The Conversation Art Podcast

Michael Shaw
  • 4.5 (253)
  • Visual Arts
  • Monthly

A podcast featuring both one-on-one and three-way roundtable conversations with contemporary artists, dealers, curators, and collectors--based in Los Angeles, but reaching nationally and internationally.

  1. 3d ago

    End of October OLD NEWS, including a lot about money(!)

    In this installment of the OLD NEWS, we talk missing Cady Noland artwork, the protests in Paris and their effect on Art Basel there, Libbie Mugrabi's back-rent debt, and Canada Gallery's shrinking staff.  To hear even more OLD NEWS, including stories from Cheryl's Diner and a great white shark photobombing beachgoers, you can hear all the OLD NEWS by becoming a Patreon supporter:   https://www.patreon.com/theconversationpod Here are the excerpts in case you want to see the photos and videos: FIND THE NOLAND! OOZEWALD WANTED POSTER by greg https://tinyurl.com/57esk39v> The important news from Cady Noland's new exhibition at Gagosian in London is that an edition of Oozewald has been stolen, and the artist wants it back. According to the STACK OF WANTED POSTERS WHICH CONSTITUTE A WORK IN THE SHOW, ed. 3 of 4 of Oozewald (1989) was last seen in September 1995 at Paula Cooper Gallery. No information on the circumstances of its disappearance, the 31 years of silence about the theft, or whether the complications of broken provenance might affect the work's authenticity. …. Oozewald is, according to its original label, 6 x 4 1/2 feet by 3/8 inches of aluminum with flag. Which does not include the bracket, or the Coca-cola drinking cup which was mentioned only on the sculpture's appearance at MMK Frankfurt. In case you find a different Oozewald. For any information, the poster says, contact OOZEWALD@CADYNOLAND.INFO There is, the poster says, a reward, as if the work wasn't enough. _greg.org >>> ART BASEL'S 'CYCLICAL DOWNTURN.' Following months of heated negotiations, Art Basel will hold onto its spot in Miami through 2031, thanks to a new deal with city officials that reduces the annual rent paid by the fair to the city from nearly $1 million to $500,000, plus additional city credits for police, fire, and EMT services, reports the New York Times. To convince officials that the art fair deserved a rent reduction, Art Basel chief executive Noah Horowitz reportedly gave a far less flattering picture of the company's finances and the art market as a whole. He also threatened to abandon Miami Beach for Las Vegas, or another city. Horowitz said that recently reported profits for the fair's parent company, MCH, followed years of "extraordinary losses in which MCH almost faced insolvency," which led them to take "in a large investment from James Murdoch's Lupa Systems family office to stabilize the business." All Art Basel fairs were "currently facing a cyclical downturn, the likes of which we haven't seen since the launch of Art Basel Miami Beach in the early 2000s," he said. Meanwhile, galleries are limiting fair participation or shuttering in response to a slower market, he added, which is why Art Basel Miami Beach will host 250 galleries this December, instead of 283 last year.  _ARTnews >>> NEW YORK'S MASSEY KLEIN GALLERY CLOSES New York's Massey Klein Gallery will close its doors after nine years, saying that after initial success, the numbers no longer add up to pay for its showroom on the Lower East Side and support the dealers' family and the gallery's artists. Husband-and-wife team Garrett Klein and Ryan Massey felt called by their Christian faith to open the gallery, and say they'll continue on with nomadic projects. "Our relationship with God has informed what we want the gallery to feel like," said Klein in a phone interview. "We're all accustomed to feeling uninvited at galleries. We wanted to create a place of warmth."  _ARTnews LANDLORDS DEMAND NYC SOCIALITE SELL HER $30M BASQUIAT TO PAY DEBTS https://tinyurl.com/ypsxybx4> The owners of a posh New York City pad are demanding embattled art world socialite Libbie Mugrabi hawk her multimillion-dollar Jean-Michel Basquiat painting to cough up the massive pile of back rent she owes. The landlords of The Park Mansion, a stunning Beaux-Arts building at 320 E 82nd St. in Yorkville claim that Mugrabi — the ex-wife of billionaire art dealer David Mugrabi — owes them $2.3 million in unpaid rent that she was first ordered to fork over in 2023. Libbie Mugrabi lived in the luxurious $28,000-per-month condo for less than a year between 2019 and 2020. While her lease expired in November 2020, she stopped paying rent that April, according to court papers filed in Manhattan Supreme Court. She was first court-ordered to pay $1.8 million in 2023, but her landlords sued her again in June to pay them with 9% interest. Now, they are nudging her once again to pay up — this time by trying to force her to sell her Untitled 1982 Basquiat.  _NYPost >>> NY'S CANADA GALLERY FACED THREAT OF DISSOLUTION AFTER BACKER'S LAWSUITS https://tinyurl.com/mr362a42> Canada, an esteemed New York gallery, faced the threat of closure last year after a backer filed two lawsuits against the space's founders. A New York court ruled that the gallery could remain open, and neither lawsuit appears to be active, with the most recent filings for both posted at the start of this year. However, in the year and a half since the lawsuits were filed, three of Canada's partners—including one of the gallery's founders—left the operation. Five artists have also exited the gallery Jean Lignel, a French collector, filed his lawsuits in February 2025 with the New York County Supreme Court. One of his lawsuits sought the dissolution of Canada, while the other alleged that the gallery's other partners had improperly withdrawn more than $3 million, something that they denied in a counterclaim against Lignel. The Canada partners' counterclaim was discontinued earlier this year. Though Lignel's lawsuits have gone through a series of appeals, neither seems to be currently ongoing. Lignel began conversations with the gallery in 2008 as a recession wrought havoc upon the New York art market and the global economy. A 2008 document submitted alongside the lawsuit shows that Canada founders Sarah Braman, Suzanne Butler, Phil Grauer, and Wallace Whitney agreed to bring on Lignel as a backer. According to the agreement, Lignel paid $150,000 in exchange for a 50 percent ownership stake in the gallery. In one of his lawsuits, Lignel alleged that, between 2009 and 2023, Canada's founders "withdrew" more than $3 million, which he claimed ran "in violation of the operating agreement." In their counterclaim, the Canada founders said that Lignel "knew that the Founding Members were being compensated for the services," and that the "compensation for their services is well below market—the going rate for partner salaries for New York art galleries comparable to the Gallery is between $350,000 to $395,000 per year." In May 2025, a judge quickly denied the motion to dissolve Canada, saying that Lignel had failed to prove that the gallery couldn't operate according to the terms of the agreement he signed. Moreover, the judge said, Lignel "concedes that the gallery has recently hired additional managers, who are not LLC members, thereby demonstrating that the gallery is a functioning business." "CANADA's four founding members—Phil Grauer, Sarah Braman, Wallace Whitney and Suzy Butler—were deeply disappointed that Mr. Lignel, their Paris-based business partner, did not support the Gallery as it expanded its operations, including during a challenging period in the art market, and subsequently sought its dissolution through litigation," a lawyer for the Canada partners told in an email. "However, as the Court's decision confirmed, the Gallery remains fully operational and continues its artist-run, community-focused programming and mission. While CANADA regrets that the members' dispute involved court intervention, the Gallery remains hopeful that it can work collaboratively with Mr. Lignel in the future." According to a 6sqft profile of Lignel from 2016, the year he put his West Village home on the market for $14.5 million, he is a music producer, publisher, and entrepreneur with a collection that includes works by Andy Warhol, Keith Haring, Ida Applebroog, and more. His involvement with Canada had not been reported prior to the lawsuits, which have gone unmentioned in the press until now. While Lignel's lawsuits were pending, Canada appears to have quietly scaled down its operations behind the scenes. A comparison of Canada's current staff page on its website and a version from October 2025 that was saved by the Internet Archive suggests that the gallery has shed two partners in the past year. Suzanne Butler, a Canada founder who was a defendant in Lignel's lawsuits, is no longer listed as a partner. Tif Sigfrids, who closed her gallery in Athens, Georgia, in 2024 and joined Canada as a partner, also quietly left the gallery. Sigfrids declined to comment; ARTnews was unable to reach Butler. One more partner left ahead of Butler and Sigfrids: Christiana Ine-Kimba Boyle, who exited her post as senior director of Pace Gallery in 2024 to become a partner and co-owner of Canada, where she formerly worked as a senior director. In March 2025, after only two and a half months as partner and co-owner at Canada, Boyle launched her own itinerant gallery, Gladwell Projects, which has staged exhibitions in Harlem, Jersey City, and Paris. She declined to comment. An archived version of Canada's roster available via the Wayback Machine also suggests that the gallery has shed five artists since Lignel's lawsuits were filed: Alex Greenberger ARTnews

