Interviews by Brainard Carey

Jeffrey Say is an art historian specialising in Singapore and Southeast Asian art history. An author of numerous essays on art, his seminal co-edited work Histories, Practices, Interventions: A Reader in Singapore Contemporary Art (2016) remains a critical anthology for researchers, curators and students on Singapore art to date. Importantly, Say undertook pioneering research and study of the history of sculpture in pre-and post-war Singapore. Prior to joining LASALLE College of the Arts in 1997, Say was a curator at the then National Museum where he was overseeing the collection of Buddhist and Indian artefacts. As a museum curator, Say curated major exhibitions on Tibetan Buddhist art, the maritime silk route and Alamkara: 5000 Years of India. Say has been instrumental in the development of art history studies at LASALLE supporting artists to develop a contextual and historical understanding of the evolution of visual arts. In 2009, he designed the world’s first Master’s programme focussing on Asian modern and contemporary art histories. He is presently its Programme Leader. This programme has produced graduates who have made significant contributions to the field in the area of scholarship and curation. Say is a public advocate of the importance of art history as a way to promote visual literacy. He is a frequent public speaker at museums, universities and galleries, and conducts short courses which remain hugely popular among various publics. Say is also a regular commentator on the local visual arts scene. Say’s current research interest is on Singapore modern and contemporary art histories. He has written an essay on the early contemporary art scene of Singapore which offers a revisionist view on the beginnings of contemporary art in Singapore (published in the July-Sept 2019 edition of BiblioAsia). He is currently working on the second volume on Singapore modern art as well as a children’s series on Southeast Asian art and culture, both of which will be published in 2022. His essay on the beginnings of contemporary art in Singapore can be found on this link; July-Sept 2019 issue. Book cover with flap open

James Maurelle is an interdisciplinary artist, sculpture, video, photography, and sound art are his analog and digital primes. His work investigates the correlation formed between labor and creativity, at the center of this byway is the spirit of his work. Constructing objects and moving images are not unlike creating music compositions, the accompaniment, i.e., tools and materials, are a call and response to dexterity. The rubric to complete any composition is to know ones’ instrument(s)/tools; the creative process is based on this reciprocal understanding. Jazz is the primer which propels the work, the tone/feel of every composition is in direct association with the culture. Every object I compose is a physical versioning of a historic recording or happening, every tool used is an augmented scale referencing an industrial progression. The materials (wood, metal, plastic, film) are the staff paper, and every committed strike upon these materials forms a note or chord. The fluidity connecting mind, hand, and tools are based on the augmented triad which is the cornerstone of my work ethic. The main objective is to continue creating full-bodied compositions, as long as the staff paper flows, I will inscribe upon it. His work has shown in solo and group exhibitions in New York, Minneapolis-Saint Paul, Austin, Philadelphia, New Orleans, Richmond, Cincinnati, and San Francisco. He is a recipient of the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture Fellowship (2015). Nile, 2014, copper, brass, solder, 44 x 17x 10" dogon azul, 2017, wood, laminate, copper, graphite, paint, 53 x 19 x 15"

Javier Orcaray, (Barcelona, 1980) is a Spanish cultural manager, curator, photographer and environmental activist. He holds a MA in World History and a MA in Visual Culture: Theory (NYU). In 2010 he opened the artist residency La Fragua, which soon became a benchmark in Spain for research and thought in the rural world. In 2014 he was a founding member of CoMbO, an independent arts space in the city of Cordoba that proposed new exhibition discourses based on the production work at La Fragua, with emerging contemporary artists such as Jacobo Castellano, Nathalie Haüsler, Angel Masíp, Tobias Sojber, David Bestué, Pablo Captain del Río, Fernando M. Romero, ATOI, Laia Estruch, Ethan Hayes-Chute and Tommy Hovik among others. In 2020 he opened /Plata, the only independent space in Cordoba dedicated for the arts and transdisciplinary research. Included in his most relevant curatorial projects are: “Mi casa es tu Casa” with the international collective Kandor13 (Catherine Czacki, Brock Enright, Pablo Jansana, Daria Irincheeva, Andrea Galvani, Cecilia Vicuña, Carolina Saquel, Santiago Reyes Villaveces, Balam Bartolomé, Esperanza Mayobre, Angélica Teuta, Alejandro Almanza Pereda, Felix Lazo, Lars Laumann at Centro de Arte Pepe Espaliú). "How a Grape can Float in the Ocean" with artist Javier Arce at Centro de Arte Pepe Espaliú as part of the 16th biennial of photography in Cordoba . "AABAS: Art Agriculture Biodiversity Food and Health" a symposium of experts and artistic residencies with Pedro Soler, Aniara Rodado, Laura M. Dávila, Daniela Moreno-Wright at the Center for Contemporary Creation of Andalusia. Plata. The new cultural space in Cordoba, 2021 Adding compost for AABAS (Art, Food, Biodiversity and Health) at Centro de Creación Contemporánea de Andalucía 2017 CoMbO (2014-206). Tommy Hovik and Pablo Capitán del Río. Exhibition at our gallery.

