Nicholas Sullivan
December 3, 2024

Complete playlist below; tracks in yellow were cut for time.

Sculptor Nicholas Sullivan joins me to share a surprisingly sensitive punk/hardcore set in honor of his great exhibition Chrysler at Clearing Gallery in New York City, on view through January 11, 2025.

Sullivan studied at both UMass Amherst and MassArt in Boston, and after graduating with an MFA, he taught at MassArt for 6 years. In his introductory sculpture class, “Form Study”, he encouraged his students to really get to know a material by slowly and continually changing and working it until the object finds itself, or manifests its own specificity. He was delighted and amazed by the strange and beautiful objects his beginner students would come up with, and this process of sequentially manipulating material into form is how he works now. Sullivan describes how a series of material experimentations led him to the form of the wood stove, a recurring motif in his artwork. He also discusses how important it is to have art mentors—people whose work forges an inspirational path of exploration of form, meaning, and process.

His current exhibition features several stove-based sculptures, and Sullivan takes us through a sequence of different formal and conceptual moves in the show. Some of the works incorporate collage, others utilize a high-gloss auto body finish; some pieces are black boxes to the viewer, some have peep holes, and others have perforated skins allowing us to peer inside. Nicholas unpacks how these different forms and ways of making relate to history and meaning in a really beautiful way.

He also helps Nate understand the history and differences between Punk and Hardcore, and we talk about the different scenes, movements, and ideologies that find their homes in this genre of music. We go from classic English punk to Swedish d-beat, queercore, Japanese hardcore, and powerviolence. We discuss what it means to rock out in the studio vs. the transcendence of being in a collective experience at a live punk show. We also identify particular tracks that garner perhaps Sullivan’s highest compliment: “It makes you want to put your head through a wall!”

1. In My Eyes ,   Minor Threat    1981
2. SQRM,   I Cant Find My Knife  
   
3. Hittinpunchinstabbinshooting ,   Driller Killer    1994
   
4. Want Us Dead,    Limp Wrist    2016
   
5. My Rules,    Void    1982
   
6. Smash Divisions,   disrupt    1994
   
7. Crudo Soy,    Los Crudos    2016
   
8. Privilegio Blanco,    Abism    2023
   
9. Cockroaches,    Nailbomb    1994
   
10. All White,    Die Kreuzen    1984
    
11. I Got Your Number,    Cock Sparrer    1982
    
12. Charity Hilarity,    Flux of Pink Indians    1982
    
13. Warsystem,    The Shitlickers    1982
    
14. G.L.O.S.S. (We're from the Future),    G.L.O.S.S.    2016
    
15. Q: And Children A: And Children,    Discharge    2003
    
16. Youth of Today,    Youth Of Today    1986
    
17. Failed,    Cult Ritual    2009
    
18. World Peace,    Cro-Mags    2000
    
19. Black-Site,    Tower 7   2021
    
20. Abuse Excuse,    Mind Eraser    2006
    
21. Endless Blockade for Pussyfooter,    Gis(m)    1997
    
22. Fuck the Border,    Propagandhi    2001
    
23. Dead Town,    The Vicious    2008
    
24. Wolfpack,    D.Y.S.    1983
    
25. Glue,    Enemy  
    
26. The Roll Call,    Firewalker    2019
    
27. Drop Dead,    Siege    2015
    
28. Hardcore for Hardcore,    The Rival Mob    2010
29. Sanctuary,    Amebix    2011
30. Animal Liberation,    Mob 47    1984
31. Los Angeles,    Hoax    2013
32. Force Of Habit,    Crossed Out    1991
33. Upsidedown Cross,    Upsidedown Cross    1991
34. No Moderation,    Government Warning    2006
35. Blank Stare,    White Hell   
36. Spudboy,    Spazz    2016
37. Paid In Blood,    XweaponX    2023
38. Can't Tell No One,   Negative Approach    1981
39. Grim Reaper,    Siege    2015
40. Paranoid,    Masshysteri    2013
41. Horrible Person,    Rat Henry    2024

