Joan Kee is the rare combination of art historian and lawyer, and she's shared her skills in her new book, Models of Integrity: Art and Law in Post-Sixties America, which examines the legal issues major contemporary artists (from Tehching Hsieh to Felix Gonzales-Torres) have confronted in the past 60 years.Kee's research shows that since the 1960s, as artist projects have become more expansive and expensive, the world of lawyers and laws is becoming a bigger part of the equation. From discussions of Christo and Jeanne-Claude's "Running Fence" land art project (they actually had offers to place the project elsewhere, which would've been a lot easier) to Gordon Matta-Clark's Fake Estates micro-real estate project (there is no evidence the artist did or did not want to present this as an artwork), Kee's research demonstrates that the history of art has increasingly been intertwined with its legal realities.A special thanks to Brooklyn-based musician SunSon for providing the music to this episode, and you can check out his website sunson.band. You can also follow him on Facebook or Instagram.This and more in the current episode of our weekly Art Movements podcast.Subscribe to Hyperallergic’s Art Movements on iTunes, and anywhere else you listen to podcasts.

Born in 1923 in Pennsylvania to Lebanese parents, Helen Khal would go on to become an important presence in the modern art world of Lebanon as a prominent art critic and artist. A new exhibition at Beirut’s Sursock Museum tells the history of that period through her friendships and relationships with a coterie of artists and writers who would become some of the most important artist voices in the region.Commissioned by Ashkal Alwan for the Sursock Museum's biennial Home Works gathering of lectures, performances, exhibitions and events — most of which, with the exception of the exhibitions, has been indefinitely postponed because of the recent nationwide protests in Lebanon. The exhibition is titled At the still point of the turning world, there is the dance and includes work by Chafic Abboud, Yvette Achkar, Etel Adnan, Huguette Caland, Simone Fattal, Farid Haddad, Helen Khal, Saloua Raouda Choucair, Aref Rayess, and Dorothy Salhab-Kazemi.Curators Carla Chammas and Rachel Dedman spoke to me about this incredible art historical show that combines paintings, ceramics, furniture, letters, publications, videos, and other primary source materials from the "Golden Era" from before the infamous Lebanese Civil War. We’ve included an assortment of images in this post to give you a flavor of the exhibition, and we’ve included the items the curators selected as personal favorites, which they also discuss on the podcast.For this episode we’ve used the sounds from the recent streets protests in downtown Beirut, which were sparked by decades of growing corruption and new taxes that were proposed and since rescinded.This and more in the current episode of our weekly Art Movements podcast.

From nine weeks of protests to an exhibition that was more ethnically and racially diverse than previous years, this year’s Whitney Biennial has a lot to unpack.I asked our associate news editor Jasmine Weber, editor and critic Seph Rodney, and reporter Hakim Bishara to join me to reflect on months of controversy and offer their opinions on the exhibition itself. We discuss favorite works, what may have been accomplished, and duds. You’ll want to hear this.A special thanks to Wanderraven, who provided the music to this week’s episode. The song is called “Here Into The Dark”. Listen to more at wanderraven.com.

Last week, Hyperallergic published a five-part series, titled The Danger Epidemic in Art Handling, on the realities facing art handlers in the United States. The story generated a lot of debate and shocked many who were never forced to think about the conditions workers are forced to endure when assembling and transporting art of all types. This conversation with Hyperallergic Senior Writer Zachary Small and Associate News Editor Jasmine Weber explores the contours of the topic, the difficulties of reporting on contentious art world issues, and how investigative reporting is crucial for change. We also discuss the Sotheby's lockout of art handlers, which we covered extensively in 2011 and 2012. A special thanks to Peter Gabriel's Real World Records for allowing us to play a special live track by world music legend Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. The label is celebrating its 30th anniversary of Peter Gabriel’s Real World Records and they marked the occasion by announcing the release of a previously unheard recording by the legendary qawwali singer. The recording includes Khan’s performance at WOMAD Festival in 1985, which was the first time the singer had performed in front of a mainly non-Asian audience. As a longtime fan of Khan's genius, I'm honored to include his music in this episode. This and more in the current episode of Hyperallergic’s Art Movements podcast. Subscribe to Hyperallergic’s Art Movements on iTunes, or anywhere else you listen to podcasts.

On the first floor of the Gardiner Museum, in the Art of the Americas gallery, there is a large Maya plate dating to the 6th to 7th centuries CE. It features a large deity in the center of the orange and black earthenware object with a band of glyphs around the edge of the dish. This object is well-known to Maya specialists, not only for the mastery of the design, but because of the inscription that not only mentions the name and location of the donor but also explains that it was a plate used to serve white venison tamales. In this episode, we talk to four experts in the field, Gardiner Museum educator and curator Siobhan Boyd, Metropolitan Museum curator James Doyle, cultural historian Margaret Visser, and Popti storyteller Maria Monteja to peel back the layers of history in this wondrous artifact from ancient times to learn about Maya traditions and culture through the lens of today. A special thanks to SunSon for providing the music to this special series, which is produced by Hyperallergic in conjunction with the Gardiner Museum.

