Lecture Archive

Interdisciplinary artist Liliana Porter talks about her wide-ranging career in this lecture, showing a series of drawings, woodcuts, photographs and paintings. At the core of Porter’s practice lies ideas of reality as a vehicle to construct images and memories from moments that are inherently ungraspable. Porter talks about an imaginable space where everything can become mixed up; a space where no one truly knows history: what comes before us or after us. Porter has held onto this fascination in creating her work as an artist as well as her attraction to strange objects. Porter also talks about this need to confront presumptuous ideas and try to correct them through art, and how this leads to a metaphor to try and look for the truth of our history; a history that is full of mistakes. Porter ends her lecture by talking about confronting tasks as artists that will be bigger then our possibility, and how it also leads us to realizing that multiple things that can happen at the same time. 

In this lecture, interdisciplinary artist Araya Rasdjarmrearnsook speaks to Chanon (Kenji) Praepipatmongkol about her practice making sculptures, drawings, working with printmaking, and writing. For Araya, the most important part of her work is language. Araya relies on language, and the abstract feeling it creates to make her work. For Araya, printmaking has been a medium she has returned too, for the unpredictable nature of it has taught her to become comfortable in the ambiguity of her work. Araya also speaks about the writing practice she has developed as an artist, writing for weekly newspapers and bi-monthly magazines. Araya comments on her artistic practice being a tool to confront questions of femininity and the role women play in society today. Finally, Araya says that being an artist is about realizing that loneliness isn’t about being estranged, but that it has to do with the path she has chosen.

Artist Peter Saul talks about his painting practice during this Skowhegan lecture, reflecting on his time living in Paris during the 1950s and New York city during the 1960s. Saul talks about his romantic perceptions of being an artist, and how it doesn’t have to do with learning but being in complete solitude in a land unknown to yourself. Saul goes on to reflect on his painting practice being shaped by cultural, historical and political events, his identity, popular iconography, and print culture. Saul goes on to also reflect on the importance of reflecting on one’s mistakes as an artist, and how for Saul, the mistake that has continued to define his conceptual practice as an artist was to be influenced to create work based on what seemed popular in the world. 

Artist Michelle Grabner gives a lecture talking about her writing, teaching and curating practice. She begins the lecture by doing a reading for the audience, which allows Grabner to reflect on ideas she is currently grappling with. Grabner talks about the need to always critique herself, and exploring the space of boredom as a way of protracting, compressing, and playing with time. Throughout the lecture, Grabner talks about her curatorial practice as well, ranging from running the Suburban in Milwaukee to her experience curating the 2014 Whitney Biennial. Grabner also reflects on the studio as a space that continues to fascinate her, where she can think critically about things and wrestle with them on a daily basis. For Grabner, some of the ideas she is currently grappling with include engaging with notions of cliches and categories, large scale abstract painting, the relationship between local and regional, and affect among others.

Through a series of slides and presented writing, interdisciplinary artist Julie Ault centres her talk focusing on diverse archival practices, memory, and historical representation. Ault breaks her practice down into three sections; firstly encompassing writing, secondly, mixing in informal speech with distilled formal expression and realizing that art making is a form of knowledge production, and thirdly reflecting on the boundaries between subjective and objective knowledge as being fractured. Ault also talks about her time in Group Material, and how this experience was rooted in friendship and dialogue as a way to produce culture and not just consume it through social process, cultural democracy and collaboration. Ault also reflects on the need to focus on archiving marginalized practices and events which are often on the verge of becoming history but not becoming history because of a lack of means to archive.

Interdisciplinary artist Jonathan Berger gives a lecture at Skowhegan talking about his interests in object making and working with exhibition sites. For Berger the exhibition site allows him to invite viewers to imagine radical event spaces that can take place. Berger also talks about his long term work with the Andy Kauffman estate, working with the photography of Bob Mizer, and becoming the gallery director of 80WSE in New York. Berger reflects on 80WSE as a space that has allowed him to cultivate the process of open thinking, and using hierarchy as a way to have new imaginations be released.

Artist David Diao talks about his long term practice as a painter. Diao talks about the influence of iconic photographs from the Russian Avant Garde which have informed his work, as well as his ongoing interest in Art history and pop culture. Diao also reflects on the many painters who have inspired him, particularly Barnett Newman. For Diao, his career as an artist has taught him to think about how value is established in the art world, what we should strive to work towards, and to know that artists will have bad years and good years throughout their trajectory. 

Artists Ryan Trecartin and Lizzie Fitch give a lecture reflecting on their many years working together as artists. Trecartin and Fitch talk about the many movies, theatrical environments, and sculptures that they have created over the years. For Trecartin and Fitch, collaboration is at the core of their practice. The artists also talk about the need to preserve a space where one doesn’t have to determine an authorship of a piece until it’s done. This gives them the freedom to change the work so it doesn’t become fixed in one type of production. Trecartin and Fitch talk about the wonderful freedom they have achieved working with many people when creating their work. This has allowed them to insert multiple opportunities that can transform what they create. Working with multiple cameras and thinking about the proliferation of cameras are also ideas the artists talk about. This type of working to capture all this information has allowed Trecartin and Fitch to also collapse the binary structures of time.

