Interviews From Yale Radio / Artists, Curators And More

Portrait of the Artist. Courtesy of Uprise Art. Devon Reina (b. 1996) is a Brooklyn, New York-based artist and designer. Devon’s cross-disciplinary background inspires his curiosity for materiality and process. His paintings celebrate a range of versatile media, from thick paint impastos, to expressive ink washes and delicate wax pastel line-work. Across his various bodies of work, Devon is interested in how marks of color can interact with each other to suggest the illusion of depth, movement, or direction.   Nemeses Year of Work: 2023 Dimensions: 40 in x 40 in x 1.25 in / 101.6 cm x 101.6 cm x 3.18 cm Materials: Pencil and wax pastel on canvas In "Nemeses", I wanted to experiment with placing two parts of the canvas in dialogue with one another, allowing them to agree and disagree in terms of color, surface area, and directionality. Courtesy of Uprise Art. Snowflake Year of Work: 2023 Dimensions: 48 in x 48 in x 1.5 in / 121.92 cm x 121.92 cm x 3.81 cm Materials: Wax pastel on canvas My work is a product

Mark Yang’s colorful, incongruous arrays of anonymous limbs entangled together investigate the nuances of human interaction through a critical lens of art history. Morphing and distorting idealized figures into conglomerates of body parts, Yang’s forms exhibit a sculptural quality, the result of the artist’s thoughtful rendering of plane, dimension, and space. Reducing, dismantling, and reassembling their limbs almost to the point of abstraction with a variety of painterly techniques, Yang creates characteristically mysterious compositions that are not immediately forthcoming with their narrative plot. With a comprehensive set of art historical references, from the Baroque compositions of Peter Paul Rubens to the postwar abstractions of Ellsworth Kelly, Yang’s anatomical abstractions have been praised for their complication of gender norms. Yang’s ambiguous bodily arrangements rarely depict his figures’ faces, prioritizing their bodies over their identities. Resisting homogenizing classifications, Yang calls

Andrew Edlin Andrew Edlin, owner of his eponymously named gallery and the Outsider Art Fair talks about the current show at the gallery and the upcoming fair. Unaccompanied Conversations explores the work of three artists: the now acclaimed Outsider James Castle, Pearl Blauvelt, and John Byam, all of whom were untrained and from modest circumstances, yet developed unique approaches to their art using unconventional materials. And they all devoted their lives to their art in the face of little or no market support. Besides their exceptional talent, these artists all shared traits of neurodiversity. They did not process information the way most people do, or hold “normal” conversations, even the banal—like commenting on the weather. But viewing the works of Castle, Blauvelt, and Byam can be like overhearing the conversations, often deep, sometimes funny, frequently intense, but always unusual, that have played out in the artists’ minds. Since people who exhibit a range of divergent characteristics are often

Tiril Hasselknippe is a sculptor working with steel, concrete, fiberglass, and resin who proposes object-based solutions to evade humanity’s downfall and whose sculptures command authority of physical presence through their sheer volume, scale, and weight. Her sculpture is rooted in material and textual world that balances deeply personal exploration with socio-political underpinnings—at times seeming to participate in parts of a post-apocalyptic storyline. Hasselknippe creates a kind of science fiction of formalism in which the double bonds between the sacred and the primitive, the natural and artificial, and the life-giving and the downfall are all present. Hasselknippe received her BFA and MFA from Malmö Art Academy in 2011 and 2013 respectively. She also participated in a foreign exchange program at The Cooper Union in New York in 2010. Hasselknippe’s recent solo exhibitions have been held at institutions including Kuntshall Stavanger, NO; NITJA Senter for Samtidskunst, Lillestrøm, NO; Kunstnerforbundet,

Photo by Yael Malka Emma Safir (b. 1990 NYC) Safir makes paintings that utilize fabric manipulation, lens–based media, smocking, rasterization, upholstery, and digitization. Her paintings function as screen simulations, proxies and portals. Safir is interested in hierarchies of labor in relation to gender and digitization. Safir holds a BFA from RISD in Printmaking and an MFA from Yale in Painting & Printmaking. She has had solo exhibitions at Blade Study, Baxter St at CCNY, SHIN HAUS at Shin Gallery and Bunker Projects; and has participated in group shows at RAINRAIN, Charles Moffett, Jack Barrett, Shulamit Nazarian, Lyles & King, Hesse Flatow, among others. Safir lives and works in New York. Emma Safir, Girandole III 2023 8" x 8.5” Pewter, reflective thread needlelace. Emma Safir, Hole Solution I 2023 14" x 11" x ~1.5" Silk, mdf, appliqué, reflective thread, neoprene, house paint, flashe paint, upholstery foam. Emma Safir, Modern Prometheus III 2023 79” x 37” x ~1.5” Silk, mdf, appliqué, reflective th

