ARTLAWS Alex Zoppa and Robyn Rosenfeld

Nancy Baker Cahill is an award-winning interdisciplinary artist whose hybrid practice focuses on systemic power, consciousness, and the human body. As a new media artist, Cahill creates immersive and interactive  experiences, video installations, and conceptual blockchain projects rooted in the practice of drawing. Her monumental augmented reality artworks extend and subvert the lineage of land art, often confronting the climate crisis,  social issues,  and civics. Nancy’s work calls for a more equitable future for all, as realized early on in her career  with her collaborative art series “Exit Wounds” in conjunction with the non profit Homeboy Industries led by Father Greg Boyle. https://homeboyindustries.org/
Cahill is Founder and Artistic Director of 4th Wall, a free AR public art platform exploring site interventions, resistance, and inclusive creative expression. Her geolocated AR installations have been exhibited globally and have earned her profiles in the New York Times, Frieze Magazine, and The Art Newspaper, and she was also included in ARTnews’ list of 2021 'Deciders'.  
Cahill's work has been exhibited internationally at museums and galleries, and her solo exhibition ‘Slipstream: Table of Contents’ was recently acquired by LACMA.  In 2021, she was awarded the Williams College Bicentennial Medal of Honor and received the City of Los Angeles’ Master Artist Fellowship. She is a 2022 LACMA Art and Tech Grant recipient and this year, she’ll have her first solo mid-career retrospective at the Georgia Museum of Art. 
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KIKI SMITH is one of the most influential visual artists in the contemporary world.  Since the 1980s, Smith has created a prolific and provocative body of work that explores embodiment and the natural world.  Utilizing a broad variety of materials and mediums – including sculpture, printmaking, photography, drawing and textiles – Smith’s unique style draws on mythology, folklore, fairytales and religious iconography, while also exploring the human form in all of its frailty and mystery.

We had the privilege of speaking with Kiki Smith on the eve of the unveiling of her rare and momentous public work  – a monumental mosaic installation inside the new Grand Central Madison train station in New York City, commissioned by the MTA . This work includes five individual large scale mosaics depicting several Long Island landscape scenes including River Light, inspired by the way the sunlight hits the East River; The Water’s Way rendered in stunning shades of indigo; The Presence, which shows a deer among striking  gold reeds; The Spring featuring  fowl surrounded by forest during  springtime growth;  and The Sound which showcases Long Island’s waterway in a magnificent 28-foot wide mural.

Smith has been the subject of numerous solo exhibitions worldwide including over 25 museum exhibitions. Her work has been featured at five Venice Biennales and in 2017 was awarded the title of Honorary Royal Academician by the Royal Academy of Arts in London.  In 2006, Smith was recognized by TIME Magazine as one of the “TIME 100: The People Who Shape Our World.” Her numerous awards include the Skowhegan Medal for Sculpture (2000), the Nelson A. Rockefeller Award (2010), the U.S. Department of State Medal of Arts (2013), and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the @intsculpturectr (2016).  Kiki is also an adjunct professor at NYU and Columbia University.
 
We join the artist as she walks through the Lower East Side of Manhattan on a late afternoon.


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GABRIEL GONZALEZ is a Grammy Award winning singer-songwriter and leader of a new break-out collective of world class musicians embodying the truth of the Los Angeles Latin experience –  La Verdad.  Since 2015 Gonzalez has also been a lead singer for Boogaloo Assassins, the famed 12-piece Latin Boogaloo, Salsa, and Latin Soul band with whom Gonzalez  is about to release a new album.

Since the beginning of his career as a child performer in Mexican films, Gonzalez (also known as Gabrielito) established himself as a notable actor and singer on both stage and screen.  In addition to appearing in Allison Anders’ classic indie film Mi Vida Loca, Gonzalez also toured with Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Tony-winning musical In the Heights.
 
This ARTLAWS podcast interview was recorded live at the Circo De Los Muertos concert at Sofitel Los Angeles in Beverly hills.


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ISABEL VINCENT is an award-winning writer and investigative journalist and the author of the new  book "Overture of Hope: Two Sisters' Daring Plan That Saved Opera's Jewish Stars from the Third Reich."  The book uncovers the amazingly true story of Ida and Louise Cook -- two British opera fans who masterminded their own plan to rescue dozens of German and Austrian Jews from a terrible fate.

Vincent began her career in the 1990's as a foreign correspondent for the  Globe and Mail, covering the conflicts that led to the Kosovo War.  Since 2008, she has worked as an investigative reporter for the New York Post with a focus on exposing corruption, fearlessly pursuing the truth in an age where truth is under attack.

Some of Vincent's other books include "See No Evil: The Strange Case of Christine Lamont and David Spencer"; "Bodies and Souls: The Tragic Plight of Three Jewish Women Forced into Prostitution in the Americas"; "Gilded Lily: Lily Safra: The Making of One of the World's Wealthiest Widows" and her moving culinary memoir "Dinner with Edward",  which along with “Overture of Hope”  have been adapted for the big screen. 
Vincent's writings have appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times, the Independent, and many other international publications.  She is also the recipient of numerous prestigious honors, including the Canadian Association of Journalist’s Award for Excellence in Investigative Journalism and the National Jewish Book Award.



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Susan Davis is the Founder & President of DESERT X,  a site-specific, contemporary art exhibition that is held in the Coachella Valley of Southern California every two years. 

Since 2017, DESERT X has pushed the boundaries of art beyond the gallery walls to present work that engages with the public in desert environments, through unique installations created by acclaimed artists from around the world.

While responding to and amplifying the dramatic range of land and seascapes within  the desert environment, Desert X is also a visual articulation of the critical issues facing our world today -- including conservation, climate change, segregation, false historical narratives,  and indigenous land rights.

Since 2020, Susan Davis has expanded Desert X beyond California – producing two biennial exhibitions in the striking landscapes of the AlUla region of Saudi Arabia.  With Desert X returning in 2023, we spoke with Susan about the process of creating a site specific endeavor of this enormous scale,  the responsibility of art to spark crucial dialogue  and why she always welcomes a little controversy. 




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Vera Mulyani is considered the world’s first Marschitect.  She is the Founder and CEO of Mars City Design, a global  innovation platform  whose purpose is to research, conceptualize, and design eco-sustainable cities for life on Mars.  Mulyani’s concept of urbanism on Mars also advocates a self-sustaining lifestyle on Earth.
Growing up in the polluted slums of Jakarta with the trauma of civil war as her brutal reality, Vera relied on her imagination as a means of survival and vital escape.  Her persevering dreams  of a bigger world and brighter future led her, against all odds, to Paris where she enrolled at the Beaux-Arts as an undergraduate and later studied Architecture, engineering and Urban Design at France’s prestigious Ecole d'Architecture de Nantes where she received her graduate degree. 
Vera is also a filmmaker, and has written and directed three award winning films – two of which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival.  She also cast both Emmy award winning actress Julia Garner and Oscar winner Jon Batiste  in their first on-screen roles.  In addition, Vera has  exhibited her paintings and photography in galleries around the world. 
* Vera is featured as part of REBEL YELL – a new series from ARTLAWS that features young emerging artists who are changing the face of our cultural landscape.


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