Artist, art educator and social activist LaToya Ruby Frazier begins her lecture talking about the ways in which her time as a participant at Skowhegan impacted her life, mentioning the many mentors and peers who have influenced and shape her practice and career. Frazier reflects on the various projects she has worked on; the industrial, polluted landscape of her hometown of Braddock, Pennsylvania, the relationship between gender, race, and class structures in the United States, and the need to always reflect on the relationships that merge out of the subjects that Frazer photographs. 

Artist Regina Jose Galindo gives a lecture showing work from the late 1990s to the present. The core idea of Galindo’s practice explores ideas of creating actions and images that reflect aspects of the reality of her context; that which is near and some of which she is able to see lying beyond. Galindo talks about her complex relationship with Guatemala, and how it has allowed her to investigate relations of power in order to subvert them. For Galindo, she sees the various works in her oeuvre as bridges and reflections. This allows Galindo to reflect on the tragedy of her own country, and how each corner has a version of tragedy. Differences between activism and making art are also important for Galindo. Galindo states that she does not take the same level of risk as activists do, and the end result of her practice is always creating an object.

In this performative lecture,Theaster Gates talks about his work through singing, slide shows, and dialogue with the audience. Gates talks about work rooted in social practice, and how that has allowed him to create objects and be invested in space production that feels urgent beyond art. This type of artistic practice has also allowed Gates to have harder conversations with bigger groups of people at the same time. For Gates, his capacity to be generous to others has allowed him to heal himself. Generosity to others as an artists has allowed Gates to create an anti bacterial medicine that makes him better and his core stronger.

Artist Neil Goldberg shows a series of video work during his Skowhegan lecture. Goldberg talks about his practice which is rooted in the ideas of mortality. Mortality for Goldberg means many things: the strangeness of this, the beauty and horror, and how this can be explored in a variety of ways through a focus on the everyday. Goldberg focuses on mundane moments that don’t matter, how these ideas are manifested everyday in New York, and how they constitute the bulk of our lives. This type of conceptual practice has allowed Goldberg to reflect on what internal experiences look like, and the relationship this has to vulnerability.

Interdisciplinary artist Donald-Odili Odita gives a lecture at Skowhegan talking about his painting, curatorial, and writing practice. Notions of duality and constantly living in a mode of survival are at the core of Odita’s practice. Odita talk about the need artists have to survive in order to understand the world they live in. For Odita in particular, this world is the home he has created for himself as well as the Nigerian home he has come from. Odita also talks about his painting practice, and how the center of the painting for him operates as a modernist space; where everything that exists outside that space doesn’t matter. As the lecture unfolds, Odita engages with the class of 2015, telling them that art can also be about engaging with other people and engaging with the world we live in, and not just our internal selves. Odita stresses that the people artists work with is the community they will build for themselves. Odita gently pushes these thoughts further, stating that being an artist is also about being a thinker and a human being in the world, which is just as important as being an artist making work. Challenging current curriculums as well as information in order to make change and adequately represent the realities and nuances of the other and the world many different kinds of people inhabit are also at the core of Odita’s practice as an artist and teacher. Thinking about these nuances has allowed Odita to realize that there’s no notion of ownership when it comes to pain, anguish, or experiences. Everyone shares in these things culturally in different ways and there is no ways in equating them for they are all specific and different. Odita states that it is important to recognize and address these differences. Odita ends his lecture talking about the importance of perseverance so we can continue to work, believe in our practices as artists, and engage with a community of peers that can generate dialogue to always help us grow.

Artist Sarah Oppenheimer talks about her painting practice through showing a series of slides. Oppenheimer talks about her work being influenced by thinking about architectural surroundings, virtual environments, and holes that are found in these virtual environments. Oppenheimer seeks to explore the digital manipulation of material, and makes the distinction of being interested in not so much the mass production of architectural materials but in the mass customization of architectural materials. Oppenheimer also talks about her interest in how a single frame or a single mechanism can frame two spaces simultaneously, and how one can collapse different spaces in a single field. Composition is also an idea Oppenheimer is invested in her painting practice, due to her investigation into compositional hierarchy. 

In this intimate lecture titled Fade: The Art of Aging, artist Betye Saar reflects on the long lasting trajectory of her practice as an artist working in many mediums. Throughout a series of slides, Saar talks about the many themes that she has continued to reflect on over the decades: race and identity, autobiography, afro-voodooism, mysticism, found material, ritual, among others. Saar also reflects on one particular project that has meant a lot to her: working with the material of handkerchiefs and turning them into works of art that have honoured the women who have passed in her family.

Writer and philosopher Simon Critchley gives a lecture diving into a critical inquiry of the practice and life of David Bowie. For Critchley, his close study of Bowie has allowed him to realize that art is a series of allusions which constitute the fictions that one inhabits, and how these fictions are tied to place. Critchley also reflects on his own moment of fake humility as a way to provide Bowie a due that he has felt has not been given. Critchley reflects on how he approaches the world through lyrics and tunes, and how music provides him a space of critical distance, allowing him to see that music is much closer to how art works and literature works. Critchley continues to reflect on his relationship to images, particularly Bowies images, and how these images are digested.

Indigenous artist Jeffrey Gibson gives a lecture at Skowhegan showing his interdisciplinary practice. Gibson talks about the subjective language of abstraction and how it has played a role in his work. Gibson relates this to ideas of infirmity on circulation, and how the infinite passing of information determines what is lost, what’s maintained, and how this shifts our ideas of the utility and value. Gibson also talks about the many collaborations he has undertaken as an artist, and how sometimes collaboration can become problematic due to the economic structures that have existed in the past between Gibson and the collaborator. Gibson also reflects on his identity as Native American, exploring the ideas of third gender, and the powwow. For Gibson, embracing powwow has allowed him to also realize that underneath the structure of community built on familial and design structures, the value of individualism is still an important concept to consider. Powwow has also allowed Gibson to embrace ideas of utopian alternative communities, and how this has allowed him to think about economy and community. 

