Who Arted: Weekly Art History for All Ages

My guest this week is Tim Bogatz from The Art of Education and host of Art Ed Radio. He was kind enough to join me to talk about Robert Longo.

American artist Robert Longo rose to prominence as a defining figure of the late 20th-century art scene, widely recognized for his monumental scale, multidisciplinary projects, and cinematic aesthetic. His breakthrough series, Men in the Cities, created in the late 1970s and early 1980s, features sharply dressed subjects captured in extreme, contorted poses rendered in stark black and white. Working with friends and fellow artists, including Cindy Sherman, as models, Longo photographed figures in dynamic, off-balance movements on a New York rooftop before translating the imagery into towering graphite and charcoal drawings. The resulting compositions present an ambiguous tension between ecstatic dance and sudden physical impact, blending corporate aesthetics with an edgy, post-punk subversion.

Beyond figurative studies, Longo's practice is defined by a mastery of medium, monumental scale, and subtractive drawing techniques. Approaching charcoal much like a sculptor, he applies dense layers of dark pigment and carves light and form back out of the surface using an array of erasers. This process yields dramatic, high-contrast works measuring eight feet or more, spanning subjects from massive ocean waves and wildlife to cathedral interiors and historical iconography. Combined with his work in music video and feature film direction, Longo’s photorealistic drawings interrogate power, modern culture, and the emotional impact of contemporary imagery.

See more of Longo's work at his website: https://www.robertlongo.com/series/meninthecity/

Find Tim Bogatz online:

The Art of Education

The Art of Ed Community

Art Ed Radio

Related episodes of Who ARTed:

Christo and Jeanne-Claude | The Floating Piers

Walter de Maria | The Lightning Field

Felix Gonzales-Torres

Claude Monet

Wassily Kandinski

Check out my other podcasts  Fun Facts Daily | Art Smart | Rainbow Puppy Science Lab

Who ARTed is an Airwave Media Podcast. If you are interested in advertising on this or any other Airwave Media show, email: [email protected]

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Aztec art served as a vital instrument of statecraft, religious ceremony, and cosmic order rather than individualized aesthetic expression. Organized into royal and religious guilds, master artisans known as tolteca worked in dedicated neighborhoods across Tenochtitlan, mastering lapidary arts, stone carving, and metalwork. Elite featherworkers (amanteca) produced radiant mosaic tapestries, headdresses, and ceremonial shields from iridescent quetzal, macaw, and hummingbird plumage, items prized far above gold or silver for their spiritual association with breath, solar rays, and divine vitality. Aztec sculptors carved massive, dense volcanic rocks such as basalt and andesite without iron chisels, relying instead on harder mineral hammerstones, quartzite abrasives, and water to achieve crisp detail. Although centuries of weathering left these stone monuments bare and monochromatic, they were originally coated in lime plaster and brilliantly painted with mineral pigments like ochre, cinnabar, and Maya blue to demarcate cosmological realms. Beyond monumental sculpture, scribe-painters (tlacuiloque) documented historical chronologies, rituals, and tributary records on accordion-folded deerskin and amatl bark paper using an intricate system of pictographs, ideographs, and phonetic rebuses.

Monumental stone sculpture served as both a spiritual anchor and an expression of imperial cosmology, alternating between stylized divine iconography and striking anatomical naturalism. Sculptors observed the natural world with precision, carving lifelike toads, rattlesnakes, grasshoppers, and canines that captured the vital essence and seasonal rhythms of sacred fauna. The pinnacle of this stonework is exemplified by the iconic Aztec Sun Stone, an intricately carved volcanic monolith commemorating the creation of the Fifth Sun, dated to 13 Reed. At its core, the stone features a solar or terrestrial deity, variously interpreted as Tonatiuh, Yohualtonatiuh, or the earth monster Tlaltecuhtli, flanked by the four previous world ages destroyed by jaguars, wind, fiery rain, and floods. Encircling the central deity are bands depicting the twenty day signs of the 260-day ritual calendar (tonalpohualli), cosmological symbols of jade and turquoise denoting the heavens, and two celestial fire serpents (xiuhcoatl) framing the perimeter. Together, these elements transformed raw volcanic stone into a permanent theological treatise mapping the cycles of time, divine sacrifice, and cosmic stability.

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Sir Anish Kapoor is an internationally acclaimed British-Indian sculptor celebrated for his pioneering investigations into scale, void, and perceptual depth. Emerging in the early 1980s as part of the New British Sculpture movement, Kapoor initially gained renown for forms coated in intense, unbound raw pigments, a technique influenced by traditional Hindu ritual powders, before expanding into colossal public installations using materials such as reflective stainless steel, polished stone, and light-absorbing Vantablack. His decorated career includes major honors such as the 1991 Turner Prize, a 2013 knighthood for services to the visual arts, and the 2017 Genesis Prize, from which he directed the full $1 million award toward humanitarian organizations aiding Syrian and Rohingya refugees.

