New Books in Art

In this NBN episode, host Hollay Ghadery speaks with poet and visual artist Zachary Logan about his beautiful collection of poetry and art, Green (Radiant Press, 2025).  An exciting new collection of ekphrastic poems accompanied by a compilation of green sketches via the lens of a queer poet and visual artist. Zachari Logan carried a sketchbook as he travelled the world and responded to iconic artwork as well as art that once existed but is now lost, destroyed, or far away. Whimsical art and thoughtful poems that ponder the nature of existence. Zachari Logan is a queer Canadian settler poet and artist whose artwork has been exhibited throughout North America, Europe and Asia. Logan’s work can be found in collections worldwide, including the National Gallery of Canada, Art Gallery of Ontario, Remai Modern, Peabody Essex Museum, McMichael Canadian Art Collection and Nerman MOCA among many others. In 2014 Logan received the Lieutenant Governor’s Emerging Artist Award, in 2015 he received the Alumni of Influence Award from the University of Saskatchewan and in 2016 Logan was long-listed for the Sobey Art Award. In 2010, his chapbook, A Eulogy for the Buoyant, was published by JackPine Press and in 2021, A Natural History of Unnatural Things, was published by Radiant Press. Logan’s artwork and writing has been featured in many publications throughout the world. Zachari Logan lives in Regina, Saskatchewan. “Green is a ravishing compendium of attention—a book that bristles with subtle and unexpected poetic turns, and the peculiar thrum of being human in a world increasingly out of step with itself. Here, the act of writing is inseparable from drawing, from walking, from remembering, from witnessing—and from loving, deeply, the fragile and persistent textures of the earth. Zachari Logan’s poems pulse with vegetal sensitivity, moving between alleyways and art history, between inner monologue and ecological longing. Green is not merely a colour: it is an atmosphere, a consciousness, a sensual and moral register. What it captures is more than the sum of its fragments—it is their residue, their ache, their adaptation, their ephemeral and often unintelligible traces. There is a deep and haunting beauty across these pages, but also fury, wit, and a quiet defiance. A sensual invitation to pay attention, this little but mighty book is not only an artistic gesture, but a political and ethical one. With luminous precision and a mind turned toward both the microscopic and the mythic, Green is a spell cast in language and images—one that lingers long after the page is turned.”— Giovanni Aloi, author of Lucian Freud: Plant Portraits, Botanical Revolutions: How Plants Changed the Course of Art and Speculative Taxidermy: Natural History, Animal Surfaces, and Art in the Anthropocene“A poem in its very color; deep green, wildly queer. This book captivates with its folds and cracks. The dissection of worlds, coupled with meticulous sketches of botany, art and the quotidian carried by the fascinating complexity of nature. One is lost between the body of a naked man or an abandoned thistle flower in a thick ditch. At once a sketchbook, a collection of poems, and an essay- this collection opens a door to the striking universe of Zachari Logan.”— Julie Hetu, author of Pacific Bell, Les dormeurs de Nauru and MotZachari Logan Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/art

Conservation of Twentieth-Century Furniture (Routledge, 2024) provides comprehensive and accessible coverage of the materials and techniques that are encountered in furniture of this century. After putting the design, manufacture and conservation of twentieth-century furniture into context, the volume then offers an A-Z of materials organised into 12 chapters. Within each chapter a wide variety of material types are discussed, observed, analysed and contextualised, and a list of further sources is provided. The furniture discussed in this book ranges from designer craftsman, individually made pieces, to factory-produced batch items, and includes cabinet work, decoration, surface finishes and upholstery, observing the traditional repertoire of materials, as well as innovative materials and processes introduced over the course of this century. Following the material chapters, the book also includes brief case studies that illustrate some examples of twentieth-century furniture conservation, with a focus on metal, plastic and wood. Conservation of Twentieth-Century Furniture is the primary resource for those working on the manufacture, history and care of furniture of this period, including conservators, curators, dealers and collectors. Lauren Fonto is a Master's student in the program Heritage and Cultural Sciences: Heritage Conservation at the University of Pretoria, South Africa. She is currently a heritage conservation intern. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/art