  2. Oct 12

    NYC artist Nancy Goldring- living in Westbeth for 50+ years, artist housing in the West Village that's a world unto itself

    New York City-based artist Nancy Goldring talks about: The artist building in the West Village of Manhattan, Westbeth, where she's lived since 1971, when she moved in as a graduate assistant, and was paying $144 a month (which actually seemed like it might be too much at the time); her experience being on the committee reviewing applicants to live in the building; how once you get into Westbeth as a tenant, it's an irreversible tenancy (though one artist she knows was thrown out for subletting); the changes in and near her neighborhood, now full of restaurants full of people in their 20s and 30s "talking too loudly;" how there's a center for the elderly in Westbeth where you can have a 3-course meal for $2.50 (Nancy doesn't partake because "I'm too picky," she says), and how a lot of residents are on social security, including a 100-year-old poet; how she never would have been able to live in New York, especially on her adjunct teacher salary, if it wasn't for Westbeth; how much jubilation there's been around Mayor Zamdani, which she's experienced firsthand from talking to strangers (on the subway, etc.); how many of her students at Montclair State, the last place she taught, were ferociously conservative and anti-intellectual… On the back end of the conversation (available to Patreon supporters- this podcast relies on listener support; please consider becoming a Patreon supporter for as little as $1/month: https://www.patreon.com/theconversationpod), Nancy talks about: how she used creative approaches to teaching drawing, including having students draw tones from an out-of-focus projection, upside down, to get them free, unshackled from dependence on others' opinions about art, getting them to think for themselves; her art process, which involves using multiple projectors and a bas relief, a bespoke approach to image making which all started with an accidental capturing of multiple images on her Venetian blinds; how for her first show using the projectors, in the late '70s, got a review in the Village Voice, calling her 'Window Woman;' that what she's after in her projection-hybrids is depth, and since analog film retains that sense of depth, she only works with analog projectors, whereas digital only creates edges, and seems thin to be; how the spirit of the1970s NY art world was doing things no one had done before, and a sense of anything goes, was followed by the 1980s of certain styles/trends becoming models for the market that everyone (collectors, museums and even artists) would latch on to, a move that so frustrated Nancy that she stopped teaching contemporary art in 1982; how the art world (and many artists within it) has reached a peak level of shamelessness, one in which artists hire agents and stylists to help them boost their image; how the 70s NY art scene had a collaborative spirit, and "a sense of evolution and potential that was exciting;"  and in the final stretch of our call/video, Nancy gives a tour of both her bas-relief/projection artworks, as well as a bit of the inside of her apartment, which has a close-by view of the Hudson river.