Jennifer Coates is a painter based in NYC and Lakewood, PA. She has a solo show up through April 8 entitled "Pagan Forest" at the Knauer Gallery at West Chester University in PA. Other recent solo shows include "Toxic Halo" at High Noon Gallery, NY 2020, and "Correspondences" at Freight and Volume Gallery, NY. She has collaborated with Wells Chandler in the show "Electric Mayhem" at Crush Curatorial, NY and with David Humphrey in the shows "Mountain Man and Uncle Fritz" at Fiendish Plots in NE and "Plush Onus" at Arts & Leisure, NY. She is the 2021 recipient of the John Koch Award in Art from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a residency from the Civitella Ranieri Foundation in 2019, as well as a residency at the Sharpe Walentas Studio Program in 2018-2019. She plays violin, ukulele and sings, performing with various bands in the pre Covid times. Books mentioned in the interview are; What Color is the Sacred by Michael Taussig, Ministry For the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson, Parable of the Sowers by Octavia Butler and A Children's Bible by Lydia Millet. Triumph of Pan (Aqua), acrylic and spray paint on canvas, 5x6 ft, 2020 Triumph of Pan (Purple), acrylic and spray paint on canvas, 4x5 ft, 2020

Russell Maltz (b. 1952, Brooklyn, NY) has exhibited work in numerous solo and group exhibitions throughout the United States and internationally, including in Australia, Germany, Austria, France, Italy, Israel, Denmark, Mexico, Switzerland, Japan and New Zealand. His work has been reviewed in publications such as The New York Times, Artforum, Art in America, Hyperallergic and The Village Voice. His works are in the collection of The Brooklyn Museum, Yale University Art Museum, Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University Art Museum, Kunstraum-Alexander Burkle, Freiburg, Germany, San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, California, Arkansas Art Center, Little Rock, Arkansas, Saarland Museum, Saarbrucken, Germany, Stiftung fur Konkreter Kunst, Reutlingen, Germany, Wilhelm-Hack Museum, Ludwigshafen , Germany, Gallery of Western Australia, Perth, Australia. He has been facilitating with Critical Practices Incorporated since its inception and serves on its advisory board. A survey exhibition exploring 40 years of his work was recently mounted at the Stadtgalerie in Saarbrucken, and at Galerie Michael Sturm in Stuttgart, Germany and ran from May through August 2017. The exhibition was accompanied by a monogram book covering his work from 1976 through 2017 and published by The Stadtgalerie Saarbrucken and printed by Kerber Verlag in Biefeld, Germany. In NYC he exhibits at Minus Space. Russell Maltz lives and works in New York City. BALLPARK - Installation View 2012 - Minus Space Gallery, Bklyn., NY, Works from the series dating from 1976 to 2012, Mixed Media - Dimensions Variable Stacked Orange, 2021 Polyurethane and Acrylic on plywood (7) plates stacked against the wall 96 x 48 x 15 inches, (243.8 x 121.9 x 38 cm)

