Nari Ward talks to Ben Luke about his influences—including literature, music and, of course, art—and the cultural experiences that have shaped his life and work. Ward often uses found materials, from baby strollers to baseball bats and shoelaces, and repurposes them in sculptures, wall-based text works and installations. They address present and historical social and political issues, including race and poverty, and deal directly with emotions like loss and hope. Ward was born in 1963 in St Andrew, Jamaica, and moved with his family to the US when he was 12. He now lives and works in New York, and specifically Harlem, which has been much more than the location of his home and studio—often providing the raw materials and the thematic basis of his art. The late curator Okwui Enwezor said of Ward that he had “completely transformed the scale and the ambition of installation art”. He discusses his early interest in the Brothers Hildebrandt, his direct references to Piero Manzoni and Joseph Beuys and his use of Claude McKay’s poetry and The Staple Singers’ lyrics. Plus, he answers the questions we ask all our guests, including the ultimate: what is art for? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Cornelia Parker talks to Ben Luke about her influences, including artists, writers, film-makers, composers and musicians, and the cultural experiences that have shaped her life and work.Parker, born in 1956 in Crewe, Cheshire, north-west England, makes works ranging from dramatic room-filling installations to subtle, ephemeral objects— some of the most profound, witty and thought-provoking art of recent decades. Common to her work are acts of transformation, from the violent to the surreal and the whimsical. She takes found objects and substances and through hugely varied processes lends them new, often multilayered, meanings. She discusses her early love of J.M.W. Turner, and the work she eventually made linking Turner with Mark Rothko. She recalls wrapping Auguste Rodin’s The Kiss with a mile of string, in a reference to Marcel Duchamp, and the controversy this intervention prompted in the press. She talks about the increasing concern with politics in her work, including two new works made for her Tate Britain retrospective opening in May 2022. And she answers the questions we ask all our guests, including those about the museum she visits the most, her daily studio rituals, and, ultimately, what art is for.Cornelia Parker, Tate Britain, London, 19 May-16 October Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Mark Leckey tells Ben Luke about the influences—from art to literature, film and music—and cultural experiences that have shaped his life and work. Leckey’s enormously varied and experimental work sits on the cusp of digital and analogue worlds. Using video, sound, performance and installation, he explores the meanings and effects of images, consumer products, media and technologies, alongside themes including class and capitalism, interwoven with personal and collective histories. Deeply subjective and emotional, yet seeking universal truths, Leckey’s practice has made him one of the most influential artists working today. He discusses his preoccupation with pre-Renaissance icons, his early interest in Mexican Muralism, the influence of Lutz Bacher and Mike Kelley, his fascination with a range of musical artists, and his use of YouTube, TikTok and other platforms in making his work. Plus, he answers our questions about daily rituals, the one work of art he would choose to live with, and the ultimate question: what is art for?Mark Leckey, Cabinet, London, until 30 April. You can find his latest works, as well as previous pieces like Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore and Dream English Kid on Mark’s YouTube channel. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ali Cherri talks to Ben Luke about his influences, from art to literature, film and music, and the cultural experiences that have shaped his life and work. Cherri works with film, sculpture, installation, drawing, painting and other media to explore geopolitical and cultural histories, the loaded sites of museums, and the meanings and practices of archaeology. He was born in 1976 in Beirut at the beginning of the Lebanese civil war and, as we hear, growing up in Lebanon in this period inevitably marked his life and ultimately the art he would make. As well as talking about growing up in Beirut, he discusses his National Gallery exhibition, prompted by his residency at the gallery, his exploration of what he calls the “politics of visibility”, his use of taxidermied animals and his experiences at antiques auctions. Among the huge range of cultural figures he discusses are David Hockney, Ilya Kabakov, Man Ray, Donna Haraway and Tsai Ming-liang. He also responds to the questions we ask all our guests, about the objects he has in his studio, his daily rituals, and the ultimate question: “what is art for?”Ali Cherri: If you prick us, do we not bleed?, National Gallery, London, until 12 June. Ali Cherri will feature in the main exhibition of the 59th Venice Biennale, The Milk of Dreams, curated by Cecilia Alemani, 23 April-27 November. