How Alice Sachs Zimet built a world-class collection by collecting only photography

Private Collection Visit • March 4, 2026 • New York City

"It's not art." Alice Sachs Zimet heard this more times than she can count when she started collecting photography in 1985.

Nearly forty years later, 347 photographs line the walls of her New York home. 148 different photographers, spanning from Henri Cartier-Bresson to Zanele Muholi.

It started with a field trip in December 1984. The legendary curator Sam Wagstaff, Robert Mapplethorpe's partner, had lent part of his collection to the Parrish Art Museum. Zimet went with a group from ICP, where she'd been an intern during the institution's inaugural year in 1975. One image stopped her: Andrew Bush's "Columbines." It reminded her of France, where her grandfather had lived for 50 years. It reminded her of her mother's garden. It reminded her of the Post-Impressionist work her parents loved. She had to have it. But she couldn't buy just one—she needed its companion, "Studio Kitchen." That impulse stuck. She still buys in pairs or threes.

Her acquisition budget came from her year-end bonus at Chase. Not much, but it was hers. She made it stretch—galleries, auctions, benefit sales, art fairs, even trades. And she made one crucial decision: no storage. "I purposely don't have storage. I live with my images surrounding me. With storage, I would not be able to control my collecting impulse. So my walls provide that boundary." Every photograph has to earn its place.

Walk through her home now and you're walking through a private museum. France is everywhere: Kertész's "Eiffel Tower, Paris" from 1929, Cartier-Bresson's "Picnic on the Banks of the Marne" from 1936, Marc Riboud's "Painter on the Eiffel Tower" shot in 1953, Brassaï's moody 1948 portrait of Picasso's studio.

Then there are the artist portraits. Bill Brandt photographing Cézanne's studio in 1951, long after the painter's death. Fred McDarrah catching Andy Warhol at his first New York exhibition in 1964. Richard Avedon's arresting 1962 portrait of Rudolf Nureyev. Ruth Orkin capturing Robert Capa at a Magnum luncheon in Paris in 1952.

But what really defines the collection is the humanity. Zimet calls them "emotional humanistic portraits of people living their lives," and once you see them, you understand. Zanele Muholi's six photographs documenting South Africa's queer movement with unflinching dignity. Sally Mann's "Damaged Child" from 1984: her own daughter, vulnerable and real. Nan Goldin's "Christmas at The Other Side," a drag queen in a Boston gay bar in the early 1970s. Christer Strömholm spending years in Paris's red-light district in the late 1950s, photographing young men dressed as female prostitutes. William Klein's "Gun 1": a boy pointing a weapon directly at you. Rosalind Solomon's "Portraits in the Time of AIDS" from 1987, faces marked by an era of loss.

It's not all heavy. Lisette Model caught 1940s New York in full exuberance, like this full-figured woman swimming joyfully at Coney Island between 1939 and 1941, a singer belting out a song at Sammy's Restaurant, society ladies gossiping at a Plaza Hotel fashion show in 1946. Arthur Leipzig's "Chalk Games, New York City" from 1950 freezes childhood in motion. Kids laughing, playing, living: Todd Webb and Bruce Davidson captured these moments too.

The collection includes roughly 20 female photographers representing about 60 images. Ilse Bing's "Spinning Dancer" from 1931. Margaret Bourke-White's "South African Miners" from 1950. Cindy Sherman's early "Untitled Secretary" from 1978. Berenice Abbott, Helen Levitt, Mary Ellen Mark, Susan Meiselas, Barbara Morgan, Martine Franck, Nan Goldin, Rineke Dijkstra, Gerda Taro, Sabine Weiss, Louise Dahl-Wolfe... masters, all of them. Zimet is particularly proud of this. The photography community, she notes, has always embraced women in ways other art forms didn't.

She's still hunting. Recent additions include Robert Mapplethorpe's "Ken Moody" from 1985, Seydou Keïta's "Bamako, Father and Child" from 1949, Francesco Scavullo's 1974 portrait of Mapplethorpe with his partner Sam Wagstaff, Christopher Makos's "Lady Warhol" from 1981, Édouard Boubat's whimsical "L'arbre et le poulet" from 1950, Marion Post Wolcott's 1939 "Member of the Wilkins Family Making Biscuits," and even a rare 1898 Toulouse-Lautrec self-portrait. When photographers Sabine Weiss and William Klein died in 2021 and 2022, Zimet bought works in their honor. She now owns six photographs by Zanele Muholi.

Her philosophy is simple: "Buy with your heart. Then buy with your brain. But never buy with your ears." Don't listen to the market, the hype, the dealers pushing this month's hot name. Trust what moves you. Then do your homework.

That wisdom now informs her third career. She chairs the Photography Curatorial Committee at Harvard Art Museums and the Collections Committee at ICP. She teaches at Christie's Education, ICP School, and Maine Media Workshops. Nearly 1,000 collectors and photographers have cycled through her workshops. As a collector herself, she protects the next generation the way she wishes someone had protected her.

On March 4, she's opening her doors to In Situ Art Club. Come see what happens when you know exactly what you love, and refuse to compromise!