Sheila Hicks gives a lecture at Skowhegan showing a series of slides depicting images of her practice rooted in fibre, while also playing music for the participants. Hicks mentions that she doesn’t refer to her work as textiles, but rather as supple lines of fibre that move in space to form sculpture, environments, and performance. Hicks also talks about her trajectory as an artist traveling the world and exhibiting in over 40 countries. For Hicks, travel has allowed her to also explore ideas rooted in colour, texture and drawing. Every place Hicks visits gives her the opportunity to develop these ideas into painting, sculpture, the environment, and performance. Hicks says that these ideas can develop into a life long practice, because travel allows her to see a diverse range of people also working with these elements. Hicks urges the participants to seize every opportunity that comes their way as artists, to always have nerve, and to realize that the fight of an artist is tenacious.

Artist Jennie C. Jones shows a series of slides depicting her interdisciplinary practice. At the core of Jones’ practice is a search for neo-modernism, and how these notions are manifested through a multi-disciplinary way through sound, sculpture, works on paper, sight-based projects, and painting. For Jones, her practice is a comment on and a continuum of the conceptual ideologies of jazz, honouring the deep radical legacies of its experimentation, hybrid modernist forms, and wit and rift. Jones seeks to merge art history, black history, and music history within the realm of an abstract language. Jones states that this construction of an abstract language and a search of neo-modernism also manifests itself through her interest in conceptualism, jazz, and hybrid music.

Interdisciplinary artist Luis Camnitzer structures his talk about the importance of anthropological distance which is at the core of his artistic practice. For Camnitzer, this distance has allowed him to be placed closer to anthropology then art because it doesn’t use aesthetic value judgments. For Camnitzer, art is about what it can do for others. Camnitzer also reflects on his interest in language; both the medium and model but through a visual lens. For Camnitzer, this fascination with language flows into his interest in the nuances between Spanish and English; how Spanish is written between the lines, and English in the lines. Camnitzer ends his lecture by stating his desire to focus on the importance of art to be a field to acquire, expand, and generate knowledge. 

Artist Yoshua Okon shows a series of videos ranging from the 1990s to current work during his lecture at Skowhegan. Okon sees his practice as a hybrid discipline rooted in performance, video and installation, which is also formed by his collaborative and curatorial work. In the early days of being in artist in Mexico city, Okon talks about collectively starting an artist-run space called La Panderia to exhibit work that wasn’t being shown in mainstream museums, and also reflects on his many years living in Los Angeles. For Okon, his artistic practice is seen as something that can stimulate critical thought, and something that can empower people to inspire them to be critical thinkers. 

Roni Horn has an intimate discussion with the Skowhegan class of 2014 regarding their work and art. Showing slides and answering questions from participants, Horn talks about how their art practice been informed by ideas concerning the objective nature of their work, rather then motivation. They also talk about their long lasting relationship to Iceland, and how returning to drawing as a primary practice has informed their practice. Horn also talks about the meditative nature of their work due to their desire o always focus on experience rather then the final product, which has also informed her slow nature of having other people access their work as well. 

Sigrid Sandstrom shows slides of her paintings and talks about her life growing up in Sweden. Sandstrom reflects on how she gradually made the shift from science, to working in theatre, to eventually becoming in artist. Sandstrom also reflects on her time in graduate school, her time as a participant at Skowhegan and the Core Program in Texas. For Sandstrom, all of these experiences have led to an interest she has developed in her painting practice; the notion of place, and more specifically landscape. Sandstrom structures her talk focusing on three past and present collaborative projects; the first one exploring melancholy and the relationship to nature and landscape, the second project works with three other collaborators thinking about painting as a mode of thinking, and the third one focuses on the concept of ignorance as an integral part of contemporary art. Sandstrom also talks about the experience she has had gradually embracing printmaking as an artistic practice as well. For Sandstrom, printmaking has allowed her to undergo an extremely physical awareness of how one tries to think, the difficulty in that, as well as the incredible rigour that it produces. 

Artist Marc Swanson gives an autobiographical lecture at Skowhegan, reflecting on his experiences growing up in Rural New England and his later move as a young adult exploring the queer Club Scene in San Francisco. Swanson talks about these two specific experiences and how it has allowed him to synthesize different moments in his life. Swanson also talks about the impact Skowhegan had on him as a participant in 2000, his time as a graduate student in Bard College, and his subsequent move to New York to become an established artist. Throughout the lecture, Swanson shows slides that explore his interdisciplinary practice as an artist reflecting ideas of memorialization, identity, cinema, historical queer memory, environmental landscape, among others. Finally, Swanson tells the participants of the important job they have and he has to get out of our own individual ways, to confront what we are using to protect ourselves, and strip those things away. When we do this is when we can reach new growth as artists. 

Interdisciplinary artist Abraham Cruzvillegas gives a lecture at Skowhegan talking about his interests in sculpture, music, and collaboration. For Cruzvillegas, collaboration has allowed him to realize that new languages, discourses, and knowledge can be produced, and that collaboration is not just about having a vertical structure as an artist, but something that can be horizontal. For Cruzvillegas, process is also something he reflects on, realizing that it is more important than the end result at times. 

