The Conversation Art Podcast

In this New OLD NEWS episode, Dr. Maiza Hixson and I talk about the profile of recent Turner Prize winner Jesse Darling in the New York Times-- We discuss Darling's persona as portrayed in the article, his anti-capitalist leanings; what his future as an artist looks like, reading beyond what he says in the article towards his immediate future, having accepted an Oxford professorship; the public no...

Writer, former art dealer, and author of All that Glitters - A Story of Friendship, Fraud, and Fine Art , Orlando Whitfield talks about: His interest in street photography, and how philosophy and critical thinking led him to apply and then attend Goldsmith's College; a quick update on his former friend, co-worker, collaborator and employer Inigo Philbrick, who in the book was sentenced to seven ye...

In Episode 362, artist, curator and recent PhD (from U.C. Santa Barbara) Maiza Hixson co-hosts this episode's OLD NEWS, featuring updates on: protests, including the case of #metoo being spray-painted onto Gustave Courbet's painting 'Origin de monde,' and how the article had a correction stating that the image was of a vulva , rather than a vagina ; the sentencing of a woman who was involved in th...

To listen to the complete episode with Adam Henry as well as all past Bonus episodes, please become a Patreon supporter of the podcast here:  https://www.patreon.com/theconversationpod New York-based artist  Adam Henry talks about: His recently ended show at Candice Madey gallery, and how he defines a 'successful show' (a mix of sales, critical dialogue generated, and future opportunities); the ad...

In the 2 nd conversation with author, recovering art worker and academic Valerie Werder , she talks about: the travails of clothes shopping for her job in the blue-chip gallery, not only how fraught it was but how much it brought up class issues as she moved through the sartorial gauntlet, where her appearance as a frosty, inaccessible object was part of her role; the complicated variations of cla...

Bianca Bosker , journalist and author of Get the Picture , talks about: The genesis of her deep dive into the art world - working with gallerists and artists, doing art fairs and galleries with collectors, and doing a stint as a security guard at the Guggenheim Museum – which largely came out of her need to learn whether she could learn to 'see' like an artist, as opposed to a 'normie Philistine,'...

This episode features the 1 st half of the full episode. To get the full version, please visit: Patreon.com/theconversationpod     The Conversation Art Podcast | creating a podcast that goes behind the scenes of the art worlds | Patreon Recovering art worker and author of the novel Thieves , Valerie Werder talks about: Her entrance into the art world via her demanding position at a fancy gallery i...

  Seattle-based artist and restorer Debra Broz talks about: Living in Seattle, where she moved to from Los Angeles a year and a half prior to our call; how Seattle is full of rule-followers who are also anarchists/anti-capitalists; how she found her Seattle studio, where it was important to have decent heat, especially for her sculptures; her reasons for leaving L.A. for Seattle, and some of the l...

Chris Wiley - Artist, New Yorker photography critic, and contributing editor at Frieze - talks about: His fleeing upstate to the Catskills during the pandemic, and what his relative disconnect from the art world and the city has been like since the move (though he still keeps a small apt. in the city); the differences between English and American artists in terms of academia vs. the market; his ep...

Michael Finkel discusses the remarkable story of Stéphane Breitwieser , the subject of his recent book, The Art Thief , including: The genesis of the book project, starting with a three-paragraph article, and eventually turning into a 10+ year-project; the style and methods of theft that Breitwieser and his partner, Anne-Catherine Kleinklaus, put to work; Michael's favorite Breitwieser crimes; his...

This special episode features return-guest-but-more-co-host Deb Klowden Mann to discuss the recent New Yorker profile of mega-dealer Larry Gagosian . Deb starts us off by updating us on her closing of her eponymous gallery due to multiple health issues, which made the work unsustainable. We follow that update with our discussion of the article, including: Our respective histories with Gagosian and...

Long Beach-based artist and former produce field worker Narsiso Martinez talks about: Growing up in a small town in Oaxaca, Mexico (Santa Cruz Papalutla), with several brothers and sisters, and a mom and dad who were often on the road for work; his resistance and questioning of working in the fields, something his family did when he was growing up as a way to have food on hand in tighter times; a...