  3. Sep 26

    a return to the OLD NEWS, plus Lucien Smith mini-tribute

    This episode is a mix of excerpts from OLD NEWS (Jeff Weiss's nightly email blast of art-related content) and a Lucien Smith obituary, including comments from readers of the obit more than the obituary itself. George Stoll, a comment from The Art Daddy, and passages from a long Atlantic article by Sebastian Smee exploring the career and influence of Norman Rockwell, particularly on the films of David Lynch, round out the episode. In BONUS footage for Patreon, there is more tribute to Lucien Smith and more content from the article on Rockwell, and Lynch.   Lucien Smith tributes plus other OLD NEWS Sept. 9th, 2026 (ny times) Lucien Smith, Art-World Star Whose Career Abruptly Turned, Dies at 37 A phenom in his 20s, he became the poster child for Zombie Formalism before abandoning the gallery frenzy for Montauk. Chris Wiley on The conversation: https://theconversationpod.com/epis-356-zombie-formalism-debt-aesthetics-and-ai-art-new-yorker-writer-critic-chris-wiley/  WOW- I HONESTLY HAD NO IDEA PETER HUJAR PHOTOGRAPHED GEORGE STOLL (IN 1983). INCREDIBLE https://tinyurl.com/48y8tfd3 Police in Illinois recover 650 rolls of toilet paper amid rise in homecoming week vandalism https://tinyurl.com/44wzryvt> Would probably be a good time to introduce all of you to George Stoll's untitled 1990s artwork where he recreated two rolls of toilet paper out of white silk chiffon, hand-quilted & lovingly embroidered with tiny roses. In other news, George Stoll is brother of John Waters actress Mink Stole https://tinyurl.com/2huhzp69>   _MichaelLobel MISUNDER­STANDING NORMAN ROCKWELL  by Sebastian Smee https://tinyurl.com/248bd98c> https://tinyurl.com/557ru2aw> https://tinyurl.com/ykwh5rj2> In the 2nd half, available to Patreon Supporters of the show, we share former guest Greg Allen's (greg.org) tribute to Smith, and more from Smee's article on Norman Rockwell and David Lynch. Visit https://theconversationpod.com/ for all things The Conversation, including past episodes, social media, the Intrepid Artist, and more

  4. Sep 6

    How a broken plate catapulted a career: Nyack, NY-based artist Rob Strati

    Nyack, New York-based artist Rob Strati talks about: Living in Nyack, as far as its local arts community and proximity to NYC; his early artist years in San Francisco, including driving a cab for several years, and eventually getting into tech (starting as a web designer at Yahoo) as a day job, always to support the art even though it became a big part of his then-identity; how his 25 years working in research, marketing and technology all started when he was exposed to web design while staying with friends in DUMBO, Brooklyn; how he shared his 2025 earnings in an end-of-year newsletter, why he did so, and what kinds of responses he received (without naming the number here, the earnings are in the top 1% of artists); how he's applied his research experience in tech to his sales approaches, including making different entry points available to collectors, and taking what he learns from selling direct to collectors on Instagram and applying to future sales; how he's been doing non-exclusive consignment agreements up until now, but is signing on with a London-based gallery for exclusive sales in the U.K. and Turkey, and why he's doing so; the fact that he's had such success selling on IG that it's allowed him to establish consignment-based agreements with galleries as opposed to contractual ones, which has given him more autonomy and leverage than most artists (who do traditional contractual agreements); how he took Dec. of '25 and the first two months of '26 "off," to recover from the grind of 2025, did a lot of skiing with his 13-year-old son, and generally recharged, while acknowledging the accomplishment of such a strong year; the nine different galleries he's currently working with (including Duane Read Gallery in St. Louis and Fremin Gallery in New York); the origin story of his signature art object(s), which has been the work that's transformed his career, all staring with his wife breaking a plate in the kitchen, and how he saw an expanded world in it; the conversation around his work as far as decorative art- how it fits into that lineage, and the emotional connection to that tradition, in contrast to the conceptual tendencies of contemporary art, but how he sees elements of both. In the 2nd half of our conversation, available to Patreon Supporters of the show, Rob talks about: How he first improvised the drawing that accompanied that first broken plate piece, and how subsequently he evolved his style in extending the plate patterns into extended landscapes and scenes; we geek out materials, including his determining that Signo pens are the best for the fine lines that he needs (and we geek out on pens for a moment); why being transparent about income (his income) is something he stands behind, including investing in the marketing of his work (boosting posts, advertising, and so on), and how last year, for example, he spent 50k on marketing his work; the "Decision I Did Not Take Lightly," which was his canceling his exhibition at the James Cancer Center Gallery at Ohio State University (his alma mater) because of it being under the umbrella of Leslie Wexner, the philanthropist who funded the Wexner Center for the Arts as well as many schools at OSU, and who has very much been part of the Jeffrey Epstein saga, how Rob was able to shift the show to the Columbus Museum by renting out a space there and continue the conversation about justice and making space for him to stand up for it, but also recognizing how difficult it is to stand up to a boss whom your livelihood depends on; and his job history – prior to striking out on his own making a living from his work alone – including being fired a lot, partly for standing up against abuse in the workplace. To watch recent episodes of The Conversation, check out our YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@theconversationartpodcast