In this lecture at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, multidisciplinary artist Derrick Adams presents selections from his lifetime oeuvre, including early work that is not able to be viewed online or elsewhere. He shares details of his art practice and his philosophy of art-making, including his views on what it means to him to be a Black artist and an American artist exhibiting overseas.

Speaking to an audience at the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture video artist and film director Charles Atlas shares numerous clips from recent videos and installations, and talks about his collaborations with artists and choreographers including Merce Cunningham, John Cage, and Yvonne Rainer during the early days of his career. Questions from the audience address issues ranging from the very specific (his association with the color orange, his use of appropriated video in one of his more recent projects) to the more general (his collaborations with various gay artists, what advice he might have to offer young artists just starting out).

In a slide presentation before an audience at the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture, artist Matthew Brannon presents autobiographical information; shares examples from his life’s work which includes prints, sculptures, paintings and text; talks about the relationship between his training as a graphic artist and his artwork; and touches on his marketing strategies and dealing with gallerists. Questions following the lecture range from the very specific to broader philosophical issues.

Addressing an audience at Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, artist Chitra Ganesh delivers a two-part lecture, the first part devoted to autobiographical information and iconic and everyday images from her childhood which influenced her interest in myth and history as it emerged in her art, as well as sharing work she made as a participant at the school in 2001 and after. The second part is devoted to a more current collaborative body of work, with installations in many varied sites as well as a large web-based project around the issues of missing persons and those detained, deported, disappeared, tortured, and killed in the aftermath of September 11, 2001. Audience questions follow.

In a lecture replete with art world stories, personal anecdotes, and self-deprecating humor, artist Byron Kim addresses an audience at the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture about his own artwork and the path that his life as an artist has taken. Questions from the audience cover a range of topics, from the very concrete to philosophical concerns.

In this slide presentation at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, artist Thomas Lanigan-Schmidt shares numerous stories about his experiences growing up gay and Catholic in Elizabeth, New Jersey, and later when he ran away to New York. The art he shares is selected to concentrate on the dual subjects of queer culture and the Church, and he also comments on the art world and American culture in his early career as an artist, which he reports dates back to his school days.

Speaking to an audience at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, artist Marie Lorenz speaks at length about her “Tide and Current Taxi” project and related work. She fields questions from the audience about the relationship of her work to that of other artists and urban explorers; the potential for danger in what she does; the role of her web blog as an archive of the ongoing changes, weather and manmade, in New York City; and what her long-term plans for the project are.

Painter Dona Nelson gives a slide presentation at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture which includes images of work by artists who inspire her as well as an overview of her own work. She discusses materials, process, studio considerations and installation and display of her work, as well as the importance of experiencing paintings live rather than in images on a screen or in a book.

Speaking before an audience at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture on the subject of “Both/And,” artist Lorraine O’Grady touches on the subjects of race, feminism, ancient Egypt, Baudelaire, Michael Jackson, and contemporary politics and culture, both in her own work and in a larger context. Questions from the audience further draw out her thoughts on these subjects, as well as what constitutes artistic rigor, and the place of text in art, in particular the relationship between poetry and art.

Sheila Pepe gives a lecture at Skowhegan spanning her practice as an artist investigating her interests in pedagogy, installation, textiles, sculpture, and activism. Observing similarities and shared differences, naming and holding naming at bay, and the relationship between ephemerality and permanence are the main activities that drive Pepe’s work. Pepe also reflects on the importance of chronology, for it allows her to honour that which comes first. Pepe’s relationship to chronology also drives her interest in history: it gives Pepe the tools to try and be a part of something and create work that can last longer. Pepe also reflects on her experiences growing up as an Italian Catholic, and how studying the iconography of catholicism has allowed her to re-embrace it. Notions of domesticity are also important for Pepe. Domesticity has given Pepe the freedom to bring domesticity into patriarchal institutions, and appreciate the beauty of it’s craft.

Marie-Antoinette Chiarenza (born in 1957 in Tunis, Tunisia) and Daniel Hauser (born in 1959 in Bern, Switzerland) began collaborating in 1983 and have been working under the name RELAX since 1997. The name stands for a stance that suspends speed and the pressure of expectations and tensions, creating space for reflection and fundamental questions. During their lecture for the 2013 Barbara Lee Lecture Series at Skowhegan, they highlighted several key notions in their work, such as value, property, responsibility, and memory. Their multimedia works challenge social values as well as the often uncritically perpetuated art canon and the hierarchical power structures of the art world.

In this lecture at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture multidisciplinary artist Mickalene Thomas talks about the life circumstances that led her to become an artist and shares extensively from her work in painting, photography, video and installation, from her earliest efforts at Yale to very recent work, and also discusses her curatorial practice. Questions from the audience touch on social and political aspects of her art with particular emphasis on what it means to be a Black artist, a lesbian artist, a woman artist, her relationship with her mother, and the role those things play in the work she makes.

Actress and Director Kate Valk talks about the history and productions of the Wooster Group to an audience at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, focusing on personal and troupe challenges and sharing the unique innovations and perspectives that they brought to performances in The Performing Garage and on tour.

