Sign up to save your podcasts
Or
Share 55b. Bonus: Sandow Birk on the Divine Comedy.
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Or
55b. Bonus: Sandow Birk on the Divine Comedy.
I’ve always struggled, since I went to art school, with the question of: What
is the career of making paintings in the twenty-first century? Of sitting
alone in a room and painting in a way people did 500 years ago, in the world
of technology and movies and stuff. So I always wanted to make works that are
about now, but then show that they’re coming out of the history of art and are
tied to art history.... And to say, look, see how the history of art keeps moving
forward, and it’s still connected… It’s sort of a way to try to prove that
painting matters.
Sandow Birk is an artist whose works have dealt with contemporary life in
its entirety, exploring themes such as inner city violence, graffiti,
political issues, travel, war, and prisons, as well as surfing and
skateboarding. Some of his work specifically engages with the kinds of “great
books” that we explore here at the Spouter-Inn, including an illustrated
version of Dante’s Divine Comedy, reworked with Marcus Sanders, from 2005, as
well as the American Qur’an, published in 2016.
Sandow joins us to discuss these two projects and the impulse of reading a
centuries-old text and saying: What if this were here and now? What would that
look like?
Show Notes.
Sandow Birk’s website includes illustrations from
the Divine Comedy, the American
Qur’an, and other works we discuss.
The Divine Comedy.
[Bookshop.]
American Qur’an.
[Bookshop.]
A talk Sandow gave about the American
Qur’an (introduced by Karla
Mallette, who spoke with us about
Purgatorio!)
Gustave Doré’s illustrations for the Divine
Comedy.
Matthew Collins, ed.: Reading Dante with Images.
Dante’s Inferno, the animated film.
Kent Monkman.
The Chester Beatty.
Arion Press and their editions of The Fairy
Tales of Oscar Wilde and Moby-Dick.
Machado de Assis: The Posthumous Memories of Brás
Cubas.
Roberto Bolaño: 2666.
Support The Spouter-Inn and our network, Megaphonic, on
Patreon! Thanks.
View all episodes
By Suzanne Conklin Akbari and Chris Piuma
4.8
3030 ratings
I’ve always struggled, since I went to art school, with the question of: What
is the career of making paintings in the twenty-first century? Of sitting
alone in a room and painting in a way people did 500 years ago, in the world
of technology and movies and stuff. So I always wanted to make works that are
about now, but then show that they’re coming out of the history of art and are
tied to art history.... And to say, look, see how the history of art keeps moving
forward, and it’s still connected… It’s sort of a way to try to prove that
painting matters.
Sandow Birk is an artist whose works have dealt with contemporary life in
its entirety, exploring themes such as inner city violence, graffiti,
political issues, travel, war, and prisons, as well as surfing and
skateboarding. Some of his work specifically engages with the kinds of “great
books” that we explore here at the Spouter-Inn, including an illustrated
version of Dante’s Divine Comedy, reworked with Marcus Sanders, from 2005, as
well as the American Qur’an, published in 2016.
Sandow joins us to discuss these two projects and the impulse of reading a
centuries-old text and saying: What if this were here and now? What would that
look like?
Show Notes.
Sandow Birk’s website includes illustrations from
the Divine Comedy, the American
Qur’an, and other works we discuss.
The Divine Comedy.
[Bookshop.]
American Qur’an.
[Bookshop.]
A talk Sandow gave about the American
Qur’an (introduced by Karla
Mallette, who spoke with us about
Purgatorio!)
Gustave Doré’s illustrations for the Divine
Comedy.
Matthew Collins, ed.: Reading Dante with Images.
Dante’s Inferno, the animated film.
Kent Monkman.
The Chester Beatty.
Arion Press and their editions of The Fairy
Tales of Oscar Wilde and Moby-Dick.
Machado de Assis: The Posthumous Memories of Brás
Cubas.
Roberto Bolaño: 2666.
Support The Spouter-Inn and our network, Megaphonic, on
Patreon! Thanks.
More shows like The Spouter-Inn
View all
The LRB Podcast
311 Listeners
Brian Windhorst & The Hoop Collective
3,936 Listeners
It’s Just A Show
48 Listeners
Up First from NPR
56,997 Listeners
You’re Not Funny
1 Listeners
And Thereby Hangs A Tale
1 Listeners
Dear Reader
1 Listeners
This Is Your Mixtape
10 Listeners
By-The-Bywater: A Podcast about All Things J.R.R. Tolkien
32 Listeners
The Opposite Of Lonely
0 Listeners
A Part Of Our Scare-itage
7 Listeners
The Scene of the Scene
0 Listeners
Fiasco Family Movie Night
9 Listeners
HubrisWeen!
0 Listeners
The Rest Is History
15,525 Listeners
Game Show 1939!
2 Listeners
The Surprising Rebirth Of Belief In God
442 Listeners
The Zach Lowe Show
2,131 Listeners