Just throw your bag on the back seat, hit the gas and go. The romance of the open road endures. From long distance, soul-searching solo journeys of contemplation to the squalid, sordid mayhem of a group road trip, travelling the highways and byways of the world has a special allure. Roads are also emotive things in their own right of course, symbolic of progress and modernity, acting as facilitator, connector, and load-bearer.

The road is one arena of human activity in which the individual still experiences a palpable sense of freedom. Freedom in a world which seems hellbent on herding us around and preventing all unscripted action. There is no timetable on the road. There is no prescribed route. Choose the fastest way, or choose the prettiest way, but you choose. There’s also a much altered sense of scale and space. We have become wearily familiar with being crammed into the constricting cylinders of planes and trains. City driving is a lurching, staccato ride, choking with frustration and claustrophobia. On the open road, the chance to throw an elbow out of the window, lean back with the wind rushing in and watch the horizon spreading out ahead is undeniably beguiling.

Escapism, nostalgia, a control over your own destiny — the road offers all these things. It’s also the perfect mode of travel for photography, as this group show at Robert Koch Gallery illustrates. While the distant landscape seems to remain a constant, up close things pass by in a flash and photography is the natural medium with which to harness those fleeting moments. In The Road we see artists including Jeff Brouws, Michael Wolf, Andre Kertesz and Elliott Erwitt contemplating the constant tension between the man-made and the natural world, we encounter bypassed and forgotten towns, and stop in at dilapidated motels from the golden age of road travel. We see moments of explosive drama, and experience profound peace. Floor it to the San Francisco gallery before 5 September.

@KochGallery

Amy Stein
In Between, 2007/2008
chromogenic print
24 x 30 in. image on 34 x 41 in. mount
Printed in a limited edition of 10, plus 2 APs

Jeff Brouws
Capri Motel, Joplin, MO
1993/2009
pigment ink print
18 x 18 in. image on 24 x 20 in. paper
Printed in a limited edition of 20

Josef Koudelka
Dunkerque – Port, 1986/1991
gelatin silver print
13 1/2 x 41 15/16 in.

Elliott Erwitt
Idaho, 1954
gelatin silver print 16 x 20 in.