This month, Izzy and Anna invite you to book club (with a twist). Izzy brings some content from Arts of Living on a Damaged Planet and Anna reads from Why I Write by George Orwell. Highlights include sea otters, rules for writing, ecosystems, cellular universes, and reasons to make art. As always, Weasel makes an appearance. (A warning and an apology: there are a lot of dog-related mouth sounds in the last 15mins of this episode).

To celebrate the final episode of 2025, Izzy and Anna revisit the resolutions (sorry, intentions) they set for themselves at the beginning of the year – ranging from mindfulness and herb gardening to deleting Instagram, getting a credit card, talking about scary things in therapy, and watching less F1 (and buying some microphones for the podcast…). The episode once more features a recurring slipper-chewing special guest.

Illustrator, storyteller and picture book specialist Emily Luke joins Izzy and Anna on the podcast this month – plus a new (sleepy) special guest. They discuss what led Emily to illustration, how it differs from Fine Art, how to write good stories, the importance of page turns, Emily’s favourite illustrators, and why more adults should read children’s books. Authors/illustrators/books/films mentioned: Hank Goes Honk, Charlie & Lola by Lauren Child, Beatrix Potter, Sara Fanelli, Quentin Blake, Miss Potter, The Day War Came by Nicola Davies and Rebecca Cobb, Alice: Curiouser and Curiouser at the V&A, and Emily’s own Morag the Magpie. You can see more of Emily’s work on Instagram @emily_lukeillustration and on her website emilylukeillustration.com.

This episode, Izzy and Anna each select a single work of art they have made recently to talk about. Anna’s piece, as we fret at the edge of a toxic puddle ii, prompts discussions around rocks (as always), body parts (particularly teeth), machinery, mining, framing, and capitalism. Izzy’s piece, Have you spoken about that?, sparks a conversation around the unpredictability of wild creatures, the emotional connotations of horizontal and vertical lines, the uncanny, learning through observation, and the relationship between research and making. They also coin a new slogan for the podcast. Exhibitions/books mentioned: Ahmet Doğu İpek at Tate St Ives, The Mushroom at the End of the World by Anna Tsing.

After lots of guest and exhibition episodes, Izzy and Anna finally bring the attention back to them. They reflect on how they are feeling about art at the moment, discussing everything from subtle mindset shifts to going back to the roots of engaging with creativity.

Books mentioned: Stolen Focus by Johann Hari and People Like Us by Hashi Mohamed.

It’s episode 90 (!!) and to celebrate, Izzy and Anna are joined by artist and facilitator Rachael Coward. With an upcoming solo show on the near horizon, Rachael talks them through her practice, her inspirations, her processes, the importance of play, responding to a site vs finding sites for a work,  and much much more (including becoming Izzy’s temporary art therapist for the episode). Rachael’s work can be found at @rachaelcoward on Instagram and rachaelcoward.co.uk on her website. Very excitingly, Rachael’s work can also be seen in person at her solo show Something Lost / Something Found, on display at The Heseltine Gallery in Truro from 6 September - 5 October 2025.

This year is bringing lots of firsts for the podcast – last month was the first ever podcast exhibition, and this month is the first ever podcast road trip! Izzy and Anna travelled up to Plymouth to see Alastair and Fleur Mackie’s show ‘Projected Outcomes’ at KARST. They discuss the many finely-tuned layers of both the artworks and the curation, delving into thesubtle effectiveness of the white cube, silent films, the tension in a mile of fishing line, sub-fossilisation, the edge of the land, and what happens when you curate images as sculptures.

Thank you so much to Ben Borthwick and theKARST team for making this episode happen! You can check out their Instagram @karstgallery and their website karst.org.uk. (For anyone wanting to skip the audio description spoilers, jump to 19.06!)

It’s exhibition time! In an exciting first for the podcast, Izzy and Anna have put together a show of guests’ work. In this live episode, they reflect on the process of curating the exhibition and its similarities to the journey of the podcast over the last four years, as well as answering some questions from the artists. Although the exhibition is over, you can see photos of it on the podcast Instagram: @downtoafineart.podcast.

This week, Izzy and Anna talk to documentarian George Steedman Jones. A man of many talents, George is a filmmaker, photographer, and (fellow!) podcaster with a particular interest in documentary ethics, authenticity, and community. You can see his work on Instagram at @georgebrynmor and on his website: georgesteedmanjones.com. His podcast, Coffee with Conservationists, is available on Spotify.

Izzy and Anna take a tour of Tate St Ives’ current exhibition, ‘Ithell Colquhoun: Between Worlds’. They give a brief overview of Colquhoun’s life and the exhibition itself before discussing their favourite and least favourite pieces, and how Colquhoun’s work relates to their own practices. This episode is sadly not sponsored by Tate (although perhaps that is for the best…). The exhibition is on until 5th May 2025 – you can read more about it here: https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-st-ives/ithell-colquhoun-between-worlds.