Exhibit | There’s Something Fishy Happening at the Hammer Museum / CRAVE

Installation view of “Still Life with Fish” at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles.

Don’t let the title of this show fool you: there are not many photographs of fish in Still Life with Fish at the Hammer Museum. This exhibition of West Coast photography offers a comprehensive look at conceptual photography from the 1960s to the present. Drawn from the Hammer’s permanent collection and the UCLA Grunwald Center for the Graphic Arts, Still Life with Fish offers little-to-no surprises, but that’s not a bad thing.

The name of this show is taken from a 1982 series of photographs by Jo Ann Callis. In the images, she photographs a table, a bowl of liquid, slides of bread, and a plate of sardines. One wonders if the show itself is conceptually dry, or was that just the nature of photography at that time? Or could it be a little bit of both. Another photograph by Callis called “Salt and Pepper and Fire” casts dramatic lighting on salt and pepper shakers and a cup of coffee against a plate of something that’s on fire. There are many layers to this show, though the inspiration for its title is rather mundane.