Art Talk

By KCRWArts Visual Arts

Art Talk episodes

May 11, 2011 The Best and the Worst: The Choice Is Yours
My last program with a reference to the art of super-famous Jeff Koons as "Shiny, Bubbly and Boring..." hit a nerve with listeners. I got quite a lot of responses to this program and you might want to read them on KCRW's website. Here are a few of my favorites...
5 min
May 04, 2011 Shiny, Bubbly and Boring…It Must Be Jeff Koons
Being the student of contemporary art, it’s not difficult to notice the relatively short time in which the rich and famous buy and then put these toys back on the market…
5 min
April 27, 2011 Luxury vs. Squalor: The Choice Is Yours
The story starts in the beautifully appointed room, where a lady of leisure is rolling up her stockings and tying them, just above the knees, with a pink ribbon...
5 min
April 20, 2011 Art! Behaving!! Badly!!!
Last week, in the industrial heart of Downtown L.A., thousands of people were confronted with art and artists behaving badly. Big time. Graffiti and litter...
5 min
April 13, 2011 The Art of Twisting and Turning Reality as We Know It
Strolling through the gardens of the Huntington Library makes me feel as if I am walking through the elaborate set design of a Shakespeare play..
5 min
April 06, 2011 Brutal and Delicate: Artists Throw Punches
Looking at the schedule of art exhibitions here and abroad, one is tempted to say that all roads today lead not to Rome but to David Smith (1906-1965)...
5 min
March 30, 2011 It Sure Isn't Pretty, but Boy Is It Beautiful
If you had a chance to see paintings by Henry Taylor a couple of years ago at the Santa Monica Museum of Art...you definitely would remember the overwhelming impact of the gritty street scenes with their downtown denizens, captured by him so colorfully, so mercilessly but, ultimately, so lovingly on his large canvases...
5 min
March 23, 2011 These Saints and Rascals Look Familiar
The forecast for last weekend was rather grim, so I was crossing my fingers and praying that the group of art aficionados I was scheduled to lead on an art tour in downtown L.A. would not be caught in a storm. Somehow, my prayers were heard...
5 min
March 16, 2011 Impossible, Implausible Story of 'The Desert of Forbidden Art'
This is a story that is almost too good to be true. The story of a young artist who dedicated and virtually sacrificed his life to save the art of hundreds of other artists he admired...
5 min
March 09, 2011 Getty's Turner Is Another Jewel in LA's Crown
Last summer, when the Getty placed the highest bid — $45 million — at
London auction, for the rare and beautiful landscape by J.M.W. Turner,
many skeptics, including myself, were understandably pessimistic about
the chance that this great painting would ever be allowed to leave the
shores of England...
5 min