Podcast
Fresh Art International
Hosted by Cathy Byrd · EN
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.
17episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
Listening to St. Louis at the Counterpublic Art Triennial
May 18, 202300:26:09Tap to summarizeToday, we take you to St. Louis, Missouri, in the United States of America. Home of the Gateway Arch, an Emblem of Manifest Destiny, at the confluence of the Mississippi and Missouri rivers. Emblem of Manifest Destiny. St. Louis is nicknamed “‘Mound City”’ because of the number of earthworks built by Indigenous peoples there, before the westward expansion of colonizers conspired to flatten them. Where caves beneath the city sheltered freedom seekers traversing the Underground Railroad in the mid-1800s. Where, from 1959 to 1972—in the span of less than 20 years—residents of the historically Black neighborhoods Mill Creek Valley and Pruitt-Igoe Homes were displaced in the name of urban development and public safety. Where, in 2014, the Black Lives Matter movement coalesced. Nearly a decade later, in the year 2023, current events reveal that in this city and this state, the sanctity of civil and human rights remains tenuous on every level. What role can a public art triennial play in such a troubled context? A microcosm of the disruptive forces at play in cities across the United States today, St. Louis offers fertile ground for creative interventions that are healing—restorative in nature. The civic exhibition Counterpublic takes on the challenge. To prepare for the 2023 event, the triennial’s home team committed to a year of listening sessions with a range of public constituents. A report integrated into the exhibition catalogue outlines local interest in holistic engagement with public memory, commemoration, and acknowledgement; the rematriation of Indigenous land; and reparative futures. In response, for three months, thirty projects animate the urban landscape along six miles of Jefferson Avenue. In this episode, we follow that throughway from south to north to share healing elixirs healing we discover at the heart of seven Counterpublic projects along the way. Listen to the ways they honor and amplify strength, beauty, and hope at the core of reemergent cultural histories in St Louis. Story: Cathy Byrd Sound Design: Anamnesis Audio Special Audio courtesy Nokosee Fields, X, Raven Chacon, Stefani Jemison, Griot Museum of African American History, Torkwase Dyson, Mendi and Keith Obadike, SlowDrag audio "Joy and Everything," remixed by K Kudda, and Counterpublic, Mood Unit by by Blue Dot Sessions Related Episodes: Model Behavior—New Orleans Art Triennial Inspires Other Cities, Where Art Meets Activism, Unsettled Landscapes at SITE Santa Fe Related Links: Counterpublic, Fresh VUE: Counterpublic St. Louis 2023
Transcribe →Searching for Libertalia in the Indian Ocean—with Shiraz Bayjoo
Mar 16, 202300:15:59Tap to summarizeIn February 2023, we travel to the United Arab Emirates for the first time. We’re here to witness and celebrate Sharjah Biennial 15: Thinking Historically in the Present. Four years in the making, the exhibition is ambitious and expansive. More than 100 artists from 70 countries are presenting projects in 19 venues across the emirate. One afternoon, we wander through Sharjah’s heritage area to Bait Obaid Al Shamsi, the personal residence of a local pearl merchant and his family from the mid-19th century until the 1970s. In a small courtyard outside his multi chambered installation, we meet artist Shiraz Bayjoo to talk about how his project engages history—a pervasive theme in this Biennial. The artist shares the storied past of the Indian Ocean and the island archipelagos of Mauritius and Madagascar, off the southeast coast of Africa. Keep listening to hear the orientalist tropes that he disrupts in Searching for Libertalia, a project that recovers the history of a purported pirate colony founded in the late 17th century. Our conversation with Shiraz Bayjoo reveals one artist’s approach to Thinking Historically in the Present. Searching for Liberatalia materializes a cultural narrative that might come closer than real history to showing us the way through rupture, dislocation, and uncertainty to a place of growth and renewal. Story: Cathay Byrd Sound Design: Anamnesis Audio Special Audio: Searching for Libertalia, Sharjah Biennial 15 Related Episodes: Sharjah Biennial 15—with Hoor Al Qasimi Related Links: Shiraz Bayjoo, Sharjah Biennial 15, Searching for Libertalia
Transcribe →Thinking Historically in the Present—with Hoor Al Qasimi in Sharjah
Mar 2, 202300:27:18Tap to summarizeIn February 2023, we travel to the Arab Emirates for the first time. We’re here to witness and celebrate Sharjah Biennial 15: Thinking Historically in the Present. Four years in the making, the exhibition is ambitious and expansive. More than 100 artists from 70 countries are presenting projects in 19 venues across the emirate. Seventy of those projects are new commissions. The memory and influence of Nigerian born art historian, author, educator, and curator Okwui Enwezor is deeply felt, despite his physical absence. The Sharjah Art Foundation had invited Enwezor to curate this iteration of the biennial. He envisioned the exhibition title before his death in 2019. Sharjah Art Foundation Director Hoor Al Qasimi was 22 years old when she met Okwui Enwezor and experienced his non-western curatorial model at documenta 11, in Kassel, Germany. Enwezor’s impactful perspective on postnational hybridity and global modern identity inspired Al Qasimi to lead the Foundation and the Biennial in new directions. On the 30th anniversary of the Biennial, we sit down with Al Qasimi to talk about the inclusive ethos that we find in the art experience of Thinking Historically in the Present. Story: Cathy Byrd | Sound Design: Anamnesis Audio Special Audio: Hassan Hajjaj with Mestre Pastel, Open Capoeira Session, Arts Square, Sharjah Related Episode: New Point of View at Venice Biennale Related Links: Sharjah Biennial 15, Sharjah Art Foundation, documenta 11, 2nd Johannesburg Biennial
