Frank Prattle with Zefrey Throwell

Me with mystery legs!   www.zefrey.com

Listen as the tables are turned and I am interviewed by the talented Hollis Witherspoon on WBAI New York, 99.5FM.

Top notch interview, I took notes on Witherspoon’s style and you will most certainly hear some improvements from me in the future thanks to her!

Javier Peres of Peres Projects                          (photo by Dean Sameshima)

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One of the best damn interviews I’ve ever done, Javier Peres holds nothing back in this one. From his humble roots in San Francisco to his meteoric rise in Los Angeles, then to Athens and now with his two spaces in Berlin, Peres tells all.

Eroticism, El Greco, Warhol auction shenanigans, Bruce LaBruce, gay zombies, the new German plague, old ladies and poppers, you name it, we talked about it.

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Music by Young Fruit.

Artists Malte Zacharias and Per Schumann of Gartenstudio

I have been following this power duo for the past 5 years. Amazing projects all over the world is only part of their charm, quality work and actual commitment to the betterment of humankind weigh in as part of their creedo as well. I’ve been meaning to do this interview for years. Very intimate and truly heartfelt as well as funny, this is a great conversation.

Music by Young Fruit

Axel Wieder (Pro qm) and Joep Van Liefland (AUTOCENTER) at
The Node Center for Curatorial Studies in Berlin

I was asked to come to Berlin by the curator Lian Ladia and have a conversation with Axel Wieder of Pro qm and Joep Van Liefland of AUTOCENTER. The conversation took place during the big Based in Berlin show, a giant hubbub affair at 5 different locations and both of these gentlemen were a part of it. The conversation was a lot of fun and insightful as well. Thanks to Node Center and all of the curators there for supplying a fantastic environment for a great conversation.

Listen along!

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Music by Young Fruit

Art dealer Anton Kern and artist David Shrigley

As the starting bell for the fall season sounds, I happened to swing by a delightfully mischievous show at Anton Kern Gallery and who should be showing but the talented, the unholy, the pithy, the nimble Scot himself….  David Shrigley.

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From mounted crooked fingers on the wall, to a robot bludgeoning a baby seal, to a long plinth of huge ceramic black boots, Shrigley’s fourth show with Kern is a winner. Listen along as they suss out such heated topics as yoga balls, saddle chairs, hating children (except for one lucky child, Linus), how to get a gallery in NYC and of course no interview is complete without an in-depth investigation of the deadly ‘Glasgow Smile’.

Elizabeth Dee (Elizabeth Dee Gallery) and Ryan McNamara (artist)

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When one thinks of dynamic combinations, most often Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups come to mind, two great tastes that go great together. When one thinks of stunning alliances in the art world, here, like the poignant Reese’s cup, is a classic being born.
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Ryan McNamara is one of the most talented artists working in performance today. From his piece at Performa last year called “Sacred Band of Thebes AKA Any Fag Could Do That“ to his more recent projects in the Whitney Biennial and PS1’s Greater New York, McNamara is stepping up the game and blending different practices of dance/theater/history/make-up and more.  Now add Elizabeth Dee in the mix, one of the most exciting cultural producers making things happen today (she was one of the main people responsible for the fantastic X Initiative, as well as running one of the most dynamic galleries in Chelsea) and the possibilities are nearly endless.

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Listen along and hear of such amazements as the permanent black eye, high school art projects on mass public display,  re-envisioning the collector/steward/patron role  and of course, disconnecting your ass and learning the almighty booty dance.

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Listen to the interview here:

Ari Jankelowitz and Steven Day of Vinyl Contemporary

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With galleries closing left and right, the henchman’s axe swinging wide over American employment and prudence if not outright fear as the prevailing mindset, there comes a voice of hope on the horizon. Ari Jankelowitz and artist Steven Day have spearheaded a new mobile gallery dubbed Vinyl Contemporary. While they don’t have a concrete physical space, they are doing projects including an upcoming show at the Verge Art Fair in Miami this December.

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Ari Jankelowitz and Steven Day

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Listen along as we answer such stirring questions as whether or not New York is a talentless art vacuum, what awaits us post-hedge fund, whether or not art has any suggestions for our foundering economy, whether or not anyone cares what artist’s think and the granddaddy of them all, the revival of the small business model.

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Artist Alicia Framis, The Lost Astronaut

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That giant disk in the sky that alternates between a bloated thick
deep-yellow splotchy mass and at other times  a fine white fingernail
floating in the ether, the nocturnal lighthouse guiding lovers hands
and military sneak attacks as well…. ahhhhhh…. the moon.
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Unbeknownst to myself, the moon is also one of the last stalwart
strongholds of sexism in modern life. Artist Alicia Framis, aka the
Lost Astronaut, informed me that a woman has never set foot on the
moon. Tackling this issue with equal parts beauty and insanity, Framis
has chosen to protest this sad fact by purchasing a used cosmonaut
suit from Russia and roam the streets of New York for the duration of
Performa.