Among his most iconic monumental installations is Cloud Gate, commonly known as "The Bean," situated in Chicago’s Millennium Park. Inspired by the fluid properties of liquid mercury, the elliptical structure measures 33 feet high, 42 feet wide, and 66 feet long, weighing approximately 110 tons. Engineered in collaboration with Performance Structures, Inc. and Arup, the exterior comprises 168 stainless steel plates welded together and polished to an entirely seamless, mirror-like finish that reflects the Chicago skyline and surrounding park. Featuring a 12-foot concave underbelly known as the omphalos, Cloud Gate eliminates traditional pedestals to create an interactive civic landmark that draws millions of visitors each year.

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Who ARTed is an Airwave Media Podcast. If you are interested in advertising on this or any other Airwave Media show, email: [email protected]

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Friedensreich Hundertwasser (1928–2000) was an Austrian visual artist, architect, and environmental philosopher renowned for his vibrant, unconventional aesthetic and radical ecological convictions. Rejecting the rigid straight lines and functional geometric grids of modernist architecture, Hundertwasser championed organic forms, irregular contours, spirals, and vivid mineral pigments. His artistic worldview prompted him to adopt names reflecting his ideals including “Regentag” (Rainy Day) and “Dunkelbunt” (Dark-Multicolored) and led him to advocate for architectural concepts such as the "window right," which granted tenants the autonomy to decorate outer walls, and the integration of dry composting toilets to restore natural ecological cycles.

A pioneer of biophilic design, Hundertwasser merged urban development with the natural world through features like undulating forest-floor interiors, soil-covered green rooftops, and “tree tenants” that grew through exterior openings. These principles culminated in landmark works such as the Hundertwasserhaus in Vienna, a municipal apartment complex created alongside architect Peter Pelikan and completed in 1985. Defined by its asymmetrical color-blocked facade, whimsical ceramic mosaics, gilded onion domes, and over 250 integrated trees and shrubs, the complex serves as an enduring model of low-cost public housing harmonized with living nature.

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Ettore Sottsass was an Italian architect and designer who transformed the design landscape of the late 20th century by challenging the rigid functionalism of modernist architecture. Born in Austria and trained in Turin, Sottsass cultivated a philosophy centered on human joy and playful expression, values cemented during his time as a prisoner of war in World War II. After gaining international acclaim for iconic industrial works like the bright red Olivetti Valentine typewriter, he grew disillusioned with corporate minimalism. In December 1980, Sottsass gathered a collective of young international designers in Milan to establish the Memphis Group, a radical movement that debuted in 1981 and defined 1980s postmodern aesthetics through electric neon colors, asymmetric geometry, and whimsical laminates.

A definitive example of this design philosophy is Sottsass’s 1981 Carlton bookcase, a monumental room divider created for the inaugural Memphis Milano exhibition. Constructed from medium-density fiberboard clad in vibrant plastic laminates, the piece playfully subverts conventional luxury furniture by utilizing synthetic materials and slanted shelves that embrace visual chaos over utilitarian storage. Featuring an anthropomorphic, totem-like silhouette set above a signature squiggled "Bacterio" pattern base, the Carlton merges ancient ceremonial forms with contemporary pop culture. Sottsass's boundary-pushing creations proved that the primary function of design extends beyond mere utility, serving instead to inject emotion, humor, and vitality into daily life.

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My guest this week is CJ Denton, author of a new novel called La Pittura. While his work is historical fiction, in preparation for the book, he conducted extensive research into the life of Artemisia Gentileschi, one of the most celebrated painters of the Italian Baroque era. We discussed her life and work particularly focusing on Self-Portrait as the Allegory of Painting (La Pittura), painted during her period in London around 1638–1639. She developed exceptional technical skill from an early age, learning the demanding craft of grinding raw pigments, sizing canvases, and mastering perspective in an era that severely limited professional opportunities for women. While discussions often fixate on her 1612 trial following her assault by Agostino Tassi, Gentileschi’s artistic brilliance and historical significance are far greater than that one ugly chapter. She navigated the practical realities of a working professional artist in 17th-century Florence and Naples, managing contracts, courting powerful noble patrons like the Medici, maintaining correspondence with intellectual luminaries like Galileo Galilei, and eventually operating her own independent studio.

Find CJ Denton and La Pittura online:

Amazon: https://amzn.eu/d/0iYzGRsR
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/1HhUNc9APz/?mibextid=wwXIfr

Author page: https://andrewsparke.com/our-authors/c-j-denton/

Check out my other podcasts  Fun Facts Daily | Art Smart | Rainbow Puppy Science Lab

Who ARTed is an Airwave Media Podcast. If you are interested in advertising on this or any other Airwave Media show, email: [email protected]

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Today I have a bonus episode in the feed. I originally planned to release my interview with Ryan T. Pozzi on Monday, but due to technical difficulties, I had to flip things around. Today, his new book, The Mess that Made Them, is hitting stores. The book focuses on the difficult circumstances that shaped a number of different artists. In our conversation, we focused primarily on Suzanne Valadon.

