A Conversation with International Gallerist, Curator & Podcast Host
Today, the world is very divided, lots of fractures. It is the time for art and culture to come into play because art is about soft power. If we want to resolve misunderstandings, art is the best, best, best way to communicate. So use this.
A Conversation with Author DOUG WOODHAM
Fmr. President of the Americas at Christie’s · Managing Partner, Art Fiduciary Partners
All of the great artists are there for a reason: because they rebelled in some way. They created a visual vocabulary that felt fresh and new, which excited people. So, the great artists are not built on sort of anthills of sand. They're built on things of substance and of meaning. Though this is not a sufficient condition to become an icon, it's a necessary but not sufficient condition. I think you have to have an interesting and vivid personality or personal narrative that makes you interesting for people to talk about and want to learn about. I think you also have to have a support network of galleries, curators, and collectors who are excited about your work and want to push it forward, not wanting it to be forgotten. Basquiat's visual vocabulary is distinctive and stands out relative to what was being done in the 1980s. That's the sort of strong hill on which his reputation is built. Basquiat benefited from being the first black artist of note who got pushed forward. As in many things, the first benefits.
Everything is Art.
Everything is Politics.
I think art competes with reality. And art will give you the last words.
–AI WEIWEI
A Conversation with Manager of Digital Media AMR HUSSEIN
Guggenheim Abu Dhabi is a unique concept. The idea behind the building itself is a dance. It's a living building because it's a dance between spaces. It's a dance between blocks of spaces and shapes and cones, and it's inspiring for the future because the legacy is a huge factor for every project. It's the legacy for young architects and for other architects. It gives them the space to dream more and to feel like it can be possible, and not to be shy. Present more bold ideas that can inspire creativity because you can't see this building and walk in without feeling like you want to be creative as well.
ERIC FISCHL’s Couples explores the secret life of suburbia at SKARSTEDT PARIS
October 20 – December 6, 2025
Fischl’s work explores the darkness inside suburbia. Desire, betrayal, and the search for connection. The violence of privilege. What happens when you’re surrounded by everything and yet have nothing left to give one another? What happens when what you own ends up owning you? Autopsies of the American dream: the suburb as an emotional landscape. Roadsides, hotel rooms, beaches, private homes with the chlorine-scented promise of a swimming pool. They are places built for temporary perfection or maintaining an outward-facing image.
Artist MIA FUNK discusses her Creative Process
I feel my paintings are shaped by my life and the people I’ve met along the way. We’re all part of the same human story. And I’ve always loved learning and sharing with others. And hopefully, you can see echoes of this in the art. I love to dance. And try to write every day.
I grew up in an artistic community and like to blur the boundaries between disciplines because I believe that’s where creative ideas arise. These conversations have helped shape me. I’ve always been drawn to art that begins a dialogue. I want to express what I see and feel and share what others know about the world.
At the end of the day, for me, it’s about the search. How do we stay open and curious? And I believe that remains one of our great challenges. How do we hold on to that sense of wonder and remember that we live in a miracle that we are a part of, and that we have the ability to either nurture or destroy? And so many people that I’ve had the chance to speak with have held on to that sense of wonder, and what can be achieved individually and collectively with the life we’re given. You can hear it in their voices. You can see it in the projects they create and the way they inspire others. Somehow, they’ve managed to remain curious, which is at the heart of the creative process.
JAMES TURRELL’s The Return Transforms Perception at PACE
Seoul · June 14 – September 27, 2025
Where does the edge of space end and your perception begin?
We don't see the world as it is, we see it as we are.
What if I could touch time? Turn light into matter?
Everything that is visible hides something that is invisible.
What would we see if we could return to the beginning?
Before presence and absence, before light and darkness, before sound and silence?
How Deception is Sculpting Our Reality
A Conversation with Artist · Geographer · Author TREVOR PAGLEN
At the core of the work is that sense of curiosity, that sense of joy, that sense of beauty, and that sense of learning. I've been fortunate to have all kinds of strange and interesting experiences, whether that's seeing weird things in the sky over secret military bases in the middle of the Nevada desert, going scuba diving and finding internet cables on the bottom of the ocean, or tracking spy satellites in the sky and being able to predict when they'll appear in a flash against the backdrop of stars. The world around us is extraordinary and embodied, right? It is not on screens, and I’m very privileged to have that be so much a part of my process.
A Conversation with Photographer MARK HANAUER
I try to get people to stop, look, and think about what they are seeing, whether it's one of my portraits, a landscape, or a close-up of a flower. Design is important to me in my photographs, and my goal is to engage one's gaze and move it around and image, and hopefully tell a little abstract story within that moment.
Connecting Brazil and China Through Art and Music
A Conversation with Curator · Philanthropist · Collector SARINA TANG
I think that, based on the fact that both Brazil and China are tied to my own roots, I understand a little more about the culture and history of both countries. About 15 to 20 years ago, I felt that I didn’t want to work just for income or to gain more fame. I felt I should do something meaningful for the rest of my life. Very few people from Brazil have ever been to China. This is why I brought a few Chinese artists from China to Brazil and from Brazil to China. That was my first experience doing some form of residency, but it was more than a residency. It was really for the Brazilian artists to learn more about China and its culture, and for some of the Chinese artists to learn more about Brazilian art and culture.
