The Art Show

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5.0 (2)
VISUAL ARTS
UPDATED WEEKLY

Visual artists tell you why and how they create! From studio visits, intimate interviews, and live issues, we take art out of the gallery and into your ears.

15 HRS AGO

How are a new generation of diasporic Australian artists working with their cultural material?

The histories our families share can be in the stories we tell, the food we eat, the objects that are passed down from one generation to the next. Finding our own place in those histories can be difficult, but it can also be exciting and crucial. How are Australian artists from the Asian diaspora creating their own stories? And how are they reckoning with the charged history of museum collections? Leyla Stevens uses her camera as a tool to engage with interconnected webs of song, performance, and environmental reverence. In her work, deeply beautiful sequences of Balinese jungles are punctuated with the sonic intensity of cicadas and visions of shadow puppetry. While referencing objects and materials specific to his Chinese heritage, Remy Faint considers big questions: What are the limits of painterly abstraction? How can painting be used to gesture towards cultural multiplicity? And how can you learn about yourself and your family through creating artworks? The music in this episode is taken from Leyla Stevens' video work, PAHIT MANIS, night forest, which is on display at the Art Gallery of NSW

1h 10m
19 NOV

Radical textiles and experimental idiocy

A time-travelling, multi-regional journey through the histories of ceramics that explores how contemporary artists are politicising this elemental medium. Nell has said that “all my life is a practice", but what does that mean for the work she creates? And how has her latest piece, a quilt featuring work by 400 people, changed her perspective on collaboration? Glenn Barkley looks back at the many histories of ceramics, shares his favourite skewer, and discusses the impact of the “Anglosphere mind virus.”

54 min
12 NOV

Reframing the portrait

The self-portrait is perhaps the most ubiquitous image of the modern era, but how do contemporary artists use the portrait, not just to reflect themselves or their subject, but to shift our understanding of who we are and who we can be? Atong Atem takes us into her practice of self-portraiture, exploring how the history of beautification has inspired her images, and why a love for interior design has been an important influence. And acclaimed contemporary artist Joan Ross explains why fluorescent yellow became central to her work, and how she is reframing the colonial context of the portrait. Those trees came back to me in my dreams is on at the National Portrait Gallery until February 2025

1h 14m
5 NOV

Playgrounds and powerful women: the role of art in the public space

Public art comes with big price tags and excites popular opinion, but what does it actually take to produce such large work and how does art change our experience of the public sphere? Justene Williams takes a chainsaw to her art and to the idea that women in public should be passive, with giant feminine statues that are inspired by the sheela na gig carvings of the middle ages Lindy Lee discusses her major new work, Ouroboros, at the National Gallery of Australia. And for most artists, the idea of the audience climbing all over their work would be a nightmare, but for Mike Hewson, it's the whole point. Mike has created playgrounds across Australia that bring an artistic approach to the park and invite children and parents to accept a bit of risk into their lives.

54 min
29 OCT

Marc Newson's art inspirations and the story of Lucky Kwong

Australian designer Marc Newson has helped to define the shape of our world today. But what are the artworks that inspired his approach and shaped his world? NGV Curator Laurie Benson takes you into the history of Rodin's The Thinker and explores what happens when a work of art becomes a cultural phenomenon. Jason Phu shares his latest Phuism. And chef and restaurateur Kylie Kwong shares the deeply personal story of the artwork that watched over customers at her restaurant Lucky Kwong.

54 min
22 OCT

Tim Winton explores the Australian landscape and Lucienne Rickard brings audiences to tears

Tim Winton is one of Australia's greatest writers, but this year he found himself at the centre of the art world when Laura Jones' portrait took out the Archibald Prize. From his earliest experiences in a gallery to some of the earliest examples of art in Australia, Winton shares the work that's helped to shape his own keen observations of nature and our own place in it. Two guards from the Art Gallery of NSW explain what it takes to keep the work safe and introduce us to their own favourite paintings. And Lucienne Rickard discusses her new durational work, Wreck, and why she's chosen to erase her own art, leaving only ghostly shadows behind.

54 min
15 OCT

Whitney director emeritus Adam Weinberg and an art partnership in the Blue Mountains

Adam Weinberg ran the Whitney Museum of American Art, one of New Yorks most iconic art spaces, for over 20 years. And he is a quintessential New Yorker. More artful poetry from millennial slashie Jason Phu. A peek into the studio of another real life artist partnership in the Blue Mountains of NSW, Claire Healey and Sean Cordeiro. They will be exhibiting shortly here, and in 2025 at The Tokyo Art Fair

54 min
8 OCT

Art scandals, art couples and art poets

One of the most salacious art scandals to hit the global art market is that of the Wildensteins. Author and journalist Rachel Corbett brings us her New York Times investigation of this secretive and flawed family dynasty that stretches back five generations. Poet and sculptor Jason Phu with more of his artful silliness. Plus the idea of artists, romantically partnered with other artists is a powerful narrative. Nabila Nordin and Nick Modrzewski join us from LA.

54 min

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Visual artists tell you why and how they create! From studio visits, intimate interviews, and live issues, we take art out of the gallery and into your ears.