One of the First Photographs of New York Sold at Auction

- by Michael Stillman

Segregated New Orleans trolley in 1955. Courtesy of Sotheby's.


While the New York photograph's price was impressive, the top figure at this auction went for a picture that runs along the border of art and history. It was a 1955 photograph of a New Orleans trolley by noted photographer Robert Frank. The people in the trolley stare out the windows, perhaps at the photographer, maybe something else. What makes this picture more than a work of art, but one of history, is the racial make-up of the riders. All of the whites are seated at the front of the trolley; the blacks are in the back. It is a stark reminder of a segregated America in the 1950s. The photo sold for $122,500.