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Artist Alicia Framis

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Listen along as she relates stories of dealing with the NYPD, NASA
employees, Marina Abramovic, and even gets 86ed from the NY public
library.

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Arto Lindsay and son
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Nestled amidst the chaos of neon, deep within the belly of bustling tourism and rampant capitalism, Arto Lindsay, famed musician and artist, pierced the goliath of Times Square with a  quiet bullet. As the starting bell for Performa this year, Lindsay organized a parade quite unlike those that typically adorn the buzzing hive on Broadway.
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I saw Lindsay’s parade in Venice this year; dancers clad in black, wailing noise, a slow towing processional in the pissing rain that wove down the cobbled canal-front of the ancient city… something along these lines is what I expected upon showing up this time, nay.  50 people, almost all women, dressed in tan trench coats cinched tight, holding cellphones above their head materialized out of the mist and suddenly became an almost silent parade. Then, on cue, flipping open cell phones, a cacophony of noise starting spilling out into the dense night. Accompanying this low din, the parade marchers starting twisting their bodies in jerky mechanical gestures and made their way south through the square whilst being heckled, jostled, and cheered by the surrounding masses.

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Arto Lindsay and son in the eye of the trenchacane
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Intensely odd and curiously endearing, I enjoyed the hell out of it.
Listen along as a I interview various passerbys, artist Cindy Sherman, artist Ryan McNamara, curator Mark Beasely, and of course, Arto Lindsay.

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Liam Gillick (artist and cat fancier)

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In the backstage green room of Creative Time’s Summit: Revolutions in Public Practice (which was a bright yellow), as a semi-fascist performance warmed up outside with stomping shovels and chanted power slogans, Liam Gillick and I stole away for a few moments over some free snacks and wrangled through the beautifully sticky morass of what it means to be an artist today.

The territory we covered was vast and yet focused, theoretical and yet personal, starting with progressive working practices and how the car company Volvo has indirectly/directly effected art production today and moving to the “hypocrsy equation” in social projects and even straying into Sabrina the Teenage Witch and monkey-wrenching talking cat toys.

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Liam Gillick presenting at the Creative Time Summit in the NY Public Library

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One of my favorite moments of the conversation came when discussing a question that Liam puts to his students, “What is your hobby going to be?”. In a world so focused on productivity and maximizing the multi-tasking potential of every nanosecond, the idea of a hobby has a slight smack of slander, especially in the high octane New York art world today. Precisely because of that and because eventually one will have some inbetween moments where their quotient of product will fall below the bar, “the hobby” is a vital question.

Find out what Liam Gillick’s hobby is, hear him say the words, “unicorns, planets, and falling down” and much more!  For full knowledge, listen to the titillating tell-all in it’s entirety!

To listen to the full interview click here:

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Lars Bang Larsen and I sat down across from each other at the bustling Japonica lunch, his demeanor was precise and yet friendly. I had heard much about this young curator and with such a striking name one hoped for some exotic sword swallower with a flashy orange head scraf and a missing arm. While the package proved to be fairly standard, the goods inside were anything but.

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Lars Bang Larsen (curator and writer)

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From the starting gun this interview was a dilly. I have done many interviews in my life and the rule is generally the subject of the interview does all the talking. It is a rare day when the interviewee flips it back on the interviewer and I end up doing most of the talking, but such was the case at first with Lars.

Just to give you a taste, our conversation ranged from hippy communes, organized unions for bands with light shows, food fights, Jacob Holdt, the most dangerous part of town, the weight of Såo Paolo, Sweet Movie, and even touch on social justice in the arts.

This one is dynamite! Not to be missed.

Listen along to the full interview:

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Morris Dickstein, author and professor

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Morris Dickstein, distinguished author and professor, is one of the most understated and humble people that I have had the pleasure of speaking to. While his books are world renowned, his demeanor is down to earth and straight forward. I chatted with him over the phone this evening about his new book, Dancing In the Dark: A Cultural History of the Great Depression as well as what he plans on presenting at the Creative Time Summit: Revolutions in Public Practice.

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One of the primary issues that Dickstein touched upon was the depth with which the Great Depression relates to the current state of affairs. Chronicling the lives of artists who survived and produced during the 1930’s, Dickstein shows the lessons that we can learn from those who came before us. Following such greats at the Gershwin brothers, Walker Evans, Fred Astaire, Duke Ellington, Cole Porter, and Dorothea Lange, Dickstein offers a glimpse at the coping skills of these artists amidst the storm of poverty and misery.

