About Art

JiaJia Fei is a digital strategist and founder of the first digital agency for art. She and Zuckerman discussed being an evening person, access to free art museums, how to find your own information, the future of funding and philanthropy and access to techpreneurs, how art can exist for the screen, and what could be their shared Kurt Vonnegut epitaph.

Richard Betts passed the Court of Master Sommeliers’ Masters Exam on the first attempt, the ninth person ever to do so. He co-founded the wine labels Betts & Scholl in 2003 and Scarpetta in 2006 and founded Sombra Mezcal in 2006. Today, Richard spends his time guiding Astral Tequila, and his newest wine project “An Approach To Relaxation.” Richard is the New York Times best-selling author of “The Essential Scratch & Sniff Guide to Becoming a Wine Expert.” He and Zuckerman discussed the long term effects of nurture, a deep-seated fear of failure, when he proposed to his wife, how it feels to give back, and working at the intersection of enthusiasm and opportunity!

Amy Cappellazzo is Chairman of the Fine Art division of Sotheby’s. Prior to accepting the position, Cappellazzo founded Art Agency, Partners with Allan Schwartzman, which in January of 2016 Sotheby’s acquired in a groundbreaking deal. Cappellazzo previously served as a market leader in the field of contemporary art at Christie’s, where she rose to the post of Chairman of Post-War & Contemporary Development over thirteen years. She and Zuckerman discussed adult social behavior around art and the future of Not for Profit galas, the pace of museum curating, the highest and best use of anything, a sexy painting by Patricia Cronin, and being an attentive and attuned mother in this episode.

Dennis Scholl is a filmmaker, winemaker, collector, entrepreneur, and artist advocate. In this episode he and Zuckerman talk about him being an obsessive guy, “ going country” and sacred Aboriginal lands, the mistake of not valuing artists, how it feels to live with art placed by other people, and why opening the aperture is key to a meaningful and joyful life!

Gary Simmons uses chalk as his main medium, utilizing the traces and ghost like effects of the chalk to portray compelling messages involving racial stereotypes. Throughout his conversation with Zuckerman, they touch on his athletic past, the intricacies of his 50 foot mural at the Dallas Cowboys Stadium, and why he helped dig a trench for Robert Irwin, along with other compelling tales of his youth!

Kathy DeMarco VanCleve is the author of books Never Caught, The Difference Between You and Me, and Drizzle, numerous screen plays, and on the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania. In this episode, she and Zuckerman speak about poetry, where glory is found, the importance of being kind, death, cancer, and parenting.

With his paintings, Richard Phillips is a master of seduction – he plays upon the complex web of human obsessions with sexuality, politics, power, and death.   He uses classical painterly techniques to make things and people you have seen before look and feel unfamiliar and mean something different. We discussed the first art car to win at Le Mans, what it feels like to unintentionally make a lot of people really mad, Gossip Girl, and what can stand in the way of love.

Sarah Thornton is a sociologist who writes about art, design and people. Formerly the chief art market correspondent for The Economist, Thornton is the author of three critically acclaimed books and many influential articles. A Canadian who went to the UK on a prestigious Commonwealth Scholarship, Thornton was hailed as “Britain’s hippest academic.” Now based in San Francisco, Thornton is better known as “the Jane Goodall of the art world.” Zuckerman sat with Thornton in the office in her apartment in San Francisco where they talked about hierarchies within the artworld, our super powers, the truth about being polite, ceramics, and more than 30 reasons art matters!

Musically Rufus Wainwright has collaborated with artists including Elton John, David Byrne, Boy George, Joni Mitchell, Pet Shop Boys and producer Mark Ronson among others. In addition to being a celebrated contemporary pop singer, Rufus has made a name for himself in the classical world. Heidi visited Rufus at his LA home and they talked about what soothes his soul, a cultural movement to turn off our devices, rhyming, why reading matters, and the why and how of being an active conduit for ideas!

Over a 25 year period Tim Blum and Jeff Poe have fostered the careers of artists such as Takashi Murakami, Mark Grotjahn, Henry Taylor, and so many others. In this episode Zuckerman and Blum talk about the first work of art they each bought—in the same year for the same price! —Ram Das, death, and how we all are just walking each other home.