  5. Aug 8

    The Conversation presents: The Intrepid Artist, an Advice podcast- Episode 1, with co-host Arleene Correa Valencia

    "To Post, or Not to Post….That is the Question" In this pilot episode of The Intrepid Artist, the main question asked by a listener is whether sharing (or even having) one's social media plays an important role in grant and open call decisions. Arleene advocates for developing a thoughtful, engaging and empathetic feed, as opposed to one in which an artist is simply constantly sharing work. She wants a feed in which the artist shares who they really are, beyond the gallery setting; whether to use Stories vs. Posts, and the importance of sharing what you want to share, and how Arleene likes to be able to share her failures on IG as a way of showing her full output and working through those failures; whether you would make the work if it isn't/wasn't posted- a key question for artists to ask themselves, and how (of course) the ultimate objective is to be engaging in the studio. In the 2nd question, a listener asks how to get motivated to draw, to make work, which has Arleene recalling a lifechanging moment in her first real drawing class in art school, led by a professor who asked his students if they needed – not just wanted – to be there; Arleene and I share our very different takes on what it feels like being in the studio- euphoria vs. reality; how the research and other behind-the-scenes work done in the studio that's necessary for making our work goes unseen, and for Arleene that means it's hard to have gratitude when she's not making the art. Become a Patreon supporter of the podcast for twice as much content, for as little as $1/month, here: https://www.patreon.com/theconversationpod In the extended Patreon BONUS section, Arleene talks about her forms of meditation- the gym and working out, as well as swimming, as key rituals that help to clear her head before she gets to the studio, so when she's there, she's in the most optimal mental space to focus on her work.

  6. Jun 20

    Lauren O'Neill-Butler on Artist Activism, Artforum magazine and the seminal Project Row Houses in Houston

    Hunter College professor and author of The War of Art, Lauren O'Neill-Butler talks about: Her 12 years at Artforum magazine, including its balance between advertising and hard-core art writing, and how her chapter on Fierce P***y was written while at Artforum; the classes on Activism she's taught at Hunter College, which were not to get students to become activists but to make them aware of its history and context; how teaching activism and writing the book were both 'rage containers' but also ways to inspire difference; how activisms 'expire,' including in the case of her colleague Carrie Moyer, whose hardcore activism (including her campaigns for Dyke Action Machine) lasted two years and followed by going back to the studio and making abstract paintings; the difference between 'activists' and 'artists activists,' which culminated in a question at one of her book events at the New York Public Library: "why are you focusing on artists? What makes them so special? Why can't you talk about other activists too?" and how, in addition to bringing an aesthetic to their activism, as part of the answer, artists are beleaguered; the seminal moment in the artist Rick Lowe's career, when a student living in the 3rd Ward of Houston asked him why, as opposed to just showing them the problems in their neighborhood that they were already aware of, wasn't he being creative about coming up with solutions?; her contention that all art is political, but what does an artist's role look like in terms of their actions; how there's no purity in America and no purity in activism, and how Project Row Houses wouldn't have become as robust without the corporate effort; Sarah Schulman's recent writing on the importance of solidarity, and how the left keeps pointing the figure and keeps eating itself; what Project Row Houses looks like, including the mix of affordable and market rate housing, artists who live in them, and expensive condos recently going up in the neighborhood amidst preserved housing in the 3rd Ward of Houston. In the 2nd half of our conversation, available to paid Patreon Supporters of the podcast, Lauren talks about: Why she included (former guest) Ben Davis's critique of Project Row Houses, along with a contextual framework on the challenges of limiting the effects of gentrification, primarily as a way to point out that it isn't artists who are the problem fixers, it's our government representatives; for Rick Lowe and Project Row Houses, it was about trying to do better for the locals; the highly influential and impactful activist organization P.A.I.N. (Prescription Addiction Intervention Now), started by artist Nan Goldin, which was instigated by the terrific irony of the Tate Museum, with £4 million in donations from the Sackler Family Trust, purchased Goldin's "The Ballad of Sexual Dependency" at the same time as she was addicted to Oxycontin (the highly addictive pain medication that led to an epidemic, of which the Sacklers are known for); the successful objective of P.A.I.N. (which is a non-partisan group despite it being formed by a politically progressive artist) to eliminate the art-washing of the Sacklers by putting their names on so many museum wings, and in turn what it was like for PAIN members to attend the protests with fellow protesters who were in very different cultural spheres, including hard-core trumpers; how savvy PAIN was in cultivating and working with the press, which really got their actions thoroughly covered, and even their private meetings were recorded, which helped provide lots of content for Laura Poitras's documentary on Goldin; how Lauren uses YouTube video footage of the PAIN protests, which were so well thought out and dramatic, in her classes; why she didn't right about the Stop Oil! Activist actions in museums (because it's mainly taken place in the U.K.); how the effectiveness of a protest depends very much on the press coverage and the level of circulation of the images from a given action; how most activisms have a figurehead (Goldin), and how it matters, for better or worse, when there's a public-facing person in a group; how successful activism depends on bringing in new blood and new ideas, and how big a factor burnout is for activists; the state of agitprop, or postering, today vs. the 90s- Carrie Moyer and Sue () of Dyke Action Machine would say that the street postering they did wouldn't work today, because there's just too much visual noise, and Lauren's nostalgia for the 90s for those reasons; the 'Secret Handshake' sculptures of trump and Epstein that have been making the rounds on social media around the world, work which she hates but recognizes as effective nonetheless; the hostile takeover of the New College of Florida, Lauren's undergraduate alma mater, by governor Desantis, and how she's been part of the alumni response to the takeover including the forming of nonprofits, a project that is very close to her heart and how she's been involved in it for the past three years, and the struggle of the school was recently featured on "Last Week Tonight with John Oliver."