French artist Suzanne Valadon led a life marked by radical reinvention, rising from poverty and unconventional beginnings to become a trailblazing figure in modern art. Born Marie-Clémentine Valadon in the late 19th century, she initially worked as a circus acrobat before an injury ended her performance career. She subsequently transitioned to modeling in the vibrant bohemian center of Montmartre, posing for renowned painters such as Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, and Edgar Degas. Observing these artists closely while developing her own visual voice, Valadon taught herself to paint, mastering technical composition and earning serious recognition across Parisian art circles as an independent creative force.

Valadon’s distinct visual style challenged traditional academic norms, most notably in celebrated works like The Blue Room (1923). Rather than adhering to the passive, idealized female nudes favored by the male gaze of the era, she portrayed everyday modern women with psychological depth, agency, and grounded realism. In The Blue Room, a clothed woman lounges casually in striped pajamas with books at her feet and a cigarette in hand, reclaiming the classic reclining figure motif. Through rich color palettes, expressive brushwork, and unflinching character studies, Valadon permanently disrupted classical conventions and cemented a vital, enduring legacy in art history.

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Eugène Delacroix stands as one of the defining figures of 19th-century French art and the leading pioneer of the Romantic movement. Rejecting the rigid, line-driven academic standards of Neoclassicism championed by contemporaries like Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, Delacroix embraced raw emotion, expressive brushwork, and radiant color inspired by Peter Paul Rubens. From his controversial Paris Salon debut with The Barque of Dante (1822) and his role as a model for Théodore Géricault’s The Raft of the Medusa, to his transformative 1832 journey across Morocco and Algeria and his dramatic lithographic illustrations for Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust, Delacroix consistently pushed the boundaries of visual expression.

His most celebrated masterpiece, Liberty Leading the People (1830), commemorates the July Revolution that toppled King Charles X in favor of Louis-Philippe. Spanning over eight feet high and nearly eleven feet wide, the monumental canvas employs a classical pyramidal composition to organize a turbulent scene of urban revolt. At its center stands Marianne, the allegorical personification of Liberty, wearing a Phrygian cap and leading fighters across diverse social classes over a barricade of fallen bodies. Blending historical reality with powerful allegory, the painting remains an enduring global symbol of revolution, human freedom, and social justice housed in the permanent collection of the Musée du Louvre.

Liberty Leading the People is one of the 250 artworks required for AP Art History. To learn more about other works from the curriculum, check out my AP Art History Cram Session playlist on Spotify.

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Joseph Ducreux (1735–1802) was an innovative French portrait painter known for defying the rigid conventions of 18th-century academic art. After training under masters such as Jean-Baptiste Greuze, Ducreux gained acclaim for his pastel work, miniatures, and precise observational likenesses. His talent earned him royal commissions, including a diplomatic assignment to Vienna to paint a portrait of Marie Antoinette prior to her marriage to Louis XVI. Despite receiving royal patronage, Ducreux was never admitted into the prestigious Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture, an outsider status that allowed him greater artistic freedom to explore human emotion and physiognomy outside the strict boundaries of traditional academic portraiture.

During the social and political upheaval of the French Revolution, Ducreux produced a series of unconventional, theatrical self-portraits that broke the fourth wall by capturing exaggerated expressions such as yawning, stretching, and laughing. His most famous work, Self-Portrait of the Artist in the Guise of a Mocker (1793), depicts the painter grinning and pointing directly at the viewer, directly challenging the stoic, idealized norms of late 18th-century art. Aided by fellow painter Jacques-Louis David during the Reign of Terror, Ducreux navigated turbulent political shifts and continued exhibiting his expressive work until his death in 1802. In modern popular culture, Ducreux’s mocking self-portrait found a viral second life as an internet meme, pairing his 18th-century smug pose with verbose, archaic translations of contemporary hip-hop and pop lyrics.

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Fernand Léger was a pioneering French modernist painter whose foundational training as an architectural draftsman profoundly shaped his structured, geometric approach to art. After absorbing the influence of Paul Cézanne and collaborating among avant-garde circles in Paris, Léger developed a distinct variation of Cubism characterized by cylindrical, tubular forms, a style contemporary critics dubbed "Tubism." His military service in World War I, where he survived a gas attack, deepened his fascination with the industrial beauty of modern machinery and inspired his goal to create art accessible to working-class audiences. This perspective catalyzed his "Mechanical Period" during the 1920s, a phase marked by vibrant, machine-like compositions and urban motifs that celebrated industrial progress.

Léger's 1921–1927 painting Composition in Blue, housed in the Art Institute of Chicago, exemplifies this mechanical aesthetic and demonstrates rigorous principles of design. Utilizing a limited monochromatic blue palette, hard-edged geometry, and carefully balanced line weights, the piece synthesizes three-dimensional volumetric shapes with flat planes. Beneath its paint layers, conservation analysis reveals a structured grid system that Léger used to systematically map the canvas. By translating machine components into universal abstract harmonies, Léger transformed industrial forms into a lasting modern aesthetic.

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