Lecturing at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, artist Louise Fishman shows selected bodies of work and shares autobiographical information on such subjects as her art education; feminism; her family; and her Jewish heritage as they have impacted her work. A painter’s painter, she acknowledges artists who have influenced her and stresses scale as an important element of her abstract painting.

Speaking before an audience at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, artist Rochelle Feinstein presents an overview of her work, beginning with early stand-alone grid paintings and moving through a variety of media to her later clustered works, including I Made a Mistake and The Estate of Rochelle Feinstein. She discusses the reasons behind the content in her oeuvre and some personal circumstances in which the art was made, stressing her interest in commenting on social rather than political life through her work, and comparing her approach to that of other painters who shared a similar interest.

In a presentation at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, experimental filmmaker Cauleen Smith shares clips from early and recent works, and discusses her philosophy of filmmaking along with her perspective on cameras and materials, music, and the place of experimental films in the larger context of filmmaking.

During his presentation, artist Dike Blair shows images of his work with a musical soundtrack overlay and fields questions from the audience about his art practice, his philosophy, specifics of the media he uses and the interplay between gouache paintings and sculptures in his installations. This is followed by a brief showing of early student work.

In this presentation at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, 2012 Paul Mellon Fellow Deborah Hay lectures on “The Performance of Beauty,” focusing on the questions she poses to herself as she choreographs and performs her dances. The lecture is preceded by a brief reconstruction of a performance by four of the School’s participants.

In this presentation at the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture, artist Huma Bhabha intersperses images of her own sculptures, assemblages and photogravures with pictures of her birthplace of Karachi, other artists’ work, and monuments and ruins which she feels have influenced her art. While the focus of the lecture is on materials, process, and scale, the questions which follow lead the artist to share her thoughts on the role of politics, figuration versus abstraction, the concept of the “ancient” in her work, and to further discuss her photogravures.

Artist peter campus intersperses prepared remarks with clips of his video art, which is shown without commentary in this presentation at the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture. The talk focuses on the nature and relevance of art education, how the commercialization of art can corrupt the art-making process, and how it has changed the nature of discourse among artists.

Speaking to an audience at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, artist Omer Fast talks about the circumstances that led him from painting to film while he was enrolled in graduate school; the artistic accident that resulted in an approach to film-making that has been a hallmark of his work; and the various interests that he brings to the films he makes. Questions following the lecture elicit comments about Fast’s relationship, from an ethical point of view, with his subjects; how financial resources affect the work from piece to piece, and a description of a performance piece which shares some of the same characteristics as his cinematic work.

In this interactive presentation before an audience of artists at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Kate Gilmore shows examples of her video work and still images from performances, talks about her interest in materials, color and humor, and explains why she prefers to hire others to perform for her rather than to perform herself, and why in general she finds reenactments and video of live performances to be unsatisfactory. The speaker chooses to continue speaking while the videos are playing, which makes it hard to make out exactly what is being said in many places.

Virgil Marti gives a lecture at Skowhegan talking about his artistic and curatorial practice. Marti’s interdisciplinary practice ranges from sculpture, textiles, painting, drawing, collaboration, and installation to explore ideas of history, autobiography, and domestic space. Marti’s wide ranging approach to materiality and use of objects draws from his interest in exploring how humans attempt to redesign natural forms, and to think about how objects can create meaning in spaces. Marti particularly draws on wallpaper to think about how these natural forms can be interpreted, through thinking about the wallpaper as a medium in exploring desire and material. Throughout the lecture, Marti states how this interest in investigating aesthetics draws from his adolescence, through a desire of watching himself becoming older and observing a younger generation appropriating the material his generation once created. Marti ends his lecture stating that no matter which direction his work goes, it is important for him to always inject his practice with a wide emotional range, which helps him learn how to control and modulate his voice as an artist.

In this presentation at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, artist Arlene Shechet talks about her early decision to commit to her studio practice as the number one priority in her life, and shares examples of her plaster, clay, crystal, ceramic and porcelain work, both individually and in installation, commenting on her various artistic interests such as history, architecture, choreography, humor, risk and the relationship of the body, hers or that of her audience, to the works. 

In this presentation of her work before an audience at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, artist Judy Pfaff displays a dry sense of humor as she touches on issues around her education at Yale; her friendship with artists such as Al Held, Elizabeth Murray, and Richard Tuttle; materials that she has discovered and enjoys working with; and various studios, galleries and museums that she has worked in. She shows a broad chronological sampling of her work and discusses her interest in art-making of all types.

In this lengthy lecture, Vito Acconci talks about his interdisciplinary practice spanning performance, architecture, installation, and writing over the last five decades. Acconci talks about the common language artists has in the late 1960s and early 1970s which was all about finding oneself, how to get to the core of oneself, and how time provided a kind of space where a person could achieve this. Acconci later speaks about how these notions gradually shifted as an artist, and how community engaged practices started to emerge more for artists including Acconci. Acconci mentions that the gallery space also started to reflect this by gradually becoming a community meeting place. when you design a space you are dictating peoples behaviour in a space, seeking to dismantle the totalitarian nature of architecture. Acconci later engages in a long conversation with the participants and faculty members, with ideas surrounding his work: time, space, energy, sound, environment, among many others. 

Los Angeles-based artist Walead Beshty speaks about his art before an audience at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, calling particular attention to the interrelationship between aesthetics, ethics and politics as he describes bodies of work ranging from an abandoned Iraqi embassy, dead malls, glass and copper FedEx boxes, glass floors and altered designer furniture, and explaining how the different handling of the materials in transit was manifested on them and critical to their becoming art objects. Questions from the audience lead him to explore further philosophical ideas about his art and his role as an educator.