The Thing in Front of You, an exhibition of unique photocollages and small-scale wall sculptures by artist Sandi Haber Fifield, will be on view at Yancey Richardson from January 11 through February 17, 2024. Sandi Haber Fifield was born in Youngstown, Ohio in 1956. She holds an MFA in photography from Rochester Institute of Technology. Her work has been widely exhibited in galleries and museums throughout the United States, including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Art Institute of Chicago; National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, DC; Oakland Museum; Philadelphia Museum of Art; Southeast Museum of Photography, Daytona Beach, FL; and St. Louis Art Museum. Haber Fifield’s photographs are the subject of four monographs: The Certainty of Nothing, 2021; After the Threshold, Kehrer Verlag, 2013; Between Planting and Picking, Charta, 2011; and Walking through the World, Charta, 2009. Additional publications that feature Haber Fifield’s work include Our Selves, Photographs by Women Artists, MoMA, 2022 an

Oda Jaune Portrait 2024 © Charles Roussel For her first solo exhibition in the United States, the rare and uncanny Oda Jaune unveils a challenging exhibition in New York. “Miss Understand” offers a series of nearly 25 new oil paintings and dozens of watercolors, on a singular perception of the woman in our time.  Oda Jaune, Bulgarian in origin and trained in Germany, has for nearly 15 years been among the most intriguing figures on the European art scene with a body of work freed from any pictorial convention. Poetic, sensual, and expansive, her painting ignites conversation and explores, without inhibition, the depth of femininity today.  ODA JAUNE G like Guerrilla Girl, 2023 Huile sur toile | oil on canvas 120 × 170 cm — 47 1/4 × 67 in. Photo: Laurent Edeline. All photos: © Courtesy the artist and TEMPLON, Paris —Brussels — New York. ODA JAUNE A like Apple, 2023 Huile sur toile | oil on canvas 170 × 120 cm — 67 × 47 1/4 in. Photo: Laurent Edeline. All photos: © Courtesy the artist and TEMPLON, Paris —Br

Molly Lowe (b. 1983, Palo Alto, CA) received her MFA from Columbia University and her BFA from Rhode Island School of Design (RISD). She has had solo exhibitions and performances at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA; Lilith Performance Studio, Malmo, Sweden; Pioneer Works, Brooklyn, NY; Anat Ebgi, Los Angeles CA; Suzanne Geiss Company, New York, NY; SculptureCenter, Long Island City, New York; and Performa 13, New York, NY. Her films have screened at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY and JOAN, Los Angeles, CA. Lowe has participated in residencies at the Shandaken Project, Storm King Art Center, New Windsor, NY; Pioneer Works, Brooklyn, NY; Recess Art, New York, NY; and the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Skowhegan, ME. In 2015, she received the New York Foundation for the Arts interdisciplinary artist fellowship award, and she was recently nominated for a Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation award. Lowe lives and works in New York. Molly Lowe, Wrestle in the Grass, 2023, Oil on canvas, 68 x 8

Devin B. Johnson (b. 1992, Los Angeles) obtained his BA in Fine Arts from the California State University of Channel Islands (2015) and received a Masters of Fine Arts at Pratt Institute (2019). In addition to being named a 2023 Artist-in-Residence for Fountainhead, Miami, he was selected as an Artsy Vanguard (2022),  named to Forbes 30 Under 30 Art and Design (2022) list, was included in Cultured’s “Young Artists 2021,” and was one of sixteen artists from around the world selected for the inaugural year of the Black Rock Senegal residency (2020). His work is collected by Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art;  the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Pond Society, Shanghai; the Rubell Museum, Miami; the Columbus Museum of Art; Longlati Foundation, Shanghai; and many others. “A Moment in Crossing,” 2023 Oil on linen. 48h x 60w in. “Something Tender” 2023 Oil on linen. 60h x 62w in. “Water Me Deeply”, 2022 Oil and spray on paper. 30h × 22 1/2w in.