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ben Luke talks to Ai Weiwei about his influences, from art to literature, film and music, and the cultural experiences that have shaped his life and work. Ai, born in Beijing in 1957, is an artist who needs little introduction; he is among the most famous artists in the world, principally due to the activism which led him to be incarcerated in his native China for months without charge in 2011. Since his release he has not let up and he continues to be a thorn in the Chinese government’s side, relentlessly documenting and publicly speaking out against its attacks on freedom and manifold other human rights abuses. And while this conversation addresses his political activities it also explores his wider work, including the early objects inspired by Marcel Duchamp, his first pieces made with ancient Chinese ceramics, his middle-finger salutes, Study of Perspective, and the huge actions, like Fairytale at Documenta in 2007, for which he has come to be best known. He also answers the questions we ask all our guests, including the ultimate: what is art for?Ai Weiwei: The Liberty of Doubt is at Kettle’s Yard in Cambridge, UK, until 19 June. His show Intertwine is at the Serralves Museum in Porto, Portugal, until 9 July. The opera Turandot is at the Rome Opera House from 22-31 March. His book, 1000 Years of Joys and Sorrows, is published by Bodley Head in the UK, priced £25 and Crown in the US, priced $32. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ben Luke talks to Allison Katz about her influences in the realms of literature, music and, of course, art, and the cultural experiences that have shaped her life and work. Born in Montreal in 1980, Katz is an artist who probes the complexities of painting, drawing on diverse imagery, a range of painterly techniques and distinctive forms of display to create environments that are by turns delightful and perplexing, but always enthralling. The longer you spend in the company of Katz’s work, the more the associations, the playful connections, and the fundamental rigour of her thinking emerge. In this conversation, she discusses the influence of being a life model at a young age, and making numerous “portraits” of a painting of a woman by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot. She reflects on paintings by Edgar Degas and Andrea del Verrocchio, among others, discusses how the poet and translator Richard Howard helped her read poetry and see that frivolity could be serious, and expresses wonder at British radio programmes, including sporting commentary. And she answers the questions we ask all our guests, including the ultimate one: what is art for?Allison Katz: Artery, Camden Art Centre, London, until 13 March. That exhibition originated in a slightly different form at Nottingham Contemporary, and a catalogue accompanying the two versions of the show will be published in early 2023. An exhibition of Katz’s posters is at Canada House, London, until 26 March. Her paintings are in The Milk of Dreams, the central exhibition at the Venice Biennale, 23 April-27 November. She has a solo exhibition at Luhring Augustine, New York, in September. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ben Luke talks to Charles Ray about his influences and the cultural experiences that shape his life and work. Ray, born in 1953 and based in Los Angeles, is one of the most singular voices in contemporary sculpture, with a extraordinary grasp of the key elements of the discipline—space, material, surface, scale, weight and mass—and a unique approach to imagery, drawing on a huge range of sources to create absorbing, yet deeply ambiguous works. Carved and cast by hand and using cutting-edge technology, they often take years to come to fruition, and are made and remade in a variety of different patterns and prototypes in a range of materials and scales before being completed. Ray engages deeply with the history of sculpture, and in this conversation reflects on his admiration for everything from Anthony Caro’s abstract metal sculpture Early One Morning to the ancient Greek Great Eleusinian Relief. He also reflects on the significance to his work of Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn and the importance of his daily walks to his practice. Plus, he answers our usual questions, including the ultimate: what is art for?The exhibition Charles Ray is at the Bourse de Commerce and the Centre Pompidou in Paris from the 16 February and continues until 6 June at the Bourse and until 20 June at the Pompidou. Charles’s exhibition Figure Ground is at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York until 5 June. Charles is in this year’s Whitney Biennial, called Quiet as it’s Kept, at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, from 6 Apr–5 Sept. And the third special installation of Ray’s works at Glenstone, Potomac, Maryland continues until spring 2023. