149: Matt Bollinger | Radio Juxtapoz

Matt Bollinger's aim is both to define America but also define himself. Okay, okay, that seems like a wide net to throw, and it maybe it even seems simplistic, but there is his contemporary approach to social realistic, Ashcan School style that has made Bollinger one of the most interesting artists working today in painting, drawing and animation that speaks about and creates narratives of midwest America. His characters often show up in different bodies of work, different mediums, as we follow them through recessions and pandemics and aging, and really just life. Originally from Missouri and now working out of upstate New York, this is a time where Bollinger's voice seems as vital as ever. On this episode of the Radio Juxtapoz podcast, we get the band back together, so to speak, where hosts Evan Pricco and Doug Gillen interview Bollinger about his recent body of work shown in London and the state of America through the lens of his characters. On the heels of our conversation with Patrisse Cullors, this could be the beginning of our "state of the union" series of pods. The Radio Juxtapoz podcast is hosted by FIFTH WALL TV's Doug Gillen and Juxtapoz editor, Evan Pricco. Episode 149 was recorded in the Los Angeles, Margate and Ithaca in September 2024. Follow us on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@radiojuxtapoz⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

As a co-founder of the Black Lives Matter movement, and a career as an artist, writer, abolitionist, Patrisse Cullors is one of the most influential figures in contemporary culture of the 21st century. What the Los Angeles-born Cullors has found in art is something quite fascinating in contrast to work as a activist: space to explore the limitations of language and the expansive nature of creating histories in physical form. I met Cullors at picnic table outside Charlie James Gallery in Los Angeles' Chinatown on the occasion of the artist's first solo show with the gallery, "Between the Warp and Weft: Weaving Shields of Strength and Spirituality." That conversation led to this episode of Radio Juxtapoz, where. Cullors and I discussed the expanded world of activism, her history in making art and the influences of Black American artists in her work and where she sees America at now with the looming elections just months away. —Evan Pricco The Radio Juxtapoz podcast is hosted by FIFTH WALL TV's Doug Gillen and Juxtapoz editor, Evan Pricco. Episode 148 was recorded in the Los Angeles in August 2024. Follow us on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@radiojuxtapoz⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

The first time we encountered the works of London-based Christian Quin Newell was at his stunning Earth altar solo show at Public Gallery. Newell works in an otherworldly realm, dreamscapes if you will (more on this in a second). His newest solo show, The Way, at the same London-based Public Gallery, created what we could say are cosmological paintings, a combination of fictional mysticism, medieval and futuristic at the same time. It's his universe, and we are walking into it. On this episode of the Radio Juxtapoz podcast, we speak to Newell about the characters and universe, his influences and his incredible ability of documenting and then painting his dreams in almost real time. The Radio Juxtapoz podcast is hosted by FIFTH WALL TV's Doug Gillen and Juxtapoz editor, Evan Pricco. Episode 147 was recorded in the London in August 2024. Follow us on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@radiojuxtapoz⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

When you open up the Fall 2024 Juxtapoz Quarterly, our colleague Kristin Farr brings up a caveat when looking (or hearing) about the works of Hannah Wilson. "Embedded in this interview is a required watchlist: Motion pictures that catalyze the arresting paintings of Hannah Wilson." What perhaps you need to know is that Wilson's works are dramatic in that they are the in-between moments of film, stills of the often-missed moments of repose and turmoil. Backs of heads, faces turned down, whispers, grimaces, stress. This is the world of Hannah Wilson is investigating. The Glasgow-based painter has had quite the few years in the public eye, from a solo show at Steve Turner in Los Angeles and residency in Norwich with the team at Moosey and a new feature in our Fall Quarterly. When we asked Wilson how 2024 was going to wrap up, they said "I’ll be continuing my research, watching lots of films and painting what feels good. Also failing, of course, if I’m lucky." The Radio Juxtapoz podcast is hosted by FIFTH WALL TV's Doug Gillen and Juxtapoz editor, Evan Pricco. Episode 146 was recorded in the London in August 2024. Follow us on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@radiojuxtapoz⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

We often said with Juxtapoz that the power of art is to make people feel engaged, feel good and feel ownership over both their community and the world-at-large. Art makes you feel alive, makes you thoughtfully engaged, whether the art challenges you or makes you just have a smile on your face. It's the beauty of it: art allows you to activate yourself. On the occasion of Ken Nwadiogbu taking part in the River Centre Development at Hellesdon Hospital in Norwich, where he the London-based painter transformed the walls of Hellesdon hospital, we found it a good time to finally get a chance here at Radio Juxtapoz to pay Ken and visit and see what he is up to. With Ken's solo show at Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery in Berlin on this summer, we had a lot to catch up on with the Nigerian-bon painter. The Radio Juxtapoz podcast is hosted by FIFTH WALL TV's Doug Gillen and Juxtapoz editor, Evan Pricco. Episode 145 was recorded in the London in August 2024. Follow us on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@radiojuxtapoz⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠

We often ask ourselves how art can heal or make us better understand the world around us. It's the function of art, isn't it? We may not have a universal or agreed upon definition of what art is or means, but we have an understanding that art is an expression of creativity in response to both personal and communal experiences. It's complicated, but good art makes you feel and understand something deeper about the human experience. On the occasion of "Don’t Forget to Remember," a documentary film by director Ross Killeen that follows the Irish street artist "Asbestos as he and his family learn to navigate his mother’s diagnosis of Alzheimer’s and cope with her fading memories," Radio Juxtapoz sits down with the artist to discuss this incredible transformation in his personal life and how this has created a new direction in his artistic life. The Radio Juxtapoz podcast is hosted by FIFTH WALL TV's Doug Gillen and Juxtapoz editor, Evan Pricco. Episode 144 was recorded in the UK in August 2024. Follow us on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@radiojuxtapoz⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠

A new season of the Radio Juxtapoz podcast is here, and we start with something that feels quite relevant as we cross-over into the halfway mark of 2024. The concept is this: Truth is a Moving Target, and the artist and exhibition it pertains to is Southern California's Jaime Muñoz who just opened his first solo museum show at LA Plaza de Cultura y Artes in Los Angeles. When Jaime makes work, he is thinking about movement, how labor moves through our world, how we get from one place to another, and the illusions that some have about what it means to be labor. I wrote this about Jaime earlier this month prior to the podcast, that he "uses the utilitarian methods to speak about a history of California, immigration, migration, labor commodification and the automobile." Over the course of this episode, we talk about these ideas and his unique craft of airbrush and ink drawings, through a unique visual collage of the things we see across our commutes and highway landscape and the political truths we tell ourselves in the midst of all of this. The Radio Juxtapoz podcast is hosted by FIFTH WALL TV's Doug Gillen and Juxtapoz editor, Evan Pricco. Episode 143 was recorded in Los Angeles at LA Plaza de Cultura y Artes in July 2024. Follow us on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@radiojuxtapoz⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠

Continuing our series of podcasts from the Crystal Ship festival in Ostend, Belgium, Radio Juxtapoz' Doug Gillen sat down with Spanish muralist and painter DULK to capture the essence of his practice that has long featured wild animals in a new urban context. The Radio Juxtapoz podcast is hosted by FIFTH WALL TV's Doug Gillen and Juxtapoz editor, Evan Pricco. Episode 1412was recorded in Ostend in April 2024 during Crystal Ship. Follow us on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@radiojuxtapoz⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠

Ah, its nice to have a little color talk here on the podcast. Dublin, Irelands' ACHES is a theorist of color. He combines a multitude of ideas and styles into his work, whether graffiti, murals, painting, graphic design, all into an aesthetic that is deservedly his and one of the more unique in the street genre. When you see an ACHES, you know its him. Now on this occasion we aren't in Dublin or the UK to speak with the artist, but in Hong Kong during Basel Week 2024 and the HK Walls festival. It's always a good time to speak to an artist away from home because you understand a certain idea of perception about their work, and a great conversation usually occurs when you have a little jet lag and hard work going on at the same time. What ACHES describes here is his history and his style that he calls a "subtractive and additive color theory." That's the good stuff. The Radio Juxtapoz podcast is hosted by FIFTH WALL TV's Doug Gillen and Juxtapoz editor, Evan Pricco. Episode 141 was recorded in Hong Kong in March 2024 during HK Walls. Follow us on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@radiojuxtapoz⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

It was always as much as an intervention as it was a hotel. When Banksy opened the Walled Off Hotel in Bethlehem in Palestine in the West Bank in 2017, it was met by both amazement and a bit of shock. In what, in a way, like, "Wait, he opened an actual hotel in the West Bank? By the wall? How did he get that done?" And of course there was the simple: "I want to go. Can I go? Is it safe? I need to go." But there were also more vital questions and anwsers that the hotel offered: what is the history of this region? What is the West's role in this history? The year 2017 was important as it marked the 100 years since the "British took control of Palestine and helped kick start a century of confusion and conflict." And of course in true Banksy fashion, he noted, "At the time of writing there are no special events being planned to mark the occasion." This was a real hotel, with real world implications in a region occupied by Israel with wartime conditions dominating the consciousness of the people there. For Banksy and Walled Off Hotel manager, Wisam Salsaa, this was the opportunity to tell the story of a people, a region and a culture.  After our Israel-Palestine episode at the end of 2023, Radio Juxtapoz wanted to return to the stories of the region but also highlight those who help give Palestinian artists a voice and platform. Wisam, for his years as a tour guide in Bethlehem and now the manager of the Walled Off Hotel (which, of course, is currently closed), helped make Banksy's vision for the hotel come to life and continued to operate it through the following years. In this episode, Jux editor Evan Pricco speaks to Wisam about the creation of the Walled Off, the artistic culture in the West Bank, how street art brought international attention to the region and how Banky changed the way many in the West began to think about its role in the history of Palestine. You can follow the Walled Off Hotel at @walledoffhotel The Radio Juxtapoz podcast is hosted by FIFTH WALL TV's Doug Gillen and Juxtapoz editor, Evan Pricco. Episode 140 was recorded in May 2024. Follow us on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@radiojuxtapoz⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