Why do artists do what they do, and how do they do it?
Something To Do With Art is a podcast that explores and celebrates artistic creativity and experimentation – whether it be falling in love with concrete (BA Zanditon), setting up a call centre in Las Vegas (Gemma Marmalade) or turning your own home into an art centre (Ahmed Farooqui).
This blog will feature each artist in turn over the coming weeks – head over to soundcloud.com/robertgood_art to take a listen.
We have come full circle as I link Gemma Marmalade back to BA Zanditon.
Gemma Marmalade tells me how to tell a lie that is 62% more believable. We also discuss her project to set up a call centre in Las Vegas, and Gemma explains the origins of her amazing surname – and why that story is strangely relevant to her work. But can I believe her?
BA Zanditon has spent several years researching and documenting the history and fabrication of the South Bank Centre in London and we discuss concrete as a material, the motivation to make art and the desire to acknowledge the overlooked.
What do Gemma Marmalade and BA Zanditon have in common? – Las Vegas gets a name check in both episodes.
Thanks for listening to Something To Do With Art. Your thoughts and comments always welcome – along with suggestions for my new series in Spring 2021.
Links:
What do Carl Gent and Gemma Marmalade have in common?
Carl Gent is an artist from Bexhill-on-Sea, UK. His work frequently involves performances based on his researches into Cynethryth, the eighth century Queen of the Mercians and co-founder of Bexhill-on-Sea. Carl tells me how his researches led him to investigate pseudo-Mongol, a fake language depicted by Giotto and other mediaeval painters.
Gemma Marmalade investigates the boundaries of truth and story-telling through performance, photography and the construction of fake personas. In this episode, Gemma runs rings around me as I try to work out if she is telling me the truth – can I believe what she says?
What do Carl and Gemma have in common? They both discuss ideas of ‘fake’ with me.
Links:
Something To Do With Art – Carl Gent
Something To Do With Art – Gemma Marmalade
Next week: What do Gemma Marmalade and BA Zanditon have in common?
Thanks to everyone who has supported this podcast so far – it has now reached 1000 plays!
To celebrate this milestone there is now a special bonus episode online featuring a conversation with artist William Furlong, founder of the Audio Arts project in 1972. Over the next three decades Bill recorded over 900 conversations with artists, including Joseph Beuys, Tracey Emin and Andy Warhol, making Audio Arts possibly the most comprehensive sound archive devoted to art and artists in the world.
So head over to soundcloud.com/robertgood_art and take a listen.
What do Craig Pinder and Carl Gent have in common?
Craig Pinder is a West End actor and original cast member of Les Miserables. I want to find out from Craig about his views on acting and how acting might compare to performance art. He tells me about the need to keep the audience entertained, and the importance of mind-body connection.
Carl Gent is an artist from Bexhill-on-Sea, UK. He has devised plays and his work frequently involves performances with a broad range of props, including daub made from ‘bovine excrement’. Carl tells me about the perils of performance, the importance to being open to the unexpected, and his dislike of theatricality.
What do Craig and Carl have in common? They both appear in plays, although their approach to the theatre is very different.
Links:
Something To Do With Art – Craig Pinder
Something To Do With Art – Carl Gent
Next week: what do Carl Gent and Gemma Marmalade have in common?
What do Beric Livingstone and Craig Pinder have in common?
Beric Livingstone was front man of indie group The Healing Fields and tells me how the realities of keeping the show on the road didn’t always match up to his ideals – leading him to move into music production and acting instead. I want to find out from Beric how the creative process works for musicians, and how it compares to making work as an artist.
Craig Pinder is a West End actor and original cast member of Les Miserables. I want to find out from Craig about his views on acting and how acting might compare to performance art. He tells me about the need to keep the audience entertained, and the importance of mind-body connection.
What do Beric and Craig have in common? They are both actors, and (so far) the only two of my podcastees who are not visual artists.
Links:
Something To Do With Art – Beric Livingstone
Something To Do With Art – Craig Pinder
Next week: what do Craig Pinder and Carl Gent have in common?
Robert Good is an artist based in Cambridge UK who works with text to explore the problems of knowledge and the limitations of language. His work critiques the systems and structures of both analogue and digital landscapes, using both books and bytes as source material. www.robertgood.co.uk
