was lucky enough to be taken on a class trip to London, whilst there we visited the Tate. After wondering around the Tate one thing in particular caught my attention, Robert Franks exhibition "Storylines". Although this was a while ago, I still believe this exhibition infulenced my choice to study photography now. So, for this I am going to look at Robert Franks "My Fathers Coat" this image consists of three images, known as a triptych. Each of the three images is of the same objects, only photographed from different angles, and different distances away. All of the photographs have strips of masking tape underneath them with the words "My Fathers Coat" Franks says he put these here to make the pictures seem like postcards, one thing that stands out about the text for me is the way it is written, all three are done in different colours and look asthough they have been written in a distressed state. The smudge mark on the text of the right hand image looks as though it could be from a tear-drop. If you have veiwed Franks work befor, you will notice the way that he uses text in his images is very different from a normal photographer. The image "Sick Of Goodbyes" shows Franks writing painted on a mirror, again in a very distressed way. Frank has also been known to scratch his negatives, something which most photographers would never consider doing, although, Frank is not most photographers, he strived to push the boundries of photography, also looking at the relationship between still and moving images.
Some distinguishable points in the image would be the coat itself, the medal on the coat and the aloe vera plant on the window cill.
The coat itself was recived from Robert Franks mother after his father died in 1976. He was told by his mother to wear the coat, however on returned to New York he hung the coat on a hook and did not wear it for many years. A quote from Frank "The writing under the photograph is like sending a postcard- the medal on the coat is an imaginary past; the plant is alive
and waiting and growing and I am getting old"
I feel this image comes across slightly depressing and sad, the way that the light falls across the photograph itself, that it is shot in black and white, also the description Frank gave of the image. I feel the use of angles and the way he has shot the seperate images, has portrayed the mood he was trying to get across very well.
Robert Frank is concidered to have revolutionised photography.