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this first episode of 2022, Ben Luke talks to Dayanita Singh about her influences, from art to literature, music and film, and the cultural experiences that have shaped her life and work. Singh, who was born in 1961 in New Delhi, India, is one of the most pioneering photographers of recent decades. She resists the idea of a single, decisive image, and instead presents her richly diverse, poetic photographs in the context of constructed environments, bespoke archival structures and artists’ books. She continues to push the presentation of her photography in new directions. In the conversation, she recalls how her mother’s photography was a “traumatic” part of her childhood and remembers an early opportunity to photograph the celebrated tabla player Zakir Hussain. She talks about her passion for the poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke and Michael Ondaatje, the revelatory visits to Shankar’s Dolls Museum in Delhi, and about her remarkable project documenting Mona, a lifelong friend and collaborator. Plus, she answers all our usual questions, including the ultimate one: what is art for? Dayanita Singh: Dancing with My Camera, Gropius Bau, Berlin, 18 March-7 August 2022. The exhibition tours to Museum Villa Stuck, Munich, MUDAM Luxembourg, the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art, Porto, and Les Rencontres d’Arles, France.This podcast is sponsored by Bloomberg Connects.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ben Luke talks to Kehinde Wiley about his influences, including artists, writers, composers, musicians and filmmakers, and the cultural experiences that have shaped his life and work. Perhaps more than any other contemporary artist, Wiley has situated himself within the history of Western portrait painting. He makes direct reference to the art of the past, quoting from artists like Holbein, Titian, Rubens, Gainsborough and David, but replacing the royal, noble and ecclesiastical figures depicted by the Old Masters with ordinary people he has encountered on the street. These “moments of impact” happen mostly in New York, where he lives much of the time, but also—in his grand ongoing project The World’s Stage—in cities in Jamaica, India, Haiti, Nigeria, Brazil and beyond.As well as his project at the National Gallery in London, Wiley discusses the early influence of John Singer Sargent, his latest works relating to Caspar David Friedrich, the influence of museums like The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens and a formative visit to the Soviet Union. Plus he tells us what work of art he would most like to live with and ponders the ultimate question: what is art for? This episode is sponsored by Bloomberg Connects. Kehinde Wiley, The Prelude, National Gallery, London, until 18 April 2022; The Obama Portraits Tour is at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art until 2 Jan 2022. He features in 30 Americans, Columbia Museum of Art, South Carolina, until 17 January 2022. And his work is in Fashioning Masculinities: The Art of Menswear, at Victoria and Albert museum, London, from 19 March 2022. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Isaac Julien talks to Ben Luke about his influences, from art to literature, music and film, and the cultural experiences that have shaped his life and work.Julien's films and video installations are often swooningly beautiful, and always deeply engaged in diverse cultural histories, reflecting on, among other things, diaspora and Blackness, queer identity and the movement of people. His work actively involves other art forms, and is often produced from collaborations with choreographers and actors. He responds repeatedly to the art, literature and cinema of the past, but is also pushing video installation into new territory, using multiple screens—sometimes as many as ten—to create fractured narratives which envelop the viewer, encouraging distinctive readings of the complex stories he tells, and constantly expanding the frames through which we see his subject matter.He discusses the epiphany of seeing Max Beckmann at the Whitechapel Gallery, his admiration for Peter Doig, Stan Douglas and Glenn Ligon, the influence of poets including Aimé Césaire and Derek Walcott, the architect Lina Bo Bardi, the cultural scene in London when he began his film-making journey in the 1980s, and discovering, in his archive, his student photographs of early 1980s protests against police brutality—images that he had forgotten he had even taken. Plus, he answers our familiar questions, including the ultimate one: what is art for? This episode is sponsored by Bloomberg Connects.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.