Joseph Pierce wants you to question everything, but especially queerness. The Cherokee citizen and Stony Brook University assistant professor believes the moment has come for queer academia to seriously question the roots of their discipline, and ask how the field can expand to include more voices outside the Euro-American canon of Judith Butlers and Jack Halberstams. "When we think about queerness," Pierce explains, "it's seen as a universal theory that can be applied everywhere. But often what that does is maintain a framework based on coloniality and white supremacy. What we want to do is question how queerness circulates." Accordingly, the young researcher has teamed up with scholars from across the Western hemisphere to produce a special edition of GLQ, an important journal of lesbian and gay studies published by Duke University Press. The forthcoming issue intends to address the limits of queerness outside normative white contexts, and how decolonization and the schema of radical liberation might provide new context to how LGBTQ culture operates in regions like Latin America and the Global South. An erstwhile contributor to Hyperallergic, Pierce has also written a new book that will release this November, called Argentine Intimacies: Queer Kinship in an Age of Splendor, 1890–1910. The result of extensive archival research, the book is a study into Argentina's turn-of-the-century crisis of modernity, and how political and economic changes in the country opened up new ways of conceptualizing family. For a discussion about the relationship between queerness, decolonialiality, culture, and politics, we invited Pierce onto the Hyperallergic Art Movements podcast to share some insight into how he and other academics are trying to evolve queer studies into a more open field of inquiry. The music for this episode is available under the Creative Commons 0 license. Subscribe to Hyperallergic’s Art Movements on iTunes, and anywhere else you listen to podcasts. hyperallergic.com

There's a curious collection of 18th-century porcelain figurines displayed on the second floor of the Gardiner Museum. Set amidst an impressive display of European ceramic table wear and figurines, this small assortment of Harlequin sculptures don dark masks that stand out for contemporary audiences. One of the colorful sculptures is by Wenzel Neu and hails from the Kloster-Veilsdorf Porcelain Factory in Germany, c. 1764–65, and beside it is a sign that asks, "Is Harlequin in blackface?" In this episode, we talk to Professor Cheryl Thompson, anti-racist educator Rania El Mugammar, and the Gardiner's Chief Curator Sequoia Miller about this figurine that portrays a character from the Commedia dell'Arte that was a precursor to the more violently racialized images of blackface in 19th and 20th-century minstrel shows. We explore the long history of blackface in Canada, and how one museum is adapting to tell the stories that its collection provokes with contemporary audiences. A special thanks to musician SunSon for providing the music to this special series, which is produced by Hyperallergic in conjunction with the Gardiner Museum. Check out their website sunson.band for more information. This and more in the current episode of Hyperallergic's Art Movements podcast. Subscribe to Art Movements on iTunes, or anywhere else you listen to podcasts. hyperallergic.com

Canadian artist Shary Boyle is known for her incredible ability to transform clay and ceramic into feats of delicate wonder, using the human body and the history of the material to delve into the undercurrents and meanings often overlooked by contemporary viewers. In the second in a four-part podcast series produced by Hyperallergic in conjunction with the Gardiner Museum's Community Arts Space: What we long for initiative, she reminds us: "Let us not let the art world homogenize us when we all individually as young people might have chosen to become artists." She continues, "I chose to become an artist to try to pursue a life of true questioning and subversion and an alternative position to what I saw as a common drive towards capitalist values of growth and progression and I want to just to continually have access to watching and observing and questioning that." In this episode, I speak to the artist about her relationship to a material that has been having a renaissance in contemporary art, and she shares her insight into a material that appears in almost every culture in history. A special thanks to Brooklyn-based musician SunSon for providing the music to this episode, and you can check out his website sunson.band. You can also follow him on Facebook or Instagram.

Most of our earliest experiences of art are forged at museums. In this episode artist Kent Monkman recounts his own youth visiting institutions that didn’t reflect the lived reality around him and his Cree community in Winnipeg.  Since those formative years, Monkman has become an important voice in contemporary art who challenges the histories told inside the hallowed halls of museums, pushing them to reflect the complexity of the world around them. He is an artist who teaches us to imagine the world we want to see, one that refuses to erase the stories of pain, but instead uses them to portray the power of resilience and future possibilities. This is the first in a four-part series by Hyperallergic in conjunction with the Gardiner Museum and its Community Art Space, a platform for experimentation and socially-engaged art. The series explores the role of museums, ceramics, and the stories they tell. A special thanks to Brooklyn-based musician SunSon for providing the music to this episode, and you can check out his website sunson.band. You can also follow him on Facebook or Instagram.

