From the Collection of Randi and Bob Fisher

2.2 / Entertaining Wonder When Rationality Seems to Fail

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From the Collection of Randi and Bob Fisher GROUP SHOW SEP 16 - FEB 28 PIER 24

by Brady Welch

With twenty-eight thousand square feet of pristine gallery space, Pier 24 is in the ideal position to throw the late summer barn-burner that is From the Collection of Randi and Bob Fisher. Walker Evans, Robert Frank, Lee Friedlander, Hilla and Bernd Becher, Robert Adams, Diane Arbus, William Eggleston—they're all here, and in quantity. If the collectors’ names sound familiar, too, then the reader might anticipate the depth and scope of this exhibition. Mr. Fisher is the son of Gap Inc. founder Don Fisher, whose sprawling collection of nearly every bright light in twentieth-century contemporary art was bequeathed to SFMOMA, where it remained on view throughout the summer. While the younger Fisher and his partner Randi have focused on collecting photography exclusively, they evince the family's same impervious gusto for all the biggest names.

The tone at Pier 24 is a bit less revelatory than it was at SFMOMA's summer blockbuster, and that's a good thing. For one, the space is not in the business of selling tickets; so while you must make an appointment to come visit, admission is free.

Only about twenty people are admitted for the roughly two-hour appointment times as well, so both viewer and photographs are allowed room to breathe. Another difference, nearly unimaginable in a museum setting, is the absence of printed information to accompany the photographs on view at Pier 24. There is no wall text for this exhibition, and the gallery guide, should a viewer ask for one, is a Xeroxed sheet of paper with only the photographers' names and the location of their work within the gallery. There is no mention of individual titles, no artist biographies, and the only curatorial statement one can piece together is the abstract affirmation suggested by the all-star artist list itself. At Pier 24, both the exhibition's curators and the Fishers rightfully assume that these images stand strongly enough on their own, and that the ideal presentation of the collection should invite viewers to make their own connections about and between each photograph. It's not an elitist proposition in the least. If learning lies in unencumbered discovery, what better way is there to encounter iconic work than by simply looking at it?

Walker Evans, unsurprisingly, serves as a sort of spiritual epicenter for much of the photographs in the show. In the three small galleries devoted to his own early, middle, and later years, respectively, viewers can trace what is clearly a foundational ethos of journalistic, voyeuristic, and pure aesthetic ambitions, and then tease them out in adjacent galleries through the work of William Eggleston, Robert Frank, Robert Adams, and Lee Friedlander.

From the Collection of Randi and Bob Fischer, installation view; Hilla & Bernd Becher (right), Thomas Struth (left). Courtesy of Randi and Bob Fischer and Pier 24, San Francisco. Photo: Tom O'Conner.

© ART PRACTICAL 2011