For centuries, monuments have telegraphed the values and origin myths of dominant culture in public space and on massive scale. They have signaled both who is part of a culture and who is not, often overlooking histories that complicate the stories they tell. Yet in the last 50 years in the United States, the role of monuments has changed significantly. Numerous historical monuments have been removed or toppled, bringing to the fore a long-repressed conversation about the relationship between the monumental landscape and national identity. In Monumental: How a New Generation of Artists Is Shaping the Memorial Landscape (MIT Press, 2025), Dr. Cat Dawson takes up the social, political, and art historical causes and ramifications of this important shift.Examining the conditions that have led to and define this new era, Dr. Dawson reveals that these interventions are as indebted to the monumental tradition as they are to representational strategies that grew out of twentieth-century social justice efforts, from the Civil Rights movement to queer organizing during the AIDS crisis.Since 2014, a new generation of artists has established a groundbreaking role for monuments, calling into question the very notion of what a monument is through novel investigations of how symbolic structures can be made and what stories they can tell. This book tells the important story of that sea change. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/art

How can art shape historical memory and national identity? And how can cultural heritage and historical references be used to enact a vision of a nation? In Staging Tianxia: Dunhuang Expressive Arts and China’s New Cosmopolitan Heritage (Indiana University Press, 2024), Lanlan Kuang explores these questions through the lens of Dunhuang expressive arts — a twentieth-century music and dance performance style inspired by the images, music descriptions, and narratives found in the Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes. Through these performances, Dunhuang expressive arts presents a vision of China as a historically multiethnic and cosmopolitan nation. Staging Tianxia is an ambitious and interdisciplinary book, weaving together ethnography, ethnomusicology, performance studies, history, and philosophy. It is also rich with episodes from Kuang’s own fieldwork in Dunhuang and rehearsal studios, and through such moments Kuang offers intriguing insights on the way that heritage is constructed and embodied. The book will be of interest to scholars and students of ethnomusicology, performance studies, Chinese classical dance, and Dunhuang studies. Listeners (and readers!) should also check out the multimedia components of the book on Kuang’s website, here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/art

No-one can fail to notice how many statues of Great Men there are around London: stern politicians, military generals, imperial adventurers . . . But what about women? As shown by Juliet Rix in London's Statues of Women (SafeHaven Books, 2025), women are surprisingly well represented amongst London’s statues. Recent years have seen new statues of Virginia Woolf in Richmond, Mary Wollstonecraft in Stoke Newington, even boxer Nicola Adams in Brent. But there are also groundbreaking statues commemorating the Black community, notably the two of Brixton resident Joy Battick on its railway station platforms. And you’ll find historical figures from Florence Nightingale to Joan of Arc and Edith Cavell – as well as Twiggy. And how many ballet dancers are commemorated, and where? And which famous tennis player was the unlikely model for the young girl with dolphin by Tower Bridge? This is a book that really will make you see London in a new way. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/art

Along with the rise of Mussolini’s fascist regime, the interwar years in Italy also saw the widespread development of its modernist interior design and furnishing practices. While the regime’s politics were overtly manifest in monumental government architecture, Furnishing Fascism: Modernist Design and Politics in Italy (University of Minnesota Press, 2025) by Dr. Ignacio G. Galán examines the subtler yet effective role of household goods and decor in the cultivation of Italy’s exclusionary sense of national identity. Presenting a fresh look at the work of various architects and designers, including iconic figures such as Gio Ponti and Carlo Enrico Rava, Dr. Galán explores how seemingly neutral products of everyday life contributed to the propagation of fascist ideology. Through extensive promotion in popular magazines and department stores, on the film sets of Cinecittà Studios, and throughout the country’s colonial territories, Italy’s modernist design practices were part of a larger political project that aimed to produce a totalizing image of cultural hegemony. Interweaving design theory, architectural history, and media scholarship, Furnishing Fascism reexamines the period’s so-called minor arts to reveal the political entanglement of modernism in early twentieth-century Italy and offers valuable insight into the complications of cultural production under the auspices of authoritarian power. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/art