During this special Pride Month, I knew we'd all need the wisdom of artist Nayland Blake, who is a leader in the field of queer representation and art, but that is one of his many talents as an artist, activist, educator, and innovator. This episode, I talk to Blake to learn about their experiences growing up biracial and queer in New York, going to school in Southern California, their formative years in San Francisco, and their return to New York. They also school me on kink. A special thanks to Twig Twig for the music to this week’s episode. You can listen to that and more at twigtwig.bandcamp.com and other streaming services. This episode is sponsored by Swann Auction Galleries. Swann’s first ever “Pride Sale,” a curated auction of material related to the LGBTQ+ experience and the gay rights movement, takes place on June 20, 2019. A corresponding exhibition of works on offer will run from June 15 through the sale.

Morehshin Allahyari has been capturing the imagination of art lovers the world over since her Material Speculation: ISIS series from 2015-16 propelled her into the spotlight. For that project, she recreated objects destroyed by the ISIS terrorist organization in Iraq. For that ambitious endeavor, she used the few images she could collect of the artifacts themselves and then 3D printed them in a beautiful translucent material that revealed a USB — filled with the related data — buried deep inside the new works. Her latest project, which is performance-lecture that was commissioned and presented by New Museum affiliate Rhizome, is titled Physical Tactics for Digital Colonialism, and it builds on her concept of digital colonialism in relation to the technology of 3D printing. The lecture was just released online by Rhizome, but I wanted to invite her into our Brooklyn studio to talk about the issues surrounding digital colonialism. A special thanks to Prince Harvey, who provided the music for this episode. Titled “Stay Gold” you can find more about the artist on his website at www.princeharvey.com.

What is June, really? It's a time for the LGBTQ community to come together and reflect on the ongoing fight for equality, even as we honor the hard-won achievements by queer activists past and present. It's also an opportunity to reflect on the rich creativity and diversity of our friends and chosen families. That's why Hyperallergic is putting a special spotlight on the queer arts community this month. Writers, philosophers, activists, illustrators, painters, sculptors, poets, filmmakers, performers, drag queens — everyone, all creative people are important beacons of hope and resilience in a time of political uncertainty. We've always been devoted to using our website as a platform for historically marginalized peoples, and Pride Month is also a time to celebrate and double-down on that work. Inaugurating this effort, we invited artist and actor Cristina Pitter to share a selection of readings from her solo performance, Decolonizing the Color of Queerness on our Hyperallergic Art Movements podcast. It's something of a paean to self-discovery that weaves its way toward self-actualization through histories of hardship and episodes of revelation — something every queer person can relate to. The music in this episode is generously provided by the composer Serena Ebony Miller. This episode is part of our "2019 Pride in Art" series, which is sponsored by Swann Auction Galleries who are running their "Pride Sale," a curated auction of material related to the LGBTQ experience and the gay rights movement on June 20, 2019 at their location at 104 East 25th Street in Manhattan. This episode is sponsored by Swann Auction Galleries. Swann’s first ever "Pride Sale," a curated auction of material related to the LGBTQ+ experience and the gay rights movement, takes place on June 20, 2019. A corresponding exhibition of works on offer will run from June 15 through the sale.

Paola Antonelli is the Museum of Modern Art’s Senior Curator in the Department of Architecture & Design, as well as the institution’s Director of R&D. She’s also — like me — a fan of the beloved arts organization Eyebeam. This month, Eyebeam celebrates its 20th anniversary, and Antonelli will be the keynote speaker at the celebration. I sat down with this leading curator to discuss the world of design, tech, and what organizations like Eyebeam are doing to change the landscape. A special thanks to Newborn Huskies for the music to this week’s episode. You can listen to that and more at newbornhuskies.bandcamp.com and on other streaming services.

Last year, editor Elisa Wouk Almino relocated from Hyperallergic’s New York-based office to Los Angeles to help expand coverage along the West Coast. In this podcast, she chats with Editor-in-Chief Hrag Vartanian about her initial impressions of the city, where artists have been increasingly flocking to. We then speak with Catherine G. Wagley, a veteran Los Angeles art critic and reporter who has contributed nuanced op-eds and reported stories to the site. She shares her thoughts on why Los Angeles is such an appealing city for artists and how it differentiates itself from other major centers like New York. She also talks about how students at the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) have been battling for more transparent financial policies — a fight that is relevant for art schools across the country. Finally, two of our frequent contributors, Matt Stromberg and Abe Ahn, share some of their favorite art spaces and experiences in Los Angeles. If you live in the city or are planning a summer trip, don’t miss out on their fun, off-beat, and insightful recommendations. A special thanks to April + VISTA for the music to this week’s episode. If you’re in Los Angeles, the band will be performing at the Echo on June 13. You can listen to more of their music on Spotify and other streaming services.