Artist Daniel Bozhkov speaks to an audience at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture about a selection of his conceptual pieces with particular emphasis on recent work, describing the nature of the projects and the peripheral directions that many of them have taken. In response to questions he explains how he came to choose the works he included in the current lecture, the nature of his role as an outsider when working with people with authority in the various fields of interest that he explores, his interest in the duality of material and immaterial things, autonomy, and the function of tangible artifacts such as paintings or other objects as documentation or active players in the projects. 

Daphne Cummings and Bill Holmes give a lecture together at Skowhegan talking about the history of the school. They talk about the founders of the school, and the vision that Skowhegan rests on; which is to create a place where art education could foster and where participants could come to become artists. Cummings and Holmes also talked about how fresco was started by Bill Cummings and Henry Varnum Poor, and how the history of the farm dates back to 1792. Cummings and Holmes go into detail about the history of the town of Madison and Skowhegan, the application process of the program and how each class was created, and conclude their lecture by answering questions from faculty and participants. 

Artist Cheryl Donegan speaks about her dual media interests of painting and video before an audience at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, noting how her different philosophies regarding the two art forms have affected her approach to them. She also talks about her experience within the broader art world as an artist whose relationship with success and approbation has been intermittent, and how that impacts her art-making decisions.

David Lang gives a lecture at Skowhegan talking about his many years as a professor, classical musician, and composer. Sound is very important for Lang, and he relates it as being a type of byproduct which is related from piece to piece. This has allowed Lang to resist sounding a particular way. For Lang, the need to question classical music has also been important, for it allows him to understand how it can become a form of music that can lead to being more universal. Lang also reflects on themes of religion, death and pain, and how music is a conduit that allows these three ideas to tell their messages. Lang talks about the importance of music as a way to manage one’s emotional life, the ways in which it gives us the time to sit with grief and pain, and how it can allow people to come to terms with their mortality. Music has taught Lang that when we die, we are in connection with our loved ones; those who have passed before us, those who are still living, and those who will come after us.

Anissa Mack gives a lecture at Skowhegan showing a series of slides in her work that compromises photographs, sculptures, installations, and performance. Rooted in history, cultural myths and idea of repetition, Mack describes her work as creating relationships between imaginary vs real experiences, and how we seek to create memories through objects. Mack is also interested in the viewer through the ways in which people can test out how images work upon us and how we manipulate these images. Mack is also interested in the hierarchies between the makers of craft and art, due to the ways in which in craft makers are rendered invisible. For Mack, this invisibility has allowed her to be in dialogue with the anonymous.

Reading from prepared text, artist Marlene McCarty talks about her education in design, her early years as an activist with Gran Fury, and two major bodies of later work, specifically her drawings of child murderers and those focusing on the area of primatology. Questions from the audience address issues of feminism; trauma; the prevalence of nipples, sometimes misplaced, in her drawings; her perception of her audience; the source of her interest and information on the subjects she has chosen, and the emphasis on symmetry in her compositions.

Artist Dave McKenzie talks about his performance, conceptual, painting and sculptural work before an audience at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, to which he returns as resident faculty after having attended as a participant in 2000. Interspersing reading from prepared text with images and video the artist relives some of his experience at the school. In response to questions from the audience he addresses issues of audience and of race as they apply to particular pieces.

Chris Ofili gives a lecture at Skowhegan where he plays music and talks about his artistic practice spanning painting, drawing, sculpture, installation. and working with the unconventional material of elephant dung. Throughout the lecture, Ofili reflects on the influence music has had on his practice, particularly hip hop from the 1990s to jazz by Alice Coltrane. Ofili’s practice touches upon many themes including religion, sex, death, violence, love vs hate, good vs evil, identity formation, and geographical spaces. Ofili also talks about his many experiences creating work for prestigious exhibitions including the Turner Prize and the Venice Biennale, the move he experiences of shifting his practice from London to Trinidad, and tells the participants of the importance experiencing failure can have to cultivate new growth as artists.

Following a tongue-in-cheek introduction by fellow artist and 2011 faculty member Daniel Bozhkov, performance and video artist Michael Smith delivers a presentation at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture that includes video clips and still images from a number of projects, with particular emphasis on his signature characters Mike and Baby Ikki. His talk addresses the origins of his characters, human and other resources that he draws upon, the various “communities” that his work both takes from and crosses over into, and his sense of how his own limitations impact the type of art that he makes. 

Artist Sanford Biggers shows a generous selection of his videos, installations, sculptures, public art, and performance work, along with commentary on the personal experiences and varied cultural influences which inform his work. Questions at the end of the lecture range from clarification of very specific titles and references to the artist’s thoughts on universality in art, coded references, his art in relation to diverse audiences, and the reasoning for choosing among the various media he uses for a given project.

Video artist Dara Birnbaum shares video clips, installation shots, and other images, along with remarks about her pioneering work using appropriated images from television and the medium of video. The talk includes autobiographical information about her development as an artist, comments on the social and political issues of her time as they affected her art, and reflections on her current struggle to discover her next subject of inquiry.