The Red Dress: Conversations in Stitch (Quickthorn, 2025), shares the deeper story of The Red Dress, its embroiderers and Kirstie Macleod's own story whilst opening up the wider issues the garment prompts for its audiences through thematic essays by individuals involved in the greater project on subjects such as empowerment, finding voice, feminism, community and healing trauma. This project offered a platform for people, mostly women, who are vulnerable and live in poverty to share their stories through embroidery. The completed Red Dress traveled for 14.5 years and was embroidered by 367 women/girls, 7 men/boys, and 2 non-binary artists from 51 countries. All 141 commissioned artisans were paid for their work and received annual donations from exhibition fees and merchandise profit. Additional small embroideries were added by participants and audiences at various events. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/art

In this episode Pat speaks with Dr Lexi Eikelboom. Dr Lexi Eikelboom is both a visual artist and a scholar of philosophical theology. Her academic work analyses aesthetic concepts such as rhythm and form as way to illuminate the human implications of the philosophical arguments in which the concepts appear. She also leads collaborative projects investigating art as a form of thinking and the effects of engagement with art on theoretical work. They discuss rhythm and time in cubist painting, letting the shapes of art speak for themselves, and art as confrontation and incitement to change. A transcript of this episode will be available on the Concept : Art website (www.conceptart.fm). Concept : Art is produced on muwinina Country, lutruwita Tasmania. Always was, always will be Aboriginal land. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/art

In the sixth episode of Soundscapes NYC, host Ryan Purcell talks with John Holmstrom a comic illustrator and founder of Punk magazine. In the early 1970s, Holmstrom moved from suburban Connecticut to New York City to attend the School of Visual Arts where he studied under the celebrated comic illustrator Will Eisner and Harvey Kurtzman creator of MAD magazine. In 1975, Holmstrom conceived the idea for Punk Magazine by collaborating with Ged Dunn and Eddie “Legs” McNeil as an independent zine to cover the local rock scene. The trio initially considered the name Teenage News, a reference to an unreleased New York Dolls track, but settled on punk which they derived from the term “punk rock” which by 1975, had crept into music journalism as a descriptor of new sounds in the rock world. Punk magazine ran 15 issues from 1976 to 1979. During that time the publication brought international attention to the local rock scene and created an association between New York rock and punk. In addition to creating Punk magazine, John Holmstrom is perhaps best known for illustrating album covers for the Ramones, including Rocket to Russia (1977) and Road to Ruin (1978). In September 2024, Holmstrom relaunched Punk magazine to cover a new generation of punk bands in New York City. Contact Soundscapes NYC Here Gotham Center for NYC History - CUNY GCDisclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/art

Women, Art, Freedom: Artists and Street Politics in Iran offers an insightful look at the 2022 Woman, Life, Freedom uprising in Iran, sparked by the tragic murder of Jina Mahsa Amini at the hands of the “morality police” for violating hijab rules. Beyond its feminist undertones and the remarkable courage of the young protesters, what sets this uprising apart from previous ones is the abundant and diverse art it has inspired. This book, rather than merely analyzing the artworks that garnered attention on social media platforms, brings to light lesser-known grassroots artistic movements that played a crucial role within their immediate local communities. Engaging with primarily Iran-based artists, it uncovers their role in shaping guerrilla interventions and street occupations and in articulating distinct forms of peaceful civil disobedience. By drawing on a broad spectrum of historical and theoretical sources, this book further reveals the origins and inspirations of Iran’s protest art. Focusing mainly on the interconnections between the public sphere, women’s bodies, and feminist viewpoints, Women, Art, Freedom underscores the vital role of artists in championing global justice and equality.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/art