Photo credit: Lamar Landers Sydney G. James (b. 1979, Detroit, MI) is a fine arts painter and muralist living and working in Detroit. James began her career as art director of an advertising agency after earning her BFA from Detroit’s College of Creative Studies in 2001. In 2004, James moved to Los Angeles to work as a visual artist in the film and television industry and earned a master’s degree in secondary education. Since returning to her native city in 2011, James has become known as the eminent muralist of the Detroit art scene, transforming the city’s skyline and artistic legacy as well as completing murals across the country, including New Orleans, LA; Brooklyn, NY; Atlanta, GA; Los Angeles, CA; Worcester, MA; and Hawaii. James was awarded a 2017 Kresge Arts in Detroit Fellowship and served as a 2021 Kresge Artist Fellowship panelist in Visual Arts. Her work has been exhibited at Detroit’s Museum of Contemporary Art and Design (MOCAD), the Charles H. Wright Museum, Inner State Gallery, PlayGround Detr

Donna Green, photo by Joe Kramm Donna Green wrestles with coils of stoneware, manipulating and prodding to create anthropomorphic gestural shapes that burst and stretch into space. Her physical experimentation challenges the properties of the clay, resulting in works that seem to be in a constant state of growth and transfiguration; heroically scaled urns undulate and drip with layer upon layer of glaze. Green draws inspiration from the ancient Jomon ceramics of Japan and Chinese Han Dynasty storage jars, as well as Gonshi, the naturally occurring scholars’ rocks, and Baroque garden grottos. Donna Green was born in Sydney, Australia, and earned a Bachelor of Arts in Industrial Design in 1984 from Sydney College of the Arts in New South Wales. In 1985, Green moved to New York and joined Industrial Design Magazine as one of its editors. She began working in clay in 1988, studying at Greenwich House Pottery and the New School in New York, and in 1997 at the National Art School, Sydney. Green has participated in

Loren Erdrich creates paintings that both aspire toward transcendence and revel in their physicality. Erdrich’s deliberate and open collaboration with her medium allows for discovery in every painting, and she uses her materials in unconventional ways to create a dynamic tension between deliberate and unintentional gestures. She paints on raw muslin with water, dyes, pigments, and other water-based media, allowing the artist and her emerging figures to embrace and celebrate the strength of fluidity, vulnerability, and reactivity. Erdrich holds a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and an MFA from the Burren College of Art at the National University of Ireland, Galway. She has been awarded residencies at Yaddo, Elizabeth Murray Artist Residency, Jentel Foundation, Santa Fe Art Institute, Sculpture Space, Vermont Studio Center, and Art Farm Nebraska, and was selected as a Hopper Prize Finalist for 2023. Erdrich has exhibited in solo and group shows internationally in cities including New York

Alexander Ross in his studio, 2021, Great Barrington, MA Alexander Ross (b. 1960 in Denver, CO) received his Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Massachusetts College of Art, Boston, MA. Ross has been the subject of solo exhibitions at the Contemporary Art Museum, St. Louis, MO; Galerie Hussenot, Paris, France; LABspace, Hillsdale, NY; Miles McEnery Gallery, New York, NY; New York Foundation for the Arts, New York, NY; Nolan Judin, Berlin, Germany; and the Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, MA, among others. The artist has been included in group exhibitions at numerous international institutions including the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum, Lincoln, MA; Denver Art Museum, Denver, CO; Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City, Mexico; New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, NY; Valencian Institute of Modern Art, Valencia, Spain; and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY. His work may be found in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL; British Museum, London, United Kingdom; Denver

photo of Ava (pictured with House Flips) Ava Werner is an American multi-media artist, working with 2D media and installation.  Broadly, her work focuses on how humans impact the earth and its resources. Werner is a lecturer in the Art and Design Department at California Polytechnic State University. Most recently, Werner had a residency summer 2023 at Vermont Studio Center. Her Waterlinks Installation project with James Werner is ongoing and has been installed in New Zealand, Micronesia and Vanuatu, Australia, California, New York and Maine. House Flip: Hurricane Katrina Photo collage, Digital print 18” x 24” 2023 Overgrowth Acrylic, cut paper, found images 12” x 12” 2023 Sordida Aqua Acrylic, cut paper, found images 10“ x 10” 2023

