Barbara London Calling

In the ninth episode of "Barbara London Calling," Barbara speaks with Brazilian artist Jonathas de Andrade. Living in Recife on the eastern coast of Brazil, Jonathas works across video and photography, with an interest in how language can render truths as well as untruths, and how that same language can liberate or marginalize its subjects.

In the eighth episode of "Barbara London Calling," Barbara speaks with Jana Winderen, a Norwegian artist who straddles the fields of art, music and science. Her work encourages us not just to hear, but to listen, as she explores the aural dimensions of faraway landscapes. Winderen travels to the ends of the Earth, often alone, where she records nearly imperceptible sounds using an arsenal of sophisticated recording gear. She might drop a microphone inside the crevice of a gigantic glacier or hundreds of feet deep into the frigid Arctic Ocean, or even into Manhattan's East River, where she listens to the sounds of fish communicating.

In the seventh episode of "Barbara London Calling," Barbara speaks with Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard, two London-based artists and collaborators with a background in installation art and the moving image. Music has always played an important role in their work, culminating in their 2014 feature film, "20,000 Days on Earth," a musical docudrama starring the iconic singer/songwriter Nick Cave. Iain and Jane began their fruitful collaboration as students at Goldsmiths in London, where they saw firsthand the good and the bad of the so-called YBA movement of young British artists. 

In the sixth episode of "Barbara London Calling," host Barbara London speaks with Rachel Rossin, a Brooklyn-based artist investigating the boundaries between reality, hyper-reality and the imaginary. Born in 1987, Rachel grew up in South Florida, where she lived in the shadow of hurricanes, floods and other natural disasters. This sense of anxiety—a kind of dread for nature’s ferocious side—still colors Rachel’s work. By age 8, Rachel was already painting and writing computer code, and she eventually began experimenting with virtual reality and digital art. For research, she hacks action-adventure video games, like Grand Theft Auto and Call of Duty, so she can better understand the kinds of big-budget special effects she often incorporates in her work.

In the fifth episode of "Barbara London Calling," Barbara speaks with Cao Fei, a Beijing-based artist interested in how the virtual world contradicts and coincides with reality. Working across film, digital media, photography, sculpture, installation and performance, her starting point is China and how people—especially young people—navigate the rapidly changing social and technological landscape.

In the fourth episode of "Barbara London Calling," Barbara speaks with Paul Pfeiffer, the American artist well known for utilizing sophisticated digital technologies to scrutinize the role mass media plays in shaping contemporary consciousness. Born in Honolulu, Paul now lives and works in New York, where he investigates the relationship between sporting events, racial politics, and what he calls "spectacle and spectatorship."

For the third episode of "Barbara London Calling," Barbara speaks with Hong Kong–based artist Samson Young, one of the most talented artists investigating sound as art. Samson works in a broad range of disciplines: music composition, performance, installation, sound, video, drawing, and design. His artwork is elegant yet razor-sharp, and sometimes political in nature, as he addresses the vicissitudes of language and history.

In the second episode of "Barbara London Calling," Barbara speaks with Zina Saro-Wiwa, an interdisciplinary artist who works with video, photography, sculpture, sound and, sometimes, food. As an artist, Zina has said she wants to expand the meanings of African-ness and, ultimately, to decolonize the idea of self. Born in Nigeria, Zina grew up in the UK and currently lives in Los Angeles, where she brought with her a love for Nollywood movies from Nigeria's fertile film industry.

For the first episode of "Barbara London Calling," host Barbara London speaks with Anri Sala, an internationally acclaimed artist from Tirana, Albania. Born in 1974, Sala eloquently orchestrates sound in space, with a keen focus on the underlying politics of contemporary life. Incorporating what he calls “a distrust of language,” his multimedia installations investigate the role of language and memory in our social and political histories.

Welcome to Barbara London Calling! In the series introduction, host Barbara London explains why she created the series and how she sees media art as the furthest reaching, most innovative art of our time. Stay tuned for more episodes featuring new conversations with artists from around the world.