Can silence be painted? How can artists capture interior states, solitude, and the passing of time? How are the homes we live in a reflection of the people who inhabit them? How can we read a painting to piece together the life of the artist?
The Soul Trembles
The exhibition at the Grand Palais offers visitors a poetic immersion into her unique universe, where threads weave stories of human connection and the ephemeral nature of life. The visitor is taken on a journey into an ephemeral world where they are posed fundamental questions about life and death. The threads you follow are up to you, and each visitor must answer that question for themselves. Where are we going? Are you ready for the journey? What is a soul? What do you believe? Why did you go on this journey? What gives your life meaning?
& The Future of Museums
A Conversation with NICOLA LEES · Director of the Aspen Art Museum
It's a complicated time to think about how we can slow down, be still, and bring a brilliant group of people together to do something that feels purposeful and can be productive. It's a moment where things are moving so fast. When I brought up the idea of a hinge generation, I think it's impossible to know how we will look back and reflect on this time and these moments. This year, there is a real emphasis on the relationship between the question we have posed for the retreat, which is fundamentally about our relationship with technology and identifying our relationship with the world and how we want to be present in the moment.
Conversation with MANUELA LUCÁ-DAZIO Exec. Director · Pritzker Architecture Prize
Fmr. Exec. Director · Venice Biennale · Dept. of Visual Arts & Architecture
When I started and I had to decide what to do in life - because I was working with museums, in exhibition design, and on the restoration of buildings - and then at some point, I had the chance to arrive at the Venice Biennale and my whole perspective changed. And it changed because I was working with living artists and architects. Until that moment, I was working around Old Masters, works in museums, and things that were there with the aura of history. And all of a sudden I was dealing with living architects and artists, and this was, for me, the most incredible experience. So I decided to leave all the rest, because I was doing quite a lot at the same time, and to concentrate on the Biennale.
Kingdom of Cats
How do we, as humans, balance our biological necessities and the inorganic industry we have created? How do we reckon with our animal natures and our intricate consciousnesses?
A Conversation with Artist DELPHINE LEBOURGEOIS
Nature was very much part of my upbringing. I spent most of my teenage years exploring the surroundings of my grand-paren’s house in rural Auvergne. A few years ago, I did an installation where I placed large cardboard cutouts of my Amazonians in a remote forest in France. The installation was hidden, away from touristic trails and not signed posted. I wanted passers by to see it by chance rather than people searching for it. The cut outs were made from recycled cardboard so extremely fragile and prone to quick degradation. The project had to be ecological and ephemeral.
Art about nature or in nature holds a particular place for me. I remember loving “My Back to Nature” the exhibition by George Shaw at the National Gallery in London, and more recently got the same awe whilst visiting “Light into Life” by Mark Quinn at Kew Gardens.
Sustainability is important but paradoxically beauty is everywhere… in decay, in a plastic bag stuck in a tree, even in garbage. This is why I liked George Shaw’s exhibition so much. He painted woodlands with traces that humans have left behind. Dirty mattresses, soiled duvets hanging from branches. His mastery as a painter made the objects nearly sacred. I don’t think art should be sanitised.
A Conversation with Artist ISCA GREENFIELD-SANDERS
Traditionally, landscape painting has played up man’s insignificance as it compares to nature. Today, the extraordinary effect humans have had on climate and the landscape has swapped that dynamic, casting us as the danger. That is a massive shift. When I started to learn art history, I connected deeply with the notion of the sublime. I was especially moved by Turner’s landscapes. When I was 11, my family got caught in a lightning storm on the beach in Miami. It was scary but incredibly beautiful, like being inside a painting by Constable, Turner, or Homer.
Can silence be painted? How can artists capture interior states, solitude, and the passing of time? How are the homes we live in a reflection of the people who inhabit them? How can we read a painting to piece together the life of the artist?
CELIA PAUL at Victoria Miro Gallery, London
March 14th to April 17, 2025
My young self and I— we are the same person. I can stretch out my old hand— with its age spots— and hold my young unblemished hand.
What is ugliness? What is beauty? How has our conception of beauty changed over the years? How do traditional notions of beauty inform our ideas about ugliness?
Just some of the questions raised by the exhibition On Ugliness at Skarstedt Gallery in London featuring George Condo, Nicole Eisenman, Jameson Green, Martin Kippenberger, Barbara Kruger, Jacob de Litemont, Pablo Picasso, Stefan Rinck, Pensionante del Saraceni, Cindy Sherman, Thomas Schütte and several unknown artists living in the Middle Ages.
The Creative Process: Podcast Interviews & Portraits of the World’s Leading Authors & Creative Thinkers
Inspiring Students – Encouraging Reading - Connecting through Stories
The Creative Process exhibition is traveling to universities and museums. The Creative Process exhibition consists of interviews with over 100 esteemed writers, including Joyce Carol Oates, Hilary Mantel, Neil Gaiman, Viet Thanh Nguyen, Tobias Wolff, Richard Ford, Junot Díaz, Marie Darrieussecq, Michel Faber, T.C. Boyle, Jay McInerney, George Saunders, Geoff Dyer, Etgar Keret, Douglas Kennedy, Sam Lipsyte, and Yiyun Li, among others. Artist and interviewer: Mia Funk.
