There are just a few photographers who create a body of work that commands your attention. For me, the legendary Robert Frank was one of them.

Not long after I arrived in New York City in my early 20s, I met Arthur Rothstein, the head of photography at Look, a couple of years before that magazine folded in the early 1970s. One afternoon, Mr. Rothstein sent me to show my work to his friend Cornell Capa, at the time focused on elevating the best of documentary photography as an art form — this was the genesis of the International Center of Photography.

A natural born teacher, Mr. Capa began pulling books off his shelves to introduce me to the works of significant photographers. As soon as I saw Robert Frank’s images in “The Americans,” I sat down. I knew I had to take my time going through these extraordinary images in front of me — slowly, turning one page after another.

Here was a fresh cultural perspective on American society from a man who arrived in the United States at age 23 from Switzerland. Being a humanist and a strong image maker gave the artist the means to fully exploit the visual terrain that made up the United States in the 1950s — without the cultural blinders that corrupted our society and continue to stalk us to this day. His images are strong, yet delicate, and his awareness is unobtrusive.