When news that Michael Rakowitz withdrew from the 2019 Whitney Biennial was published by the New York Times on February 25, people wondered why the Iraqi-American artist decided to sit out the biannual art event. Later, in April, when the Leonard Cohen: A Crack in Everything opened at the Jewish Museum, many people noticed that Rakowitz's work about the renowned Canadian crooner’s relationship with Zionism and Israel — which appeared in the original exhibition at the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal — wasn’t there. Why? Rakowitz talks to me about the controversies with both exhibitions and his thoughts on museums and power. He also reads his 2015 letter to Leonard Cohen, which he mailed to the singer a year before the legend died. And, as a special treat, the music in this podcast is performed by Rakowitz himself.

The business of artists's estates is becoming a big business, but the realities facing artists today aren't always as glamorous as some might think. For every multi-millionaire dollar Robert Rauschenberg estate, there are thousands of lesser-known talents whose families have to confront the tough decisions about what to do with hundreds of artworks and archives. To sort out the realities facing artists and their loved ones, I invited two experts in the field who deal extensively with artist estates. Saul Ostrow is a critic, curator, and a principal at Art Legacy Planning, and Jason Andrew is a curator and partner at Artist Estate Studio. Both of them are on the front lines of helping artists and their families decide what to do with their art after they pass away. I invited them to share their expertise in an episode that is a must-listen for those who are faced (or may be one day) with helping the artists in their lives to plan for the inevitable. A special thanks to Twig Twig for the music to this week’s episode. You can listen to that and more at twigtwig.bandcamp.com and other streaming services.

A business and financial literacy conference, the Art World Conference is gathering together 50 speakers for panel discussions, conversations, and in-depth workshops addressing many of the challenges faced by visual artists and arts professionals who work closely with artists. The multi-day event is the brainchild of Dexter Wimberly and Heather Bhandari, two veterans of the art field who bring decades of expertise to the table. I invited Dexter and Heather to the studio to talk about the changing currents of the art community and their own visions for a more empowered and exciting art world. We discuss the lingering myths that continue to plague art professionals, and new ways forward. The music in this podcast was provided by Providence-based band Strawberry Generation. Check them out on Spotify, Apple Music, Facebook and Instagram. They are currently working on their first full-length album, to be released later in the year. They’re also getting ready to tour for the first time this summer, playing at the Indietracks festival in the UK.

What if artists were invited into institutions of higher learning to lead conversations about safety, community, and change? Artist Shaun Leonardo was invited to be the visiting fellow at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, and he's been organizing a series of events that are trying to break down the barriers between various aspects of the Pratt community. I invited him, along with Jane South, who is the chair of the Fine Arts Department within the School of Art at Pratt Institute, to discuss the challenges and goals for such an initiative. And we discuss their big event on April 9 titled "Open Exchange: Belonging." A special thanks to Jonathon Jircitano for allowing us to use his new single, "Falling Into Place," which is available on iTunes, Spotify, and other music services.

In Canada, an incredible new program allows doctors to prescribe museum visits to their patients. Hyperallergic's Zachary Small visited the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts to talk with Stephen Legari, the first full-time art therapist on staff at a North American museum (he sees 1,200 patients a year), about his work in the city's encyclopedic museum and what role art can plan in healing. It's a fascinating story that might also point to new possibilities for art museums eager to play important roles in their local communities by teaching people to learn from and engage with art. A special thanks to Dried Spider for the music to this week’s episode. You can visit driedspider.bandcamp.com, for more information.

He launched into the screens of the internet savvy almost a decade ago, as a lively and unconventional Twitter commentator about the Arab Spring, but Sultan Sooud Al Qassemi is now known as one of the most passionate champions of Middle Eastern art. Founder of the Barjeel Art Foundation, Al Qassemi joins us to talk about the state of Middle Eastern art and discusses some of his favorite artists from a region that still isn't well represented in the world's modern art museums. One thing you can definitely say is any conversation with Al Qassemi is sure to be lively. A special thanks to Twig Twig for the music to this week’s episode. You can listen to that and more at twigtwig.bandcamp.com and other streaming services. This and more in our current episode of our weekly Art Movements podcast.

In 2002, artist Lisa Ross found herself in China. She decided to venture to the far western regions of the country, which she heard were home to a predominantly Uyghur population. She would return numerous times after that to document many aspect of a community that was about to change forever. Her photos are haunting, since they represent a world that is no longer there, as the Chinese authorities are imposing strict assimilationist policies on the local populations. It is believed that over a million Uyghurs and other Muslim populations have been forced into “re-education camps” that have been built in the last few years. A number of Ross’s contacts in the region have been disappeared and detained in such camps. I invited Ross, and her collaborator Anthony Varalli, to our studio to tell us about her experience in this land that sees few foreigners and where international reporters rarely ever visit. Some of Ross’s work in the Uyghur homeland is currently on view in New York’s Miyako Yoshinaga gallery. Titled I Can’t Sleep: Homage to a Uyghur Homeland, the exhibition continues until March 16. The music for this episode is “People are Glorious” by renowned musician Sanubar Tursun, who worked with Lisa Ross. Tursun was arrested by the Chinese authorities in December of last year. Her music is part of the album Music of Central Asia, Vol. 10: Borderlands, which you can find on iTunes and other music portholes.

