Collector Pamela Kramlich: ‘I wanted to do something that no one else was doing’

Prometheus shrieking with pain, as depicted by a 17th-century Dutch artist, displayed alongside a video by Bill Viola showing a figure consumed by fire. A fetching “Procuress” by Gerard van Honthorst, contrasted with a video by Marina Abramović. These are just two of the absorbing pairings in an exhibition now on at the Centraal Museum in Utrecht.

Entitled Double Act, the show brings together Old Master paintings from the museum, combined with time-based works from the collection of San Francisco-based Pamela and Richard Kramlich. Theirs is one of the best and most comprehensive video art collections in the world.

“It all started in 1987,” explains Pamela Kramlich, when we meet at a London hotel shortly after the inauguration of the show. Kramlich, who had studied art history at Berkeley in the 1960s, was a member of a collectors’ forum at SFMOMA (San Francisco Museum of Modern Art) and travelled to Germany with curator John Caldwell to attend Documenta, the five-yearly contemporary art exhibition.

“I was young, and because there were a number of good collectors in other fields, I wanted to do something that no one else was doing,” she explains. “John suggested I look at Fischl & Weiss’s video ‘The Way Things Go’ [1987] and I was captivated.” On returning home she immediately bought the video over the telephone from the Sonnabend Gallery. “It cost just $350.”

That wacky video — showing objects setting off a series of accidents — was just the start of what Kramlich calls the “funny journey” that she and her husband then undertook.

Certainly, the fact that her husband Richard was an investor in technology in Silicon Valley was a spur: “We were interested in looking at new things and new ways of doing things. You want to change your perspective.”

Initially, the couple worked with art adviser Thea Westreich Wagner to put the collection together. “There weren’t many people buying in those days,” she recalls. “At first, I was not aware of issues surrounding collecting media-based art, for example the number of editions, the technology.”

Today, the collection numbers more than 200 film, video and media installations, and in the late 1990s the Kramlichs undertook what turned out to be an expensive, 18-year project — to build an exceptional place to display and live with their art. The resulting house, designed by Herzog & de Meuron, is sited in the wine-growing Napa Valley. The Kramlichs’ living quarters are on the upper floor, a glass pavilion, with most of the gallery space underground.

“The house has been a thrilling journey, it is like a sculpture in itself: a glass box on top of a hill,” says Kramlich. It is not open to the public, but they welcome friends, committee and board members and some who ask to visit. There is one house rule for visitors: “We do like them to watch the films from beginning to end, otherwise you don’t really know the work, it’s like trying to read half a poem!”

The videos she and her husband have collected include politically engaged works such as Richard Mosse’s “The Enclave” (2012-13), depicting a rebellion in the Democratic Republic of Congo, as well as Jane and Louise Wilson’s 1997 video “Stasi City”, shot in the former offices of the East German secret police. The complete list is dizzying, ranging from Jennifer Allora and Guillermo Calzadilla to Yang Fudong. Not all is video: they also have two-dimensional works and sculpture, some incorporating video, for instance by Gary Hill and Nam June Paik.

I ask what she is looking for when she considers acquiring a time-based work. “I have to be bothered by it, by the idea and the way it is expressed,” she says. “In our collection we have a lot of things that really speak to the world we live in, things that have happened historically. We have works by Shirin Neshat, very relevant to the present upheavals in Iran. We have a work by Pierre Huyghe, about the tsunami in Japan. I love Bruce Nauman and how he challenges what it means to be a human being. I look for something that approaches ideas that can’t be said in any other way.”

Like any committed collector, she still thinks about certain works she failed to acquire. “Early on, we were offered a William Kentridge work. I decided to step away, because I felt his work was more about drawing. I felt someone who appreciated drawing would be better to buy it.” Another was Christian Marclay’s famed “The Clock” (2012), the 24-hour work made of film segments, each showing the time. “It is fascinating — and we did try to get a copy but didn’t succeed. But it really is an institutional piece anyway.”

Is she still buying? She laughs. “I have a wishlist a mile long — but money doesn’t grow on trees, and like everyone you have to make choices. But those very constraints make you pick the strongest works.” On this trip to London she saw Richard Mosse’s video “Broken Spectre” (2022), filmed in the Amazon, and acquired a still photograph from it.

I ask Kramlich how the project with the Centraal Museum came about. “When I studied art history at Berkeley University back in the 1960s the emphasis was on more modern works — for example German Expressionists and Fauvists. But I feel a profound connection with historical masterworks, and when they are in dialogue with videos from my collection, they become even more meaningful — and vice versa.”

She credits this particular initiative to Bart Rutten, artistic director of the museum: “Bart was very interested in video — for example, those by Bill Viola and Steve McQueen.” Early conversations in Basel finally led to the show being realised — a year late, because of the pandemic. “Bart made the selections — eight from our collection, with two that are not moving images: a Steve McQueen light box and a photograph by Richard Mosse.” As for the 17th-century painters on show, they include Abraham Bloemaert, Roeland Saverij, Jan van Scorel, Dirck van Baburen and Gerard van Honthorst. While the works are very different, seeing them paired with the videos demonstrates the universal messages they carry, and their enduring relevance.

Kramlich sits on various boards and committees, including at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and on the international council at Tate. She and her husband have also sponsored works for museums, as well as establishing the New Art Trust, which focuses on conservation, presentation and education about video works.

Like many other collectors, her concern is what will happen to the group in the future. “I want it to stay together,” she says, “and I want it to be displayed. We are talking to various institutions. We are still trying to figure out the best use of the collection and how we want the works to be seen.

“I was told a long time ago you are not really a collector until you have things in storage,” Kramlich says, laughing. Indeed much of their collection is stored, so the Utrecht show offers a rare chance to see a few of their holdings without going all the way to California.

To January 15, centraalmuseum.nl