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This week is the lead up to one of the hottest events happening this year, the Creative Time Summit: Revolutions in Public Practice. Collaborating with the New York Public Library, the arts organization Creative Time has put together a zinger of a conference. 35 cultural producers will present their work in a rapid fire format of 7 minute information blasts, making “short, pointed, and dynamic presentations on their work and art and social justice in the public sphere.”

While many conversations of the what art can do for society and vice versa, get bogged down in stuffy academic jargon and seem to fruitlessly wander without results, this summit has been organized as a tight and pointed springboard, reigning in the great minds of public art and action to 7 minutes and forcing them to focus on a point.

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Dara Greenwald, artist

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The list of participants is vast and varied from the Yes Men, to Thomas Hirschorn, Suzanne Lacy, Dara Greenwald, Temporary Services, Okwui Enwezor, Liam Gillick, Harrell Fletcher, and many many more. (For a complete list of presenters visit: here).

This column will be highlighting some of the artists that will be participating in the summit. With such a short span of time to present their work at the conference, this blog will be augmenting the summit by giving background history, context, and anecdotes as a well as interviews and photos for those involved.

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James Fuentes (James Fuentes LLC)

Down on St. James Place, at the edge of Chinatown, James Fuentes has carved out an amazing space for himself. Showing some of the most exciting new artists in NYC, Fuentes is a real life embodiement of the American Dream. Growing up mere blocks from the gallery and then moving to the South Bronx, he has risen to be one of the more interesting gallerists working today. Listen along as we discuss being chewed up and spit out by collaborators who get busted for faking Basquiats, the voracious appetite for youth that consumes modern collectors, Agathe Snow, Deitch Projects and Lombard Freid Projects, Art Star television, and much much more.

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Leo Koenig (Leo Koenig Inc.) and Greg Bogin (artist)

A mere two hours before Greg Bogin’s show opened at Leo Koenig Inc. on 23rd st. in Chelsea, I swung by and tangoed with these two as they both fought off the pre-show jitters. We spun quite a yarn on this one, from naked high school dreams, to the realities of expansion in an age of shrinkage, to the idea of perfection, to triathlons, trust amongst artists and gallerists, and the raucous and infamous Leo Koenig crew.

Dynamite! (other than some cell phone static… sorry about that)

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Marilyn Minter (artist)

On a dreary day, when the Soho streets were filled with floating rats and soggy trash, I had the chance to sneak up to Marilyn Minter’s cozy studio and chat with her for a bit about her upcoming show at Salon 94. We covered a lot of turf, from the difference between being turned on to being seduced , to billboards and videos in Times Square, to the hot white light of success and how not to deal with it, to the age old policy of No Smiling Before Christmas. This one is truly delightful, listen along and also make sure to check out the trailer for her new video: HERE

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Dana Schutz (artist)

On the Chelsea Piers in the middle of a fantastic spring afternoon, Dana Schutz and I strolled about looking for trouble. Dana has a new show up at Zach Feuer Gallery called Missing Pictures that is most certainly not to be missed. Listen along as we cover everything from Facebook fanaticism, to arm hole shaping, to Rick Berlin, to navy blue, and even the recent gonorrhea outbreak in the Gowanus Canal.

To be candid, this interview is fucking awesome. Don’t be the only one who hasn’t heard it!

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Mungo Thomson (artist)

I had a chance to sit down with Mungo right before his latest opening called “The Varieties of Experience” at John Connelly Presents. We shot the moon as far as subject matter, from sword masters, to whale songs, Brian Eno, light sabers, nostalgia, and all things in between. Mungo is one of my favorite contemporary artists, funny as hell and sharp as a whip across the backside.

Got to listen to this one.

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Hank Willis Thomas (artist)

Hank is one of the most comfortable and agile speakers that I have ever had on my show. In addition to being
well versed, what he’s saying is damn intelligent and strikingly honest. This interview comes on the heels of his stunning show at Jack Shainman Gallery called Pitch Blackness. Listen along as we tackle such subjects as slick logos, Johnny Walker, Obama, text books, myths, legends, and much more.

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Ruth Ann Brown (director of New American Artist Union) and
Bryan Suereth (director of Disjecta)

Two of Portland’s hottest stars face off in this lively mixer. They cover immense ground, from Sam Adams the naughty mayor of Portland, to grants for the arts, thinning out art makers, and tons more. If you’ve been wondering what is happening in the booming city of bridges, this is a must listen!

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