It was a snowy week in Brooklyn, so some of us decided to gather in the podcast studio to talk about the world of art, giving you a small window into the conversations that happen in our office every day. Hyperallergic editor and critic Seph Rodney and news editor Jasmine Weber join me to talk about what they’re excited about right now: Burger King’s Warhol commercial for the Superbowl, Venice’s new tourism tax, the new Museum of Modern Art expansion, the Museum of the Bible CEO’s ridiculous remarks about the rock that killed Goliath, and more. The music featured on this episode is by Mark Pritchard, who is represented by Warp Records. You can hear more from his latest release “Under the Sun” at markprtchrd.com and find more great music from Warp Records at warp.net.

There are many illuminating moment’s in Hal Foster’s Conversations about Sculpture (Yale University Press, 2018) with Richard Serra, including the discussion of the infamous “Tilted Arc” sculpture, Serra's formative years as he battled with Minimalism and Conceptual Art, his idea’s around site-specific art, and the role of text and image in his oeuvre. This podcast begins with Serra’s own voice from a SFMOMA clip that asks the question, “Why Make Art?” and continues with a little adventure to see the artist’s first land artwork, “Shift” (1970), in King City, Ontario. Finally, I sit down with Foster, who talks about his own relationship with an artist who has reinvented himself a few times in his career.

Memes are the street art of the social web, and they are becoming more central to the political and cultural conversations we have. In her new book, Memes to Movements: How the World's Most Viral Media Is Changing Social Protest and Power, An Xiao Mina helps us understand how memes influenced the Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong, Black Lives Matter in the United States, and Women’s Marches around the world. She explores how memes can help people express public dissent in environments where that can be downright dangerous. As one of Hyperallergic's original contributors, An Xiao Mina is no stranger to Hyperallergic readers. In her latest project, she continues to challenge us to think critically about the online world and the role of art in the formation of this brave new social terrain. She also discusses her time working at Ai Weiwei’s studio, her internet research in Uganda, and her current job working in the Bay Area’s robust tech scene developing tools for journalists and other online citizens. The music for this episode is “Grass-Mud Horse Cartoon and Rap (Cao Ni Ma),” which was one of the many versions of the Grass-Mud Horse song that emerged anonymously in China approximately a decade ago to protest internet censorship. This version, An Xiao Mina’s favorite, is featured in this episode. Also, a special thanks to Jason Li for allowing us to use his illustration for Memes to Movements as this week’s cover art.

Last year, we invited artist, writer, and Queens College professor Chloë Bassto talk with curator, art historian, and museum veteran Lowery Stokes Sims to have a conversation of their choosing. It took me a year to publish this podcast, but I’m happy to say their words are more relevant today than ever, as the two art world figures discuss the imagined publics of contemporary art, public and private education, and the challenges of empathy and identity in art. Bass is no stranger to Hyperallergic readers, and she's known for her deep engagement with art and writing coupled with a solid understanding of the way art functions in the world and the emotional sophistication needed to outline those parameters. Then there’s Lowery Stokes Sims, who has been a trailblazer throughout her career. She was on the education and curatorial staff of The Metropolitan Museum of Art from 1972 to 1999, during which time she specialized in modern and contemporary art. From 2000 to 2007, she was executive director and then president of The Studio Museum in Harlem, and served as Adjunct Curator for the Permanent Collection. Then from 2007 until 2015, she chief curator at New York’s Museum of Arts and Design. I think you’ll agree that the following conversation offers useful insight into the worlds of two leading figures in New York’s art community. A special thanks to Brooklyn-based musician SunSonfor providing the music to this episode. You can check out his website sunson.band and follow him on Facebookor Instagram.

It’s rare for an artist to have two concurrent solo shows in the same city, but Didier William accomplished that with his Curtains, Stages, and Shadows, Act 1 & Act 2. The two-part exhibition explores the formal and narrative possibilities of painting. In his review of Act 1, critic Seph Rodney focuses on the figures that can appear as elusive as they are powerful, writing: These are all figures ready to enact real violence with the cutlasses, and they are also figures who are depicted as staging a rebellion. If one views the text in the back room, one can begin to understand why William believes it necessary to pictorially rehearse the action of insurrection. I invited Rodney to continue the conversation with William in this episode of Art Movements, in which the two explore the visual language of revolution, specifically in the context of the Haitian revolution, which is one of the larger themes in the artist’s series. A special thanks to Red Wedding for providing the music for this episode. You can check her out on Instagram.