  7. May 23

    Peter Hujar and Paul Thek's "Wonderful World That Almost Was," with writer and Frieze editor Andrew Durbin

    Writer and Frieze editor-in-chief Andrew Durbin talks about: His book tour for "The Wonderful World That Almost Was," which has been hectic; how he became familiar with Peter Hujar's work initially, and why his and Paul Tek's legacies really took off after their deaths; Peter's persona and personality as someone who could be as charming and engaging as can be, but also someone who flew off the handle with a volatile anger at some in his life, and how he actually using photography to deal with some of that anger; how Paul Tek appeared to be thoroughly charming and quintessentially hippie-ish from the various television footage of him in interviews, despite his ultimate distaste for and rebellion against the hippie archetype, and how he had an ongoing contradiction in wanting to be around people and then wanting to get away (he often questioned the love of those who loved him), which he did prolifically, from Miami right out of school to various parts of Italy throughout his adulthood; Peter's troubled relationship with his mother, who was emotionally abusive and neglectful, and whom was described by a boyfriend of Peter's at the time as "very good at being unsatisfied;" how Peter learned much of his photography skills working in commercial photos studios in the '60s and '70s (including that of Richard Avedon) and eventually applied and expanded them in the darkroom for his own work, and to what extent Gar Schneider, his friend and the printer of the work in his estate, will make prints posthumously from the estate;  In the 2nd half of the conversation, available to Patreon supporters, he covers: The legacies of Peter and Paul, including via Linda Rosenkranz's book "Peter Hujar's Day," which became a film by Ira Sachs, and how Andrew's book may just be part of the rise in their respective public profiles; how he was more interested in and relied on their own memories of their childhoods (and adulthoods) as opposed to thru the lenses of family; how Andrew melded with his subjects, and how consuming and  surprisingly somatic the experience of writing the book became, leaving him unsure how to re-fill his time once the writing finally ended; how thru writing the book he had to confront his own fears of AIDS, of death, and his insecurities, and the therapist who guided him gracefully through that process; how, despite the book being published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux, he still maintained his full-time job (editor of Frieze magazine), and in fact how much the book strained his finances, as biographies turn out to be expensive endeavors (with almost no opportunity for grants to support them); how the reason that Andrew's book and Ira Sachs' film (Peter Hujar's Day) are coinciding has to do with a hunger for authenticity, including especially a yearning for a time (the '70s) in New York when artists could live together in a community and scrape by financially on whatever they made, a time long-gone but one that even some young people are aware of; iconic writer/cultural critic Susan Sontag's relationships with Peter and Paul, the latter of whom became infatuated with her, and how Andrew showed her as 'an intoxicating' individual, and what that feels like; Paul's complex relationship with his sexuality, to the extent that he often pursued relationships with women, whom he dated quite often but never got serious with, and how sexuality was something he may have tormented himself over; how the actor who played Peter in "Peter Hujar's Day" could never fill Peter's robust shoes, but at the same time how happy Andrew is for how many people the film has brought to Peter's work; the differences between living in New York and London (where he lives now), including how London actually has more in common with Los Angeles in terms of its size and its more deliberate social dynamics whereas in New York you're constantly running into people everywhere; and how he'll finally be ready to transition to his next project once this one if finally done, as it's been such an immersive, somatic experience.