Ellen Hackl Fagan builds connections between color and sound using installations, an interactive web app, and collaborative projects that combine color-saturated paintings with sound. Balanced between randomness and intention, like jazz music, Fagan’s art continues to reveal limitless possibilities for improvisation. Echoing life’s chaotic beauty, her color-saturated paintings are sourced in pop music, Rimbault, Jungian psychology, the theory of correspondences, minimalism and decorative art. Ellen Hackl Fagan is the inventor of The Reverse Color Organ and the ColorSoundGrammar Game, two projects that enable viewers to interact aurally with color.The Reverse Color Organ is a web app, downloadable to a smart phone, thus placing this synaesthetic tool into peoples’ hands to be used, not only to expand the language of color, but also as a crowd-sourced musical instrument. Fagan exhibits her work extensively throughout New England and New York City. Books she continues to reference in her work are: James Joyce, Finnegan's Wake, Ellen Dissanayake's Homo Aestheticus,and Ogham, An Irish Alphabetwhich tap into her deep interest in prehistoric art and earthworks. In 2014 she expanded her independent curatorial practice into a full time business and is now the owner of ODETTA Gallery, based in New York City and Greenwich, Connecticut. Since that time Fagan has created and produced over 70 exhibitions of contemporary art, working with over 150 artists, in addition to maintaining her studio practice. As director of ODETTA, she is exploring new platforms in gallery practice and community building, both virtually and in real life. During the pandemic, she has opened ODETTA Digital on the SHIM Art Network platform, and is their Director of Sales, bringing together groups of artists to develop their own exhibition opportunities and curatorial skills. She also has opened ODETTA Petite, a replica of the ODETTA Bushwick gallery space. Here she exhibits works as model scaled proposals for monumental works of art, to be purchased as commissioned works. ODETTA has been critically reviewed in numerous notable publications, both in print and in blogs, like The New Criterion, Artillery Magazine, and Hyperallergic. Public commissions include Coach’s flagship store on 5th Avenue and David Yurman Jewelers’ showroom in Tribeca. ODETTA's exhibitions have traveled to Real Art Ways in Hartford, CT, The Flux Art Fair at Marcus Garvey Park in Harlem, NYC, Bronx Art Space, NYC, and the Morris Museum of Art, Morristown, NJ. Ellen Hackl Fagan, installation view Helpless 2020 Five Points Torrington CT. Ellen Hackl Fagan, SeekingtheSoundofCobaltBlue, Bounty, 2020, inkpigment acrylic on readymade object, 2020, 12-x-12-inches, Private Collection.

Emily Larned has been publishing as a socially engaged art practice since 1993, when as a teenager she made her first zine. She is co-founder of Impractical Labor in Service of the Speculative Arts(ILSSA, est. 2008), a union for reflective creative practice, which to date has counted over 400 members in 37 states and 6 countries. ILSSA explores the immaterial working conditions of impractical laborers through participatory projects, publications, and exhibitions. Through her imprint Alder & Frankia (est. 2016), Emily publishes new collaborations and reissues of feminist archival material. Emily's award-winning artist books, zines, & publications (including Muffin Bones zine, Memorytown USA zine, Parfait zine, & artist books under her former imprint Red Charming) are collected by over 70 institutions internationally, including the Tate, the Brooklyn Museum, the V&A, & the Smithsonian, & are exhibited around the world. Her work has received accolades from the AIGA (50 Books | 50 Covers), the Type Directors Club (TDC) (The World's Best Typography), and the Connecticut Art Directors Club (CADC) (Gold & Silver awards in Book Design, Spirit of Creativity Award). She graduated from Yale School of Art with an MFA in Graphic Design and is currently Assistant Professor of Graphic Design at the University of Connecticut, Storrs. The book mentioned in the interview is Cassandra Speaks: When Women Are the Storytellers, the Human Story Changes by Elizabeth Lesser. A sampling of publications from Impractical Labor in Service of the Speculative Arts (ILSSA or Impractical Labor for short). Established in 2008 as a collaboration between Emily Larned and Bridget Elmer, ILSSA is a union for reflective creative practice. As a union for artists, makers, and creative practitioners of all kinds, ILSSA focuses on improving the immaterial working conditions of members. ILSSA publishes contemplative tools and resources; organizes participatory projects, exhibitions, and events; facilitates an annual group residency; and observes an annual holiday, the Festival to Plead for Skills. ILSSA seeks to restore the relationship between makers and their tools, makers and their time, and makers and what they make. Basic membership is free and open to all who which to join. Partial view of the installation “Police Others As You Would Have Others Police You,” part of “Who Governs?” curated by Frank Mitchell, Artspace New Haven, October 30-December 12, 2020. Print installation made from the archives of Kay Codish, feminist theater director turned head of the New Haven Police Academy from 1992-2008. In the foreground is a reprint of her 1996 article.