Omari Douglin lives and works in Los Angeles. He received an MFA in Painting from Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY in 2019. Selected solo and group exhibitions have been held at Sebastian Gladstone (Los Angeles), Ramiken (New York), Micki Meng (San Francisco), and Theta (New York). Omari Douglin was born in Brooklyn, NY 1992. Raining Spy and Chips, 2023, Acrylic and oil on canvas, 60 x 43 inches Untitled (After Lukas), 2023, Oil on canvas. 60 x 43 inches Kick Ass Painter, 2023, Acrylic and oil on canvas. 60 x 43 inches

Oidie Kuijpers (b. 1993) is a painter based in Brooklyn, New York. Kuijpers makes work which explores representation and investigates painting as a form of critical inquiry. His paintings have been included in exhibitions at Oberlin College, Pace Gallery, New York, Pratt Institute, and D. D. D. D. in New York. untitled (2023.31), 2023, acrylic on panel 10 x 10 inches untitled (2023.10.A), 2023, acrylic on panel, 10 x 10 inches untitled (2023.05.A), 2023, acrylic on panel, 10 x 10 inches  

Gregg Louis received a Master’s of Fine Arts degree from the School of Visual Arts in New York City in 2009. His work has been featured in exhibitions around the world, including Nohra Haime Gallery in New York; NH Galería in Cartagena; Hverfisgalleri in Reykjavik; The World Chess Hall of Fame in Saint Louis; Postmasters Gallery in New York; Galerist in Istanbul; Frieze London; Vienna Contemporary; and Art Bogotá. In 2009, Louis was an artist-in-residence at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. The New York Times, The Wall St Journal, and Sculpture Magazine have all covered his work. Louis currently lives and works in Saint Louis, and is represented by Nohra Haime Gallery in New York City. Fires in the Sky, 2023 Summer Nights, 2023 Midnight in Wonder Valley, Deep Sky & Like a Moth Drawn to a Flame, 2023

Portrait of the Artist, Photo by Josh Wool. Brad Kunkle, b. 1978 Lehighton, Pennsylvania, BFA, Kutztown University, 2001. A decade after selling out his debut solo exhibition in New York City on opening night, Brad Kunkle has become internationally known for his unique use of gold and silver leaf in contemporary oil painting. His themes explore the shedding of dogmas inherited from previous generations, intuition, and the power of feminine energies as guides for seeking enlightenment in symbiosis with the natural world. He is represented by Arcadia Contemporary in NYC. Where Time Begins, 78 x 50 inches, Oil, gold and silver leaf on linen. 2023. Pneuma, 63 x 36 inches, Oil and gold leaf on linen. 2023. Stasis III, 24 x 18 inches, Oil and gold leaf on wood. 2023.

Cynthia Lahti (b. 1963) lives and works in her birthplace of Portland, Oregon. She received her BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design. Lahti has presented solo exhibitions in Oregon at CEI Artworks Gallery (2019), Ditch Projects (2017), Imogen Gallery (2017), Passages Bookshop (2016), and PDX Contemporary Art (2016), among others. Her work is in the collections of the Portland Art Museum, Boise Art Museum, Columbia University Library, Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, Reed College, Stanford University’s Bowes Art and Architecture Library, University of California, Santa Barbara, Library, and Yale University’s Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, among others. In 2023, the artist’s drawings and sculptures were featured in Kelly Reichardt’s film Showing Up. CYNTHIA LAHTI , White Phone, 2023 Signed and dated Ceramic figure 12 x 12 x 11 inches CYNTHIA LAHTI, Red Girl, 2023 Signed and dated Ceramic figure, wood base 17 x 8 x 7 inches CYNTHIA LAHTI, Sock, 2009 Signed and dated Ceramic figure, wood bas

photo is by Tyson Housman Originating from vintage video clips, Helia Chitsazan (b. 1995, Tehran, Iran) invokes a visualblur and static of old camera films through her painting. Chitsazan explores a constant and universally ambiguous feeling of absence and loss. To her, art is a language to hold emotions and complications that she experienced growing up in Iran's specific cultural and social circumstances. Chitsazan speaks on the manifestation of her practice, “...growing up in a society with different levels of verbal oppression has made me interested in communicating and expressing myself through various other ways but not talking and art is one of them.” Chitsazan was born and raised in Tehran, Iran. She graduated with a BFA in Painting from the Tehran University of Art and recently received an MFA in Fine Arts from the School of Visual Arts in New York City. Recently, Chitsazan was included in a group exhibition, Interest in Humanity: Portraits of Yesterday and Today at Fou Gallery (New York, 2023) along