  8. Apr 25

    James Delbourgo on the 'Noble Madness' of collectors- from Charles Foster Kane to Norman Bates and others, and what Freud had to say about all of them

    James Delbourgo, professor of history at Rutgers University and author of A Noble Madness: the Dark Side of Collecting from Antiquity to Now, talks about: Why he's written about contemporary art so extensively, as a history academic who's very interested in the present, going to galleries and wondering who collectors are right now, raising a lot of questions about archetypes for what would become a big part of his book; how collectors can not only be defined as powerful, they can also be defined as weak, unhinged and deranged, among other things; how the profile of the collector, over time, is more a corkscrew than an arc, with the Freudian view of the collector was seen as repressed and even dangerous, whereas the contemporary collector is seen as being more about power; how in Robert Bloch's book "Psycho," upon which the movie was based, the Norman Bates character is actually described as a collector but one who is ugly and unprepossessing, and how the Hitchcock film turned him into a charming, ingratiating figure who turns the audience on his side; how really thoroughly experiencing housed collections (prime examples are the Hearst Castle in San Simeon, CA, and    the Vittoriale degli Italiani in Gardone, owned by Gabrielle d'Anunzio) was embedded in his writing the book; the collector as puppeteer, as orchestrator (and collector) of people, as William Randolph Hearst was; how encountering someone's place, and their things, is "a physical experience that constitutes the way you understand this person and your relationship to them," as James put it; and how Freudian interpretation has had such a lasting relevance over the years, even as it's gone out of fashion. In the 2nd half of our conversation, available to Patreon Supporters of the podcast, you'll hear James talk about: How hoarding, like the Middle Ages, has waned, and is tossed around far too lazily; the 'l' word, as in "loser," which he used to describe Robert Bloch's Norman Bates, whom he qualifies as a 'lovable loser,' particularly because collectors like Bates collect authentically, out of passion, not for financial gains; how he couldn't quite get the marketing department to change the subtitle of his book (particularly "The Dark Side" part), and why he's interested in authentic collectors, those who collect for love, with no thoughts of profits or strategy, the type of collector who he believes is vindicated in the end, as opposed to the Charles Foster Kane-type collector, who collects to accumulate; the democratization of collecting, including 'garbologists,' in which everything can, and does, get commodified; countercultural collectors, who collect things like deformed animal corpses, their own child's placentas, and other curiosities, and how they don't care what people think of them, or in fact that they want to defy popular opinion…as James put it: "their truth to self is uncompromised…by notions of taste or fine arts or utilitarianism…they're the freest people of all…they've freed themselves from the tyranny of the respectable opinion of other people;" and finally he describes an exhibition about Marie Antoinette at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London (the lines to get in were staggering), a collector of shoes and porcelain and snuff boxes and furniture…who was so vilified/demonized for political reasons, as the enemy of the people…she is the classic case of the political demonization of a collector who is executed as if it would purge the suffering of her subjects; the most classic case of that political question around the collector, and how, ironically, it was her execution that made her immortal.

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A podcast featuring both one-on-one and three-way roundtable conversations with contemporary artists, dealers, curators, and collectors--based in Los Angeles, but reaching nationally and internationally.

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