Russell and Robert chat to legendary artist Lisa Yuskavage. Best-known for her groundbreaking, provocative figurative paintings, Lisa‘s images occupy a space between high and low; the sacred and the profane.
In this feature-length special episode, we discuss her journey to making the work she truly loved, combatting working-class guilt whilst studying at Yale (and her friendship with architectural artist Maya Lin), reading a Diane Arbus biography, how an Alice Neel documentary influenced her thinking on having a family, interrailing across Europe in the early 80s, discovering her voice as an artist leading to her breakthrough 1990s ‘Bad Babies’ exhibition. We discuss teaching, psychotherapy, her longterm friendship with artists Laurie Simmons & Carroll Dunham (and their awesome children Cyrus & Lena Dunham), rejection letters and her experiences in the gallery system, staying the course & self belief, her love of cinema (such as David Lynch's Blue Velvet), reading George Orwell's account of his prep school years, remembering her friend Jesse Murray an artist who passed away from AIDS-related pneumonia in 1993. Finally we learn about the challenges of making art during lockdown and explore the artworks she lives with at home including Philip Guston, Kara Walker, Neo Rauch and Matvey Levenstein.
Thank you to Lisa for her generosity and for sharing her experiences of art making! Follow @LisaYuskavageStudio on Instagram, and for images discussed in this episode visit @TalkArt, or @TalkArtPodcast on Twitter! Lisa is represented by @DavidZwirner. We strongly recommend visiting Lisa’s website www.yuskavage.com Thanks for listening!! If you've enjoyed this episode, do leave us a review at Apple Podcasts. We love to hear your feedback!
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