Sir Sargent, as he’s known on social media, represents a new wave of art writers and critics focused on Black contemporary art and its evolving role in an international African diasporic consciousness. He was born in Chicago as Antwaun Sargent, and has called New York home since 2011. When he first arrived in New York City, he was a kindergarten teacher, but he soon discovered his interest in telling the stories of Black artists and sharing his insights on into a contemporary art world often perceived as opaque and inaccessible. He’s since co-curated his first exhibition, spoken at countless events, and is now working on a book. I invited our news editor, Jasmine Weber, to join me in this conversation to learn about Sargent’s thought on a scene that is getting more attention than ever. A special thanks to Amani Fela for providing the music for this episode.

Tyler Green may be best known as the journalist and art writer behind the Modern Art Notes podcast, but for the last six years, he’s also been working on a major book about a photographer who helped establish the sublime visual record of the American West for viewers around the world. In his new book, Carleton Watkins: Making the West American, Green writes a very readable story about a figure who blended art and science, helped establish photography as an art, and whose images helped galvanize a citizenry that would eventually establish a national park system around the country. Green managed all of this despite being faced with a researchers nightmare: Watkins’s archive was destroyed in the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake. Then there's the twist, as Green discusses a very personal connection to Watkins that he discovered in the midst of his research. It’s a fascinating tale that shows us history is often more present than we know. A special thanks to Mark Pritchard of Warp Records for providing the music for this episode.

Artist Dayanita Singh wasn’t happy taking photographs in the traditional way, preferring to create what she calls “book objects,” mini-exhibitions to showcase her work. Singh  plays with the conventional language of art, and even calls herself an “off-set artist” to denote her preferred way to display her images. She is currently exhibiting in the Carnegie International exhibition in Pittsburgh, and she has a small retrospective of her book objects at Callicoon Fine Art on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. I talked to her about her love of images, a formative (and funny) experience she shared with Robert Frank, and the future of the artist book. A special thanks to Flash Trading (flashtrading.bandcamp.com) for providing the music for this episode.

The world of art has become more complicated as copyright, appropriation, and other issues force artists, dealers, collectors, and others to turn to lawyers for help. As foibles around the sale and maintenance of luxury art objects grab media headlines, you might be fooled into believing the future of art is in litigation. I invited Sergio Sarmiento to join me to talk about the evolving world of art law and discuss why he went to law school as an art project, what he thinks about some recent sensational cases (Richard Prince/Instagram, Sam Durant at the Walker Art Center, and the recent Banksy auction stunt) and his thoughts on how appropriate has changed from the 1970s.

On October 29, 2017, the world lost its first feminist art historian. That title, of course, describes Linda Nochlin, a leading academic who changed the world of art after she published her important essay, “Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?” In 2016, I had the honor of interviewing her for the Women of Abstract Expressionism podcast and only used a few minutes of our interview. In this episode of Art Movements, we release the whole interview (leaving out some in-between bits) where she discusses the role of women in the arts, how oppression impacts culture, and her personal friendship with Joan Mitchell and others. I also briefly interview one of her former students, art writer Aruna D'Souza, to explain what Nochlin was like as a person. And the music this episode is “Brandenburg Concerto No. 4 in G, Movement I (Allegro)” one of the most renowned compositions by Johann Sebastian Bach, who was Nochlin's favorite composer.

After decades in the art world, Deborah Kass has a hit. A major one. The type of beloved public artwork that you see endlessly on your social feeds, and brings a smile to your face whenever you encounter it. I'm talking about "OY/YO" (2015), the eight-foot-tall yellow sculpture that just landed at the Brooklyn Museum for an exhibition titled Something to Say. I took the opportunity to invite Kass into the studio to talk about her work, her thoughts on the art world (she's a pessimist), the role of art today, and more. I also got to ask her something I've always wanted to ask her, particularly since she's so well known for her Warhol-inspired Barbra Streisand series: Does she have a favorite song by Streisand? And a special thanks to sound artist Bradford Reed, who performed this past weekend as part of the 24-hour Sonic Transmission Archive event at the Newburgh Open Studios in Newburgh, New York. I was able to attend the Sunday portion of the event, which is a Wave Farm Partner Transmit project organized by Ethan Primason and Caroline Partamian, and got to hear and record his performance myself. Thanks to the artist and organizers for allowing us to use the sound work.

