Tangents

 

 

Recordings of conversations we are having with artists, academics, and experts, as part of our ongoing research processes. Topics covered include sleep disorders, the confluence of science and art, the handmade, and life writing.

Fay Ballard in Conversation with Dr Patricia Townsend

 

Dr Patricia Townsend, artist and psychoanalytic psychotherapist, and author of ‘Creative States of Mind: Psychoanalysis and the Artist’s Process’ (Routledge 2019) and Fay Ballard discuss how artists make work.

 

www.patriciatownsend.net

Fay Ballard in conversation with Jamie Ruers, Freud Museum

 

Jamie Ruers, curator of ‘Freud and Latin America, exploring Freud’s impact on culture, society art and psychoanalysis in the region’ (Freud Museum London 17 January to 14 July 2024) discusses Freud’s thoughts on and his relationship to objects with Fay Ballard. Jamie and Fay worked together at the Freud Museum exploring the significance of objects in our lives, a subject covered by Fay’s drawings.

Family in Practice: Jule Held in Conversation with Nick Kaplony

Artist Julie Held trained at the Camberwell College of Arts and The Royal Academy Schools in London, where she was born to German Jewish refugees of Nazism. A recurring theme of her work is the relationship between ‘inside and outside’.  Held’s paintings probe the mysterious threshold between outer realities and inner worlds – moving beyond appearances to capture the soul of a person or place. Held has been widely exhibited across the UK and Europe, including at the Royal Academy,The National Portrait Gallery and The Barbican. Her work is held in a number of public collections.

 

In this conversation with Dust Architects artist Nick Kaplony, discussion covers the artists’ motivations of working with family as subject matter, their experience of the relationship between practice and the mourning process and moving beyond direct representations of family in their work.

Nick Kaplony in conversation with Rowena MacDonald
Rowena Macdonald has published two books: Smoked Meat, which was shortlisted for the 2012 Edge Hill Prize, and The Threat Level Remains Severe. Smoked Meat is set in Montreal and The Threat Level Remains Severe is set in the House of Commons where Rowena has worked for the past twenty years. She was born on the Isle of Wight, grew up in the West Midlands and now lives in East London. She has just finished a third work of fiction: a collection of interlinked stories set in Selfridges, entitled The Temptation of Ralph Lauren.

In this interview, Nick and Rowena talk about how biographical events weave into fiction and how this plays out in writing and visual art.
Martha Orbach in conversation with Dr Ruth Charnock

Martha explores some of the tangles around life writing and using personal material in your work with Dr Ruth Charnock who’s writing a book on Anaïs Nin.

Nick Kaplony in conversation with Diana Finn

Therapist Diana Finn in conversation with Nick about his practice and the events in his life that inform his work, considered from the perspective of a psychotherapist.

Is there an equivalence to life writing in visual arts? Part 1

A discussion with Dr Jane Wildgoose, artist & researcher, Senior Research Fellow at Centre for Life Writing Research, King’s College London & Keeper of The Wildgoose Memorial Library.

Is there an equivalence to life writing in visual arts? Part 2

A discussion with Dr Jane Wildgoose, artist & researcher, Senior Research Fellow at Centre for Life Writing Research, King’s College London & Keeper of The Wildgoose Memorial Library.

The handmade in the technological age: glitches and touch

Neil Stewart – artist, writer and theorist whose main concerns include concept of brands, culture of technology and nature of life, discusses the ‘handmade’ with Fay Ballard.

Stephen Pompea in conversation with Judy Goldhill

Stephen Pompea, an astronomer at NSF’s NOIRLab, the National Science Foundation’s National Optical Infrared Laboratory and Leiden Observatory in conversation with Judy Goldhill.

 

Astronomy and the investigation of the machines for viewing and observing the universe are of fundamental importance to Judy. Here they discuss the specifics of the evolution and recycling of materials in the universe and in particular telescopes that observe cold gas and dust.