Architect Teddy Cruz, discusses the discoveries made, lessons learned and principles developed as he and his university students assessed issues of density and use in San Diego-Tijuana neighborhoods in an effort to enable the reframing of city codes to more accurately reflect these issues. He also shares what he learned from a group of San Diego teenagers about creativity and process in their successful effort to convince the city to allow them to build a skateboard park under a freeway.

Speaking on the evening of the 2010 summer solstice, which she references in her talk, painter Anoka Faruqee shares her deep-seated passion for color and the influence on her painting of Persian miniatures, Islamic tiles, and her personal history. The questions which follow cover a full range of technical and philosophical subjects.

Martin Kersels traces the development of his career from his undergraduate days to current work, touching on the major themes in his work as well as critical moments in his life and his art-making that led him to examine or reevaluate the character of his practice. Questions from the audience touch on the speaker’s use of humor and physicality in his work, the welcome he has received in France over the years, and the specifics of particular pieces mentioned in the lecture.

Vietnamese artist Dinh Q. Le discusses the origins of his artwork in the Vietnam War and the Khmer Rouge attacks on his home village which resulted in his family relocating to the US when he was a child. Interwoven with examples of his installations are personal anecdotes about his life as an artist under a repressive government. 

In a multi-faceted slide lecture, Carrie Moyer talks about her life, social and aesthetic interests, political activism through agitprop and interventionist arts, and her collaborative project Dyke Action Machine! In between examples of her early and late painting, she shares examples of work by other artists and pop culture which she deems interesting or influential in one way or another.

Photographer Catherine Opie, focuses on the diverse themes and common threads represented in the bodies of her work which were exhibited at the Guggenheim retrospective of her photographs, An American Photographer. Communities, queerness, autobiographical data, a lifelong love affair with the medium, and specificity of identity in landscape and portraiture are motifs which run throughout the talk.

Artist Paul Pfeiffer shares extensive samples of his video and photographic work and discusses how his meteoric rise to prominence in the Nineties both heralded the entrance of video art as a medium on a par with painting and brought into conflict his desire to maintain his independence as an artist to discover different ways to explore media with the art world’s demands for more of the same type of work. Also addressed in this lecture are the artist’s assertion, challenged by members of the audience, that his work is not about identity politics, and an examination of why the Philippines was the resource he drew on for his production of The Saints.

Artist Dana Schutz shares a generous sampling of her paintings and comments at length about the unique thinking that resulted in various bodies of work. Questions from the audience cover such topics as her hole canvases, the role of drawing in her practice, visual source material, how she determines that one of her paintings is finished, the recurring themes of the future, and the end of the human race as we know it.

Arthur Simms weaves a narrative that combines his philosophy of art making with information about his personal history and the cultural and artistic elements and references which he incorporates into his sculptures and drawings, may examples of which are included in this lecture.

Artist Tamy Ben-Tor shows a selection of her video and performance work, and shares images and text from an artist’s book produced in collaboration with the painter, Miki Carmi. Her comments on her philosophy of artmaking address issues of struggle, sacrifice, humor, and interdisciplinary art, themes that she is asked to elaborate on during the Question and Answer session which follows the lecture.

Painter Katherine Bradford talks about her association to the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture and shows examples of her work covering the span of her career. She also addresses some of the factors that influenced her to explore different approaches in her painting.

Artist Luca Buvoli shows slides of his posters, comic book series, marquees and animations in his extensive Not-A-Superhero work, as well as more recent exhibitions dealing with issues of Fascism, Futurism and the writings of Filippo Tommaso Marinetti. During the questions which follow he is asked about the relationship between his choice of materials and what he is trying to convey; his thinking about the concepts of past and future; his research and development practice; what sort of work might be forthcoming; and how he thinks his art addresses political subject matter.

Artist Leonardo Drew talks about his dramatic evolution from a precocious teen with a facility for creating beautiful illustrations to a mature sculptor who negated the pretty surface in favor of works which draw on decay and oxidation which mimics nature in works which force the viewer to become an active participant in the process of interpretation. Following the talk, which also offers advice to developing artists, the speaker answers questions which range from the physical and mental aspects of his art practice, to his decision to number rather than title his pieces; his thoughts on beauty as it relates to his art; and issues of conservation of works fabricated from unstable materials.

Artist Hasan Elahi talks about the random and serendipitous way he came to be an artist, and points out how themes in his very earliest work reappeared and were better understood by him in his later political art. A large part of the lecture, as well as many of the questions at the end, is directed towards his interrogation and surveillance by the FBI as a possible terrorist suspect and the subsequent self-surveillance that the speaker undertook to make available on his website.

Following a brief slide presentation during which he talks about the efforts of Partners in Health (a group he co-founded) to improve health and secure social justice in impoverished countries, Dr. Paul Farmer shares the podium with author Tracy Kidder and artist Mel Chin. The presentation intersperses good-natured banter among the three friends with serious consideration of questions from the audience which address serious issues such as culture, criticality, failure, history, social injustice, and cynicism in an approach which integrates the various disciplines which they represent.

Artist Katharina Grosse talks about the installation work she did in a variety of spaces, and the aesthetic and philosophical interests which led her to start spray painting architectural elements and objects in these pieces. Although the artist also has a studio practice, she only touches on it briefly in this lecture. Questions from the audience at the end of the lecture range from the very specific to more theoretical ones.

In this interactive presentation, not long after the US premier of his award-winning feature film Hunger, artist Steve McQueen talks about that film, another called Western Deep, and an installation project, Queen and Country. Questions from the audience explore his techniques, process and artistic philosophy.