Connecticut- and New York City-based artist Alexis Rockman talks about: His semi-exodus from Manhattan, where he's lived his whole life, to a fairly rural part of Connecticut called Warren; leaving his Tribeca studio of 33 years and building a new one on the property of their house in Warren; his early love and interest in animals through his anthropologist mom's encouragement which led to everyth...

Hungarian billionaire Gabriela and artist and architect Andi Schmied talk about: Andi's residencies, across Asia and Europe, as well as the Triangle Arts residency in DUMBO, Brooklyn, where she first connected with her fellow Hungarian, the billionaire Gabriela; some of the developments around the world that led her to the realization that there's a glut of useless, ultra-wealthy housing that's no...

Art Advisor Lisa Schiff has been in the news over the last two weeks, because of lawsuits being filed against her by clients who weren't given the artworks they paid for, and Schiff has subsequently filed for bankruptcy. How did this happen? Was there any indication, from the warm and thoughtful conversation I had with her in late 2014, that anything like this would happen down the road?  We re-vi...

Brooklyn-based artist Nancy Blum talks about: Her relationship with Judaism, both growing up and as an adult, where her exploration of healing and self-soothing from generational trauma, which ultimately connects with her art; her alternative interpretation of the word 'therapeutic,' in relation to art-making, how it can be something deeply personal that artists are trying to share; the use of flo...

In this in-between (342 and 343) episode, I talk about the new Bonus Episode with Stefanie Kogler-Heimburger (for subscribers only), and recent OLD NEWS including a photo contest winner who used AI to generate his image and subsequently withdrew his win; a successful Union strike at RISD; and art vs. advertising in the form of a muffin mural for a bakery in Conway, New Hampshire. To access the new...

Berlin-based artist and co-curator of the exhibition ' Class Issues: Art Production in and out of Precarity ,' Norbert Witzgall talks about: The term/phenomenon of "Hope Labor," which drives the economy of fine art and is based on the presumption that your hard work will pay off when you 'make it;' how Berlin has become prohibitively expensive for artists, which among other things has led to artis...

In this  Conversation MIDWAY - between epis. 340 and 341 - I talk about the bonus episode for Patreons, featuring Blum-Weinberg-Keinholz-Rottweiler, as well as talk about the art services industry via the Worst Job Posting Ever Created, the Nan Goldin documentary, and Tom Sachs, among other related topics. If you would like to access Episode 340A, which features four great stories from Art Can Kil...

Episode 340- Veteran art handler and preparator Bryan Cooke talks about: Cooke's Crating , the business he started back in 1975, and how it's essentially a service business, one that has grown with the art market, particularly in the last 10 years; why they don't use the word 'art' in the company title, and how they discreetly move art around, especially high-priced works; how and why he self-publ...

In this Teaser for Episode 339A, which is only available to Patreon supporters of the show, we talk about becoming a supporter of the show, read from a bit of the intro to the book Art Can Kill, and talk about the comments from an article on the collector Adam Lindeman's upcoming March 9th auction at Christie's. If you would like to access Episode 339A, which features three great stories from Art...

Arts writer and former professional surfer Jamie Brisick talks about: w hat it was like being on the pro surfing tour back in his late teens and early 20s, and how he developed his Plan B career initially as a surfing writer before moving into arts & culture writing; how he comes to art/the art world with a relatively fresh perspective, and has experienced some unsavoriness in the upper spheres in...

n the 14 th installment of the podcast's Virtual Café, we take as our prompt a Dec. review by NYTimes art critic Holland Cotter about politics in art: About 10 artists in the Virtual Café (including past guests Ianna Frisby of Art Advice and William Powhida) talk about art and politics, including successful examples of political art; the nimbleness of capitalism to absorb all things protest; the c...

Writer and cultural critic William Deresiewicz , author of The Death of the Artist , talks about: His motivations in writing the book, largely motivated by dispelling the myth that this (our current internet/social media era) was the greatest time ever to be an artist, as well as trying to understand how artists (not just visual, artists across all fields- writing, music, film & television) were a...

For this latest roundup of OLD NEWS stories, we're joined by a very special guest, to talk about: The MASS MoCA union; the new monument to the Central Park 5; the debate about bringing attention to the climate crisis by throwing food and attaching body parts to famous artworks in museum, as analyzed by Jerry Saltz in his piece 'MASHED POTATOES MEET MONET,' as well as through our own lenses on the...