September has become the #MeToo movement’s defining month. Bill Cosby recently received a sentence of 3 to 10 years in prison for the drugging and sexual assault of Andrea Constand. And as I write this, Dr. Christine Blasey Ford is testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee about her allegations of sexual misconduct and attempted rape against the Supreme Court nominee, Judge Brett Kavanaugh. Under intense public scrutiny, survivors of sexual assault are often asked to revisit painful, traumatic memories with crystal clear recollection and foolproof evidence about a violent act that, by its very nature, is manipulative and deceitful. As in Congress, so too in the arts: the scales of justice are weighed against survivors of sexual assault. That’s why American Theatre magazine’s thorough investigation of sexual assault allegations in the performing arts is so important. In a field where intense recreations of violence and intimacy are often part of the job description, victims of sexual misconduct are often disregarded or otherwise face effective banishment from the theater community’s predominantly male-run list of organizations. American Theatre’s entire September issue is devoted to investigating the #MeToo movement in the performing arts. Below is a recording of my conversation with the magazine’s senior editor, Diep Tran, wherein we discuss the major allegations facing major regional theaters in Houston, Minneapolis, New Haven, and beyond. A special thanks to Miserable Chillers & Sun Kin for the music to this week’s episode, which features their latest album, Adoration Room. You can listen to that and more at miserablechillers.bandcamp.com and other streaming services.

Faced with the ubiquity of white supremacy in US culture, some are seeking new, radical ways to shift the conversation to center Black consciousness as a way to combat the poison of White supremacy. Two artists and educators, Shanti Peters and Joseph Cullier, founded The Black School to confront such realities. Hyperallergic editor Jasmine Weber spoke to the pair about the role of radical Black education and the "Black art world," in a special interview that comes on the heels of their residency and exhibition at the New Museum in New York. One of the things they discuss are is the group's tarot cards, which can be purchased in the group's online shop. Then Jasmine and I were joined by editor and critic Seph Rodney and contributor Shirine Saad to talk about the new Soul of a Nation: Art in the Age of Black Power exhibition that opened at the Brooklyn Museum last weekend. And finally, we have our last segment. Earlier this week, LA-based writer Matt Stromberg reported on the "pause" artist lauren woods pressed on her American Monument project at Cal State Long Beach's museum. The action comes after the museum director Kimberli Meyer was fired. American Monument — a multi-media installation addressing police brutality and the killing of African Americans by police officers — was a project Meyer helped realize, so woods decided that a pause was a necessary act of solidarity in light of the news. Stromberg recorded the roughly 28-minute speech, and we have the recording for those who want to hear it first hand. A special thanks to Dried Spider for the music to this week’s episode. You can visit driedspider.bandcamp.com, for more information.

McMansions are the houses many of us love to hate. They're big, gaudy, and often they're accumulations of traditionally mismatched architectural elements. Whatever they are, they're everywhere in suburbia. We invited Kate Wagner, aka McMansion Hell, to talk oversized buildings of wealth and status, including the McMansion that is US Education Secretary Betsy DeVos's house in Holland, Michigan. As Hyperallergic editor and critic Seph Rodney returns from Brazil, I invited him to talk about the São Paulo Biennial (Sep 7–Dec 9_)_, which opened a few days after the Natural Museum of Brazil burned down in Rio de Janiero. He picks some favorites and discusses what he saw at the second-oldest art biennial in the world. A special thanks to Althea SullyCole for the music to this week’s episode. You can visit her website, altheasullycole.com, for more information. She is also performing on September 21 at Postcrypt Coffeehouse in New York City, and September 22 at the Rhythmic Integration Center in New Milford, CT. 

The stories of trailblazing women continue to inspire but many of these figures, who occur throughout history, have been written out of the history books or relegated to accounts of their time and ignored by historians. Now, curator Marcela Micucci talks to use about these figures who had a big impact on all aspects of city life, including the so-called "Witch of Wall Street," Hetty Green. It's an exhibition full of colorful stories. And then I talk to critic Paddy Johnson and artist William Powhida, co-hosts of the Explain Me podcast, about the fall season, New York museums, and what they've been up to. A special thanks to Twig Twig for the music to this week’s episode. You can listen to that and more at twigtwig.bandcamp.com and other streaming services.

This week's we talk to Abou Farman, artist and anthropologist at the New School, and Raquel de Anda, director of public engagement at No Longer Empty, about their recent efforts to educate New York City cultural leaders about the needs of immigrant communities. Then I invite Hyperallergic staff writer Zachary Small to tell us about the latest news in the #MeToo movement, particularly in light of the case of NYU professor Avital Ronell, who was found responsible for sexual harassment and suspended her for the 2018–19 academic year. He interviews Emma Sulkowicz, who many people suggest helped kick off the movement with their widely publicized "Mattress Performance (Carry That Weight)" (2014–2015) performance. A special thanks to Newborn Huskies for the music to this week’s episode. You can listen to that and more at newbornhuskies.bandcamp.com and other streaming services.

