In 1898, a new metropolis emerged from the consolidation of New York City with East Bronx, Brooklyn, Staten Island and the western part of Queens County. In Greater Gotham: A History of New York City from 1898 to 1919 (Oxford University Press, 2017), Mike Wallace describes the first two decades of this city’s expanded history, a period in which it led and em ... Show More
Feb 27
Veronique Boone, "Le Corbusier on Camera: The Unknown Films of Ernest Weissmann" (Birkhaüser, 2024)
Le Corbusier on Camera: The Unknown Films of Ernest Weissmann (Birkhaüser, 2024) is based on amateur films, shot by the architect Ernest Weissmann (1903-1985) with a Pathé Motocamera in the years 1929-1933 at, among other places, the Atelier Le Corbusier and Pierre Jeanneret. The ... Show More
31m 38s
Feb 3
Itohan I. Osayimwese, "Africa's Buildings: Architecture and the Displacement of Cultural Heritage" (Princeton UP, 2025)
Between the nineteenth century and today, colonial officials, collectors, and anthropologists dismembered African buildings and dispersed their parts to museums in Europe and the United States. Most of these artifacts were cataloged as ornamental art objects, which erased their i ... Show More
1h 19m
Jan 28
Bram de Maeyer, "Building for Belgium: Belgian Embassies in a Globalising World (1945-2020)" (Leuven UP, 2025)
Embassy buildings are the most tangible evidence of a state’s diplomatic presence abroad. State authorities have invested in the architectural conception of purpose-built embassies to flex their diplomatic muscle and project nationhood on foreign soil. While scholars have primari ... Show More
37m 1s
Sep 2021
Susanna Phillips Newbury, "The Speculative City: Art, Real Estate, and the Making of Global Los Angeles" (U Minnesota Press, 2021)
Underlying every great city is a rich and vibrant culture that shapes the texture of life within. In The Speculative City: Art, Real Estate, and the Making of Global Los Angeles (U Minnesota Press, 2021), Susanna Phillips Newbury teases out how art and Los Angeles shaped one anot ... Show More
35m 21s
Dec 2023
2023: the biggest stories and the best shows
It’s the final episode of 2023 and so, as always, it’s our review of the year. Host Ben Luke is joined by Louisa Buck, The Art Newspaper’s contemporary art correspondent, based in London, and Ben Sutton, editor, Americas, based in New York, to discuss the big art and heritage new ... Show More
1h 7m
Aug 2023
360. Fear City: New York in the 1970s
“A cloud of black, acrid smoke hung over the area. It was a scene from a warzone, a battlefield - it was a scene from the end of the world…” New York in the 1970s was a city decimated by economic stagnation, unemployment and ever-rising crime rates, haemorrhaging its population t ... Show More
54m 6s
Feb 2024
The Roots of the Harlem Renaissance—and Its Power Today
The words the “Harlem Renaissance” have immense magnetism for vast numbers of people. In art history, however, the Harlem Renaissance has often been treated as a footnote to the main story of 20th century art. It’s often been given scant attention in textbooks, and even U.S. muse ... Show More
51m 2s
Jun 2023
America’s Big City Brain Drain
<p>In recent years, well-paid and college-educated Americans have shed major cities like New York, San Francisco and Washington for places like Philadelphia or Birmingham, Ala.</p><p>Emily Badger, who writes about cities and urban policy for The Upshot at The New York Times, expl ... Show More
29m 50s
Apr 2023
Art and the banks; hip hop in Baltimore; Juan de Pareja, the artist enslaved by Velázquez
<p>This week: Ben Luke talks to Melanie Gerlis about the recent turbulence in the banking sector, as US banks go under, an ailing Credit Suisse is acquired by UBS and Deutsche Bank shares fall at one point by 14%. What are the implications for the art world? Melanie also explains ... Show More
57m 30s