Known for combining high and low culture through elements of painting, drawing, graphic design, animation, and collage, Bevilacqua characteristically works in a saturated palette, covering his glossy canvases with brand logos and doodles. Michael Bevilacqua's semi autographical mixed-media works serve as a platform for exposing his cultural, intellectual and spiritual preferences. His work can be found in numerous public collections including the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Learn more on his Instagram account. The book mentioned in the interview was The Devil you know by Charles M Blow. Balen/SEGA 2019 paint and acrylic on digital canvas 55” x 65” Shake this Disease 2020 paint pen and acrylic on paper 24” x 18” Data Moshers 2017 UV ink on canvas 60” x 48”

April Bey grewup in The Bahamas (New Providence) and now resides and works in Los Angeles, CA as a visual artist and art educator.Bey’s interdisciplinary artwork is an introspective and social critique of American and Bahamian culture, feminism, generational theory, social media, AfroFuturism, AfroSurrealism, post-colonialism and constructs of race within supremacist systems. Bey’s work is in the collection of The California African American Museum, The National Art Gallery of The Bahamas, The Center for Contemporary Printmaking, Fullerton College Art Gallery, Museum of Art and History, Lancaster, CA, and more. Bey has exhibited in biennials NE7, NE8 and NE9 in The Bahamas. Bey has also exhibited internationally in Italy, Spain and Accra Ghana, West Africa. Bey has launched 5 solo exhibitions:Picky Head at Liquid Courage Gallery in Nassau, Bahamas,COMPLY at Coagula Curatorial in Chinatown, Los Angeles, MADE IN SPACE at Band of Vices Gallery in West Adams, a large survey of work spanning several years, Welcome to Atlantica at Fullerton College Art gallery and most recently a solo presentation with UPFOR Gallery at UNTITLED ART ONLINE Art Fair. Bey is both a practicing contemporary artist and art educator having taught a controversial course at Art Center College of Design called Pretty Hurts analyzing process-based art and Beyoncé hashtag faux feminism. Bey is currently a tenured professor at Glendale College. And I'm Calm, Calculated and Perfectly Aligned [email protected] Watercolor drawing, acrylic paint, epoxy resin, hand-sewn "African" fabric, oil impasto 40 x 30 in 2020 COLONIAL SWAG: First Edition Atlanticans [email protected] Digital print stapled into eco fur on panel 30 x 24 in 2021

Charlotte Becket lives and works in New York City where she is an Associate Professor at Pace University. She attended Hunter College's MFA program and received her BFA from the Cleveland Institute of Art.Solo and two person exhibitions include LaMama Galleria, New York City, Valentine Gallery NY, Crisp Gallery in London, LEAP in Berlin, Taxter and Spengemann in New York City as well as group exhibitions at Gazelli Art House in London, Gasser and Grunert, Anna Kustera, NY Studio Gallery, Passerby and the Invitational Exhibition Academy of Arts and Letters in New York City. She has been invited to lecture on her work at various galleries and universities and has been the recipient of grants from The New York Foundation for the Arts, Socrates Sculpture Park, The Joan Mitchell Foundation, The Tony Smith Foundation, the Verizon Foundation, and the Center for Book Arts.Her work has been reviewed in The New York Times, TimeOut London, ArtForum, and Art in America, among others, and included in the publication, 100 Artists, a compendium of interviews with 100 international contemporary artists by Francesca Gavin. Force Field Book Series, 2019, paper 8"x3"x3" Particle Horizon, 2020, paper 26"x26"x30"