Art Grind Podcast

Humanist, Feminist, Hedonist, Painter! Anastasiya Tarasenko asks the hard brazen questions. Her thickly painted oil on copper paintings are unique and provocative. She employs a personalized and undeniable symbolic imagery that shares a simultaneously dark and humorous, specific yet universal, reduced yet refined commentary on existence.

Her fascinating vacillation between the macro and micro world views allows her to both appreciate and reconcile the ultimate dichotomy- That to exist- Is to live in contradiction with ones self.

Listen to this candid conversation as Marshall and Sophia and Anastasiya delve into all of the juicy stuff- sex, religion, morality, capitalism, and of course art!

Check out her solo show in Boston right now until the end of February 29, 2020 at Steven Zevitas Gallery
Anastasiya Tarasenko website: Atarasenko.com
Show Notes:
Intro: 01:20
Jenny Saville: 16:16
Dicks in paintings: 25:50
Karl Marx: 39:40
Break: 44:27
Objectum Sexuality Documentary: 46:49
Bret Easton Ellis - White : 54:06
Everyday Feminism: 56:21
Is this created by a woman?: 1:08:52
Ben's notes: 1:08:52
What makes a good painting?: 1:18:18
Copper surface: 1:19:54
Problems never really end: 1:31:16

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This installment of the Art Grind podcast features a painter who has been a longtime personal role model for several of the podcast's hosts. Even as he is a creator of absolutely monolithic paintings, Vincent Desiderio, a veteran lecturer at the New York Academy of Art and elsewhere, also manages to be an incredible speaker on the subject of art; laying out an ideological landscape that encapsulates why artists (including Desiderio himself) do what they do and how they do it. Both as a painter and an art theorist, Desiderio seems to inhabit a sort of isthmus, a place which he himself describes to be a liminal boundary which, once you push past it, "you experience something that is absolutely unforeseeable...and that is a total engagement with the process of painting.” In this episode of Art Grind, Vincent Desiderio maneuvers flawlessly between mini-lectures on semiotics in painting, the advance of postmodernity and the elusive avant garde, and the constant reassessment and summoning of drive involved in making one's life as a painter. In recounting his own ongoing battle with this last topic, Vincent enchants us with stories from his own art career, encounters with art critics and other villains, as well as personal crises including the day that a crucial moment of his career coincided with a medical emergency. Resounding through much of these stories and lectures is the concept of 'terror' and of 'opting to thrive' in the face of it -- an undercurrent which is reminiscent of Antonin Artaud's famous claim that "No one has ever written, painted, sculpted, modeled, built, or invented except literally to get out of hell.” Written by Michael Gusev. Interview recorded and edited by Michael Gusev.

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This episode was one of the last in-person interviews recorded before the pandemic hit. Hosts Marshall Jones and Sophia Kayafas enjoy a rich dialogue with Sarah Schmerler who is a journalist, art critic for the New York Times and art educator for 26 years. Schmerler is a gifted story teller whose creative insights offered us an intimate slice of conversation that was not only entertaining but also educational. Have a pen and paper ready for an interview packed full of ideas on teaching and understanding the art process from an educator’s perspective.

Show Notes
00.00 Intro

1:00 I’m a Spice

1:30 Teaching as Unveiling

​10:00 Writing a Thesis- The Work, The Process the Practice​​
12:00 Teaching -The Sacred Partnership

25:25 What makes a Great Painting?

26:00 "The Crucifixion and Last Judgment diptych," Jan van Eyck

35:00 Dad Ruined Star Wars

37:00 The Story Worth Telling

40:00 It’s in the Attempt

47:00 The Maker, The Audience, The Review

55:00 Why is Context Important?

1:03:00 The Process- Writing about Art

1:05:00 Parameters, Working with Restraint

1:09:00 Alchemy, We Write into Meaning!

1:10:00 Break, Donation Requests! - add link to Website

1:11:00 Family of Teachers

1:15:00 Professor Schmerler

1:21:00 The Art of Teaching

1:25:00 Drawing Major at Pratt

1:29:00 What not to do

1:35:00 Reading is invisible, Writing is Invisible

1:37:00 Pictorial Marker- The Word and its Meaning

1:48:00 Drawing of Ben

1:53:00 Peopletechture

1:57:00 Perception, Understanding, Discernment

1:58:00 Measuring the Impact of the Painting

2:00:00 Wrapping Up, A Good Deep Question Requires Time

2:10:00 Just go along with it! The Critic’s All-Star Game

2:11:00 “It’s Good Kitch," Thomas Kinkade

2:13:00 “An Ad for Excedrin," Max Ginsburg

2:15:00 “Queezy Neoclassicism," Odd Nerdrum

2:17:00 “Two Pears Talking," Euan Uglow

2:19:00 “I am not sure how pleasurable/violating this is," Helen Beard

2:21:00 “Anger and Contention," Clyfford Still

2:23:00 “Is She a Chair too? ," Philip Pearlstein

2:27:00 “Tweeny Tombescence," Lisa Yuskavage

2:30:00 Summary & Signing off
Sarah Schmerler's website
https://theschmerler.tumblr.com/</

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In this episode, we sit down with the incredible portrait painter Sean Cheetham to talk about his time in the art work, the beginnings of his creative career, as well as knife making, calligraphy, and some of his other interests
Sean's website: LinkSean's IG: Link

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On this episode of the Art Grind, our hosts Marshall and Sophia talk with Reisha Perlmutter. Reisha talks about beauty as a point of connection, and how her bond with nature from an early age has affected her work later in life. The group also discusses the personal value of being an artist and how pursuing a career as an artist can radically change your view of your surroundings.

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