DORIS FISHER: This Lichtenstein piece is the first unique piece that we bought.  

LAURA SATERSMOEN: Here’s Doris Fisher:

DORIS FISHER: We bought this, and it’s called ‘Nerts.’ Don’t ask me what it means, but it’s called ‘Nerts’. And if you look at Roy’s pictures, most of them have lips. Most of them have an eye.  He was a very interesting man.

LAURA SATERSMOEN: In fact, Nerts is an old slang word meaning ‘nonsense’ or ‘nuts.’   Roy Lichtenstein was one of the first artists the Fishers collected, and Nerts was the first major painting they bought.

DORIS FISHER: He died a number of years ago, much too young. He, I think, is an incredible artist. We have several of his prints. He was a remarkable artist.  We visited his gallery. We saw him working.  He was a wonderful man.

LAURA SATERSMOEN: Lichtenstein prints were the first thing they collected – for a very practical reason:

 DORIS FISHER: Don and I collected prints from the year, probably 1973 because we had these very modern, ugly buildings: ugly, modern, fifties. And this girlfriend of mine, who was my best friend, who I’d gone to Stanford with, I took her down there. Don’t ask me why, but I did. And she suggested that we buy prints and put prints on the wall. And so we started collecting prints.

LAURA SATERSMOEN: Here’s Don Fisher:

DON FISHER: Over time, you start understanding what an artist is all about. You go to enough retrospectives of Lichtenstein, you know what you like, you know the things that you think are the best. And I think we’ve done a pretty good job of selecting what we thought were the best periods.