Artist Ester Partegàs reads prepared text which she calls parallel to but not descriptive of her sculptural works and installations, images of which are displayed while she reads. The short presentation is followed by a lengthy Question and Answer session in which Skowhegan participants ask her about a wide range of topics, including process and materials; the nature of her practice; different elements of her artistic and personal philosophy; and the kinds of venues she might favor.

Artist Ernesto Pujol spans his lifetime as an artist in this lecture at the Skowhegan. Beginning with early installations and ending with recent durational performance pieces that address the artist’s concerns in the cultural, social and political arenas, the speaker makes particular reference to the evolving historical significance of whiteness, the importance of finding space for silence in contemporary society, and how he incorporates time and religious concepts in his work.

Norwegian-born painter Hanneline Røgeberg talks about her very private and personal painting practice, paintings and literature that have influenced or inspired her, and her view of the act of putting paint on canvas as akin to an intimate licking or tasting of the nude bodies which are her subjects. The lecture is followed by a range of questions, some of which she answers in depth.

Painter Jo Baer reads a presentation which was delivered by Dr. Mark Godfrey of the Slade School of Fine Art on the occasion of a one-person show of her minimalist work at the Dia Center in New York City. After the reading, Baer talks about her transition to a figurative style of painting after 1975. Questions from the audience elicit additional insights into this significant shift in her work.

Video artist Burt Barr shows clips of early and recent work and talks about the ideas behind them and how they were produced. Following the presentation he fields questions ranging from his role in directing the actress in the film Roz, to his thoughts on how the pacing of his work relates to Hollywood, and the roles violence and women play in his work.

Artist Francis Cape shares examples of his work, from very early pieces constructed from found cardboard boxes to recent work for the New Orleans biennial, framing the historical and political development of his work as it conflates with the philosophical writings of Hannah Arendt and Herbert Marcuse, and discussing the close relationship between his dual careers as carpenter and artist.

Andrea Fraser talks about her work and her philosophy and practice in the field of institutional critique of the art world. The sound quality of the original lecture tape is extremely poor with many and sometimes extensive gaps in the transcript.

Artist Charles Gaines lectures on his personal philosophy about art as a means to promote public discourse on social and cultural issues. The talk is illustrated with still images and videos which reveal his use of linguistics, mathematics, mapping, science and computer technology to create a variety of works. Questions from the audience request clarification of points made during the lecture.

Artist and author Harmony Hammond talks about her work, including her floor, woven, installation, mixed media pieces, as well as monochrome paintings. She also discusses her book Lesbian Art in America, explaining materials, techniques, and background, and framing her comments within an historical and cultural context of feminist and queer issues.

Chinese-born painter Yun Fei Ji talks about his early years in China and subsequent move to the United States, and explains the political commentary embedded in his works, which derive in style and technique from traditional Chinese painting and deal with the effects of various Chinese government mandates on the citizenry.

Photographer and filmmaker Sharon Lockhart combines information about the artistic and technical aspects of several photographic and film projects with nostalgic reminiscences about the collaborating artists and the people in front of the camera. Questions at the end of the lecture address her decision-making process; ethical and practical issues inherent in trying to enlist groups of previously unknown people to participate in her projects; and the implications of undertaking artwork that creates a representation of a culture which is not the artist’s own.

In this lecture which encompasses and interweaves a broad range of topics, including politics, aesthetics, utopia, modernity, the history of ideas, beauty, reflection and self-reflection, Josiah McElheny talks about his major art projects since the beginning of the 21st century. Throughout the narrative the artist describes key historical moments in the 20th century that he feels were critical ideological turning points that affected both art and culture. The lecture is followed by questions which focus on philosophical issues in the work and in general.

Cabinet Magazine editor and publisher Sina Najafi talks about the genesis of the quarterly, how it came to be named, and his editorial philosophy. He also shares a variety of material from past issues of the magazine as well as books published by Cabinet.

Artist Julianne Swartz talks about her light and sound installations, kinetic sculptures and photographic work done between 1999, when she was a participant at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, and 2008. She makes observations about her relationship to the sites where her installations are displayed, the role of failure in her art practice, and her interest in exploring issues of politics, irony and sentimentality through her work, as well as how she views her relationship with the viewer.

In this autobiographical lecture Tom Burckhardt talks about the people and events in his life that inspired and influenced his painting, drawing, and works on paper, citing family, experience with other cultures, music and politics as key factors. Throughout the speaker clearly identifies with the struggle of artists to find a voice through their art practice.

Ghanaian-born artist El Anatsui talks about the role of African culture and history, and the found and made objects which he uses in making his art to express relevant characteristics of that culture and history. 

Interdisciplinary artist Paul Chan gives a lecture at Skowhegan concentrating on two works and the space between these two works. For Chan, the idea of change; what it means to change, the potential for change, how change grows, develops and how change can happen, are at the core of his practice. Chan also reflects on his personal journey becoming an artist, ranging from his days as a labor activist as a student in Chicago, to spending time in Baghdad with Iraqi families. The importance of mistakes, and seeing them as openings for talking about things one would rather not admit to themselves also drives Chan’s practice. Another aspect of Chan’s practice that is important to him is drawing. Drawing allows Chan to function as a way of thinking. It provides Chan space to reflect on ideas in his work; rage, his relationship to religion and philosophy, and reimagining failure as a tool to cultivate new openings and modes of thinking.