Transcribe →Global Appalachia—Where Culture and Geography Shape Community
Nov 30, 202200:38:30Tap to summarizeIn 2022, members and guests of the International Association of Curators of Contemporary Art (IKT) travel from around the world to Kentucky, in the Appalachian region of the United States. The uninitiated might consider this a remote context for conversations around international contemporary art. Instead, we find Appalachia a nuanced cultural and geographic space. The third episode in our IKT Kentucky series explores the evolving and inclusive concept of “Global Appalachia” presented during IKT’s 2022 gathering. Generations of curators, poets, and artists from a world of cultures have found their way across time and space to build communities in this region. Here and now, Global Appalachia is where their 21st century contemporaries continue to shape a boundless future, with a diverse array of perspectives on the meaning of home and tradition. Sound Design: Anamnesis Audio Music: Delving the Deep by BlueDot Sessions, Gettie's Wash by Blue Dot Sessions, Tan Mountain by Blue Dot Sessions Voices, in order of appearance: Rebecca Adkins Fletcher, Frank X Walker, Elizabeth Mesa-Gaido, Vian Sora, Ceirra Evans, Anissa Lewis, Hannah Drake, Karlota Contreras Koterbay, Erin Lee Antonak Related Episodes: Curators Declare Independence at IKT Kentucky, The Lure of Local Arts in Appalachia Related Links: Rebecca Adkins Fletcher, Frank X Walker, Elizabeth Mesa-Gaido, Vian Sora, Ceirra Evans, Anissa Lewis, Hannah Drake, Karlota Contreras Koterbay, Erin Lee Antonak, IKT Kentucky Global Appalachia Symposium, International Association of Curators of Contemporary Art, Speed Museum, Great Meadows Foundation
Transcribe →Lure of Local Arts in Appalachia
Nov 15, 202200:31:26Tap to summarizeIn 2022, members and guests of the International Association of Curators of Contemporary Art make their way to Kentucky, in the United States. Our first days are packed with urban experiences — museum, gallery, private collection, and studio visits, a symposium — and sunset tours of two outdoor sculpture collections. A small group continues the adventure on a road trip that takes us to the far eastern edge of Kentucky. As we cross the state, we learn firsthand the challenges of growing up and producing culture in the region. We bear witness to creative resilience and community in remote spaces and places in Appalachia. We bear witness to creative resilience and community in remote spaces and places where rich stories are told through art, film, music, and theater. Voices: Orlando Maiike Gouwenberg, Jessica Bennett Kincaid, Carolina Rubens, Jeff Chapman Crane, Sharman Crane, Kate Handslik Sound Design: Anamnesis Audio Music: Danver County by Blue Dot Sessions Earl Gilmore - This Little Light of Mine, on “From the Depths of my Soul,” 1977, June Appal Recordings Nimrod Workman & Phyllis Boyens - I am a Travelin' Creature, on “Passing Through the Garden," 1974, June Appal Recordings Pigmeat Jarret – Look at the People (Little Girl), on “Look at the People,” 1979, June Appal Recordings Ralph Stanley – I am a Man of Constant Sorrow Sarah Kate Morgan - Goodbye My Honey I'm Gone, on “Old Tunes & Sad Songs," 2022, self-released Sparky Rucker – Come on in my Kitchen, on “Cold & Lonesome on a Train,” 1977, June Appal Recordings Special Sound: Stranger with a Camera, Elizabeth Barrett, 2000 Appalshop; Shift Change, Higher Ground Theater, 2021 Related Episodes: Sounds of Berlin, Cultural Complexity in Miami’s Little Haiti, Key West: Creativity at the End of the Road, Mapping Caribbean Cultural Ecologies Related Links: Association of International Curators of Contemporary Art, Great Meadows Foundation, Appalshop, June Appal Recordings, Higher Ground Theater, Valley of the Winds Gallery, Mine Portal 31
Transcribe →
Fourth Wave Feminist Art
Dec 28, 2016Tap to summarizeGet inspired by our conversations on Fourth Wave Feminist Art. We begin with a flashback to a past conversation with artist Jillian Mayer on her project 400 nudes. Filmmaker Robert Adanto and artist Leah Schrager discuss the F Word Film: a look at radical, 4th wave feminist performance art. You’ll also hear about Adanto’s new documentary titled Born Just Now on artist Marta Jovanovic. Sound Editor: Guney Ozsan
Transcribe →
Fresh Talk: Roman Mars
Apr 8, 2013Tap to summarizeAt South By South West Interactive, in Austin, Texas, Roman Mars speaks with Cathy Byrd about what inspired him to create 99% Invisible, a radio show and podcast series featuring architecture and design. Based in San Francisco, Mars is a super hero in a world of passionate and mostly bootstrapped podcasters. Last year, the 99% Invisible Kickstarter campaign was the most successful journalism project ever funded. This recording session takes place inside the SXSW Interactive presenters' lounge, a room buzzing with creative energy.
Transcribe →