Writer/curator Cathy Byrd sparks conversations about today’s art, design, and film on the Fresh Art International podcast. Synthesizing interviews and field recordings with critical commentary since 2011, the podcast archives the voices, sounds, and stories of contemporary culture makers from around the world.
Episodes
Monday Oct 29, 2018
Monday Oct 29, 2018
What does it mean to make art collectively? How does art speak to our shared destiny? Where does sand intersect with art and community?
In the studio at Jolt Radio, with Miami-based curators and artists, we speak of art at the intersection of sand, smells and social behavior. Curator Quinn Harrelson and artist Troy Simmons introduce Collectivity, a site-specific exhibition at the Bakehouse Art Complex that explores the power of the individual and the collective. Curator Marie Vickles and artist Geovanna Gonzalez talk about the role of destiny and poetry in the exhibition Visions of the Future at Little Haiti Cultural Complex. Artist Misael Soto, the first-ever Art in Public Life resident for the City of Miami Beach, explains how he's curating and activating Sand, just steps from the shore in Collins Park.
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio | Special Sound: Domingo Castillo, Tropical Malaise, Martin Jackson, It's really very easy, Misael Soto, Flood Relief
Related Episodes: 2018 Creative Time Summit in Miami, Art and the Rising Sea, Cultural Complexity in Little Haiti, Where Art Meets Activism, Where Art Meets Cultural History
Related Links: Bakehouse Art Complex, Little Haiti Cultural Complex, Sand, ArtCenter/South Florida, The Bass Museum of Art, Creative Time
Monday Sep 10, 2018
Monday Sep 10, 2018
In 2018, seventy-five artists from thirty-three countries came together for the contemporary African art biennial known as Dak’Art. The offsite program featured more than 200 autonomous artist-organized exhibitions and events across Dakar and on the island of Gorée.
The projects we share in this episode explore ideas of freedom and responsibility as they investigate colonial histories, politics, and the economy, migration and the environment. Often achieved collectively and always emphasizing process, experimentation and action, they animate the legacy of legendary Senegalese artist Joe Ouakam and Agit'Art, the revolutionary creative movement he co-founded in 1974.
Voices: Simon Njami, Glenda León, Guy Woueté, Marcos Lora Read, Magdi Mostafa, Tori Wraånes, Marisol Rodriguez, Moataz Nasreldin, Pascal Traoré, Michel Amadou Gué
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio
Related Episodes: Magdi Mostafa Turns Analog Tech into Sound Sculpture, LIVE from Dak'Art 2018, SITElines, Unsettled Landscapes 2014
Related Links: Dak'Art 2018, Simon Njami, Glenda León, Guy Woueté, Marcos Lora Read, Magdi Mostafa, Tori Wrånes, Marisol Rodriguez, ZAM ZAM, Moataz Nasreldin, DARB1718, Issa Samb, Agit'Art, Pascal Traoré, Island of Gorée
Monday Sep 03, 2018
Monday Sep 03, 2018
What does it mean to be Black in 21st century America? The expression of Blackness in art has a history of intricate connections to civil rights and social movements. In the United States and abroad, painting and drawing, filmmaking and photography, performance and protest have long represented diverse creative perspectives on the volatile subject of race and identity in this country.
Today, we hear from curators and artists whose work directly engages with race and American identity. Individually and collectively, they generate “freestyle” expressions of Blackness—revealing that no matter how history influences the Black cultural space, identity remains a fluid form in the hands of contemporary artists.
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio | Photos courtesy of featured artists and the Renaissance Society
Featured Audio: Thelma Golden at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Hamza Walker, Black Is, Black Ain't Symposium, Renaissance Society, Johanne Rahaman field recordings in South Florida, Theaster Gates at Katzen Arts Center, American University, Theaster Gates performs at Huguenot House in Kassel, Germany, for documenta 13, Sanford Biggers, BAM (For Michael), Fahamu Pecou, All that Glitters Ain't Goals, Amy Sherald at Monique Meloche Gallery, Chicago
Related Episodes: Modern Black Portrait of Florida, Jefferson Pinder on Symbols of Power and Struggle, Theaster Gates on Meaning, Making and Reconciliation, Sanford Biggers on Time and the Human Condition, Amy Sherald on New Racial Narratives, Fahamu Pecou on Art x Hip-Hop
Related links: Thelma Golden, Studio Museum of Harlem, Freestyle, Hamza Walker, Black Is, Black Ain't, Johanne Rahaman, Jefferson Pinder, Theaster Gates, Sanford Biggers, Amy Sherald, Fahamu Pecou, Deborah Roberts
Monday Jul 09, 2018
Monday Jul 09, 2018
What happens outside the art scene inspires many of today’s curators, filmmakers and artists. They mine the conceptual depth of personal and communal rituals and routines. Community gardens, shared ride systems, public processionals, weathervanes, home improvement projects, live streaming radio and selfies on the internet are just a few of the subjects and sites of their research, commentary and engagement. Projects that elevate our view of the everyday reveal life as an art form—translating the mundane into the extraordinary.