Last month, a dozen activists gathered at the Whitney Museum of Art to condemn the institution's lack of modern context about the HIV/AIDS epidemic in relation to Wojnarowicz's artwork. Their action was noticed by the art world and the museum, which is continuing to talk to the protesters after changing some of the labels to reflect on the fact that the AIDS crisis is not over. In this episode we talk to Wojnarowicz biographer Cynthia Carr, author of Fire in the Belly: The Life and Times of David Wojnarowicz, who helps narrate the complicated story of an artist who has become one of the luminaries of New York's East Village scene in the 1980s. I also invited two artists, Jean Foos and Frank Holliday, who knew Wojnarowicz during his lifetime, to help paint a picture of a scene that burned bright, but was eventually snuffed out by a commercial art world obsessed with novelty, and the looming disaster that was AIDS. A special thanks to Twig Twig for the music to this week's episode. You can listen to that and more at twigtwig.bandcamp.com and other streaming services.

This past Monday, over a hundred members of UAW Local 2110, the largest of the Museum of Modern Art’s five unions, staged a walkout just days before negotiations were set to resume. The union members, who are employed in almost every department at MoMA, have been working over 80 days without a contract. I invited two members of UAW Local 2110 to talk to Hyperallergic and tell us what the state of negotiations is with one of the world’s leading museums of modern and contemporary art. I asked them about the sticking points and challenges of the negotiations this time around. And then I talk with Apsara DiQuinzio, curator of modern and contemporary art at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archives (BAMPFA) in Berkeley, California, about the Bay Area’s evolving art scene, her current exhibition featuring two artists associated with the Mission School (Alicia McCarthy and Ruby Neri), and I ask her, how truly liberal is the art world? A special thanks to Hellrazor for the music to this week’s episode, which features their latest album, Satan Smile. You can listen to that and more at lkhellrazor.bandcamp.com and other streaming services.

We talk to Susan Unterberg, the person behind the mysterious Anonymous Was a Woman foundation that gives $25,000 — no strings attached — to female artists over 40. And then we talk about a boxing exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum that’s worth a look. A special thanks to Miserable Chillers & Sun Kin for the music to this week’s episode, which features their latest album, Adoration Room. You can listen to that and more at https://miserablechillers.bandcamp.com and other streaming services.

Curator Monika Fabijanska talks about her The Un-Heroic Act: Representations of Rape in Contemporary Women's Art in the US exhibition, and arts journalist Barbara Pollack chats about her new book on an emerging generation of Chinese contemporary artists.

In our inaugural episode, we discuss the top art news headlines from the week, including how New Yorkers can use their library cards to visit 33 of the city’s museums, an unlikely museum in Thailand, how a Stolen Arab Art exhibition is exactly as advertised, and I talk to emoji activist Jennifer 8 Lee and journalist Zachary Small. Our guest this week is renowned journalist Jennifer 8 Lee. Not only is she a successful author (Fortune Cookie Chronicles) and film producer (The Search for General Tso), but Lee is a driving force behind Emojination, the people’s voice of the Emoji Consortium. We talk to her about how she helped bring the dumpling emoji 🥟 into the world. Then we talk to Hyperallergic’s Zachary Small, who tells us about the four queer performance festivals happening in New York this month.

Hyperallergic's editor-in-chief Hrag Vartanian talks to Ford Foundation President Darren Walker about the public's interest in scrutinizing institutional authority, Walker's own love of art, and the renovations at the Foundation's building, and also discussed Agnes Gund's new Art for Justice fund, the role of the arts for marginalized communities, and the importance of public education. The music featured in this episode was “Give it Your Choir” by Mark Pritchard from Warp Records. You can hear more from his latest release “Under the Sun” at http://markprtchrd.com and find more great music from Warp Records at http://warp.net.

Hyperallergic travels to Cairo to see one of the new wave of exhibitions that are reintroducing Egyptian modern art, particularly related to the Art and Liberty group (often referred to as Egyptian Surrealism), to a wider audience.

Artists Marilyn Minter and Xaviera Simmons both have solo shows up in New York this month. We invited them to chat with Hyperallergic's editor-in-chief Hrag Vartanian about sex, art, gender inequality, Planned Parenthood, and the election.

Hyperallergic's Editor-in-chief Hrag Vartanian speaks to mega-collector Don Rubell of the Rubell Family Collection about decades of collecting and establishing one of the biggest collections of contemporary art in the world.

In the Oceti Sakowin Camp at Stadning Rock, North Dakota, there is a prominent art tent area. Dozens of artists and volunteers are silkscreening and producing work among the thousands of waterprotectors and their allies, which have arrived to stop the Dakota Access Pipeline from crossing the Missouri River. Among those artists is Standing Rock native Cannupa Hanska Luger and three of his friends, Jesse Hazelit, Raven Chacon, and Dylan McLaughlin. Hyperallergic spoke to the friends to discuss what is going on at Standing Rock and what role art plays.

Native American women grapple with the highest rates of sexual violence in the United States and two Native American artists, Rebecca Nagle and Graci Horne, have traveled to Standing Rock to create a Healing Tent and to work on their Monument Quilt project, which addresses sexual violence.