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio | Special Audio: Camionnette Chérie, original sound by Claudette et Ti Pièrre; TET CHAJE, mix by Michelange Quay; David Walters, Mesi Bondye; Yosvany Terry, Conga Reversible
Related Episodes:
Marcus Gammel (2107), Skulptur Projekte Münster 2017, Sounds of Miami Art Week (2016), New Performance Art (2016), Cesar Cornejo (2015), Jllian Mayer (2014)
Related Links:
Monday Jun 25, 2018
Monday Jun 25, 2018
Activism has long been a way for artists and curators, writers and filmmakers to engage with global flashpoints, inspiring new perspectives on visible and unseen causes. Over the last century, public interventions, performative protests, and works created for public marches and events have led communities to participate in art experiences and make art themselves.
The Me Too Movement, Black Lives Matter, Dreamers and Climate Change Activists expose sexual harassment and assault, race-based violence, immigrant rights violations, and the impact of sea level rise. The issues have energized today’s culture production. Contemporary artists and curators increasingly lead and invite calls to action in response to these vital concerns.
Voices in this conversation: Andrea Bowers, Ralph Rugoff, Catherine Morris, Gary Carrion-Murayari, Manolis D. Lemos, Tania Bruguera, Maria Elena Ortiz, Maria Alyokina
Sound Editor: Julien Borrelli | Special Audio: Andrea Bowers, Manolis D. Lemos, Pussy Riot | Photography: Credits in captions
Related episodes: Andrea Bowers on Environmental Activism, Ralph Rugoff on the 13th Lyon Biennial, Catherine Morris and A Year Of Yes, Tania Bruguera on Art Activism, Maria Aloykhina on Political Art
Related links: Agora, The Highline, New York; Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminism Art, Brooklyn Museum; Songs for Sabotage, New Museum, Sala de Arte Público Siquieros
Monday May 28, 2018
Monday May 28, 2018
Curators and artists whose passion is social engagement share their experiments in relational aesthetics—participatory performances, interactive installations, community events, and inside/outside exhibitions—invite viewers to become co-creators, to take ownership in the creative process.
Curators Jochen Volz (São Paulo Biennial, Live Uncertainty, 2016), Susan Cross (Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, Material World, 2010-2011, The Workers, 2011-2012), James Voorhies (Bureau of Open Culture, MASS MoCA, The Workers) and Stephanie Smith (SMART Museum of Art, FEAST, 2012, and Institute for Contemporary Art, Richmond, Declaration, 2018) share their perspectives, as do artists William Pope.L (Baile, 2016), Theaster Gates (Soul Food Pavilion, 2012) and Marinella Senatore (Estman Radio, ongoing).
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio
Special Audio:
William Pope.L, Baile, São Paulo Biennial
There Is Only Light (We Do Not Know What To Do With Other Worlds) performance-reading, July 2011, MASS MoCA. Produced by Bureau for Open Culture
Theaster Gates, FEAST, SMART Museum of Art, University of Chicago
Marinella Senatore and Estman Radio recording, courtesy Marinella Senatore and Virginia Commonwealth University Institute for Contemporary Art
Related Links:
Live Uncertainty, Material World, The Workers: Precarity/Invisibility/Mobility, FEAST: Radical Hospitality in Contemporary Art, Declaration, Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation Exhibition Award, Exhibitions on the Cusp
Monday May 21, 2018
Monday May 21, 2018
Today, we bring you Fresh Art International LIVE from Dakar, Senegal. We made the journey to West Africa in May 2018, to capture sounds of local art and culture and to document our first encounter with the biennial of contemporary African art known as Dak'Art.
In the first of our two live streaming broadcasts, you'll hear Marisol Rodríguez (Mexico City/Paris), one of the biennial's guest curators, talk about her work with a team of creatives based in the Hurricane Zone (Mexico's Yucatàn Peninsula, Central America and the Caribbean).
Also LIVE: our show from la Boite à Idée, or Idea Box, a cultural hub in Dakar's Mermoz district. In the garden of this space is where cultural activist Ken Aicha Sy, founder of Wakh'Art Music introduces us to a few of the creatives engaging in the local art and music scene. You'll hear from Ms. Sy, along with Franco-Senegalese artist Gabriel Dia, jazz guitarist Paride Pagnotti, I Science vocalist Corinna Fiore, and composer Nathan Fallou Fuhr. A modest local songwriter introducing himself simply as "Jean-Pierre," steps up to the microphone with his guitar to voice our melodic good-bye-for-now.
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio | Special audio courtesy ZAM ZAM, Paride Pagnotti, I Science, Nathan Fallou Fuhr and Jean-Pierre
Monday May 07, 2018
Monday May 07, 2018
Monday Apr 23, 2018
Monday Apr 16, 2018
Monday Apr 16, 2018
Art and Sports? Curator Franklin Sirmans brings them together in The World’s Game exhibition at the Perez Art Museum, Miami. Immersive installations, paintings, sculptural objects, photographs and videos by forty artists reveal how the universal language of this transnational game can define beauty, make social statements, create a sense of community and express a shared passion. Timed to coincide with the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia, the exhibition celebrates soccer as the portal to a world of contemporary art.
Sound Editor: Anamnesis Audio | Special audio: Stephen Dean, Volta and Perez Art Museum, Miami