Nicholas Sullivan (b. 1987) is an artist living and working in Brooklyn, NY. Sullivan earned his M.F.A. in Sculpture from Massachusetts College of Art and Design, Boston, MA, and his B.F.A. in Sculpture from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, MA. Recent exhibitions include; Chrysler, C L E A R I N G, New York, NY; Spitting Image, Underdonk, Brooklyn; NY Everblue, International Waters, New York, NY; Planes, Trains and Automobiles, Galeria Mascota, Mexico City, MX;  Make Hay in the Sun, HG, Chicago, IL; NY; Domino, Shoot The Lobster, New York, NY; Comfort Animal, A-L Gallery, Seoul SK; Neu, No Place Gallery, Columbus OH, ; The World Without Us, Brennan & Griffin, New York NY; Gist & Gesture, Kavi Gupta, Chicago, IL; Foster Prize Exhibition, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA.

Murder Ballads
November 19, 2024

1. Cowboys And Indians,    Bill Emerson
   
2. In The Pines,    The Kentucky Colonels
   
3. Caleb Meyer,    Gillian Welch
   
4. River Bottom,    The Country Gentlemen
   
5. Stagger Lee,    Mississippi John Hurt
   
6. Hiram Hubbard,    Jean Ritchie and Doc Watson
   
7. Wild Bill Jones,    Dock Boggs
   
8. Wild Bill Jones,    Billy Strings, Don Julin
   
9. Don't Weep for Me,    Ralph Stanley, Ralph Stanley II
   
10. Little Omie Wise,    Doc Watson
    
11. Down in the Willow Garden (Rose Connolly,)    Iron Mountain String Band
    
12. Little Sadie,    Tony Rice Unit
    
13. Little Sadie,    Crooked Still
    
14. The Little Sparrow,    The Country Gentlemen
    
15. Jesse James,    The Country Gentlemen
    
16. I Don't Want Your Greenback Dollar,    The Blue Sky Boys
    
17. On the Banks of the Ohio - From Paper Moon,    The Blue Sky Boys
    
18. Katie Dear (Silver Dagger,)    The Callahan Brothers
    
19. Tom Dooley,    Frank Proffitt
    
20. I Didn't Know The Gun Was Loaded - Single Version,    The Andrews Sisters
    
21. Lovely Creature,    Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
    
22. Pretty Polly,    Ralph Stanley
    
23. Rain And Snow,    Del McCoury
    
24. Fox On The Run,    The Country Gentlemen
    
25. The Oxford Girl,    Shirley & Dolly Collins
    
26. Poor Ellen Smith,    The Kossoy Sisters
    
27. Miss Otis Regrets/Just One of Those Things,    Kirsty MacColl, The Pogues
    
28. Delia's Gone,    Johnny Cash
    
29. One Mile East of Hazel Green,    Randy Waller
    
30. Send Me to the 'Lectric Chair,    Bessie Smith
    
31. The Box It Came In,    Wanda Jackson
    
32. Winter's Going,    Bonnie Dobson
    
33. Make Your Bed,    Neko Case
    
34. Man Down,    Rihanna
    
35. Shotgun Blues,    Béla Fleck, Abigail Washburn
    
36. Young Hunting,    Sara Grey
    
37. Ruby, Are You Mad at Your Man?,   Carolina Chocolate Drops
    

David Humphrey: Election Day
November 5, 2024

Complete playlist below; tracks in yellow were cut for time.

In honor of Election Day 2024, painter, sculptor, writer, educator, and musician David Humphrey begins his mixtape with the ominous Megastorm by Trans Am—an apt choice for an uncertain moment.

Humphrey’s work is a bit hard to categorize—people with carefully rendered clothes and hairstyles merge directly into other people or melt down into passages of pure abstraction. The clarity of the abstract picture plane breaks apart into pictorial space, only to rush back to the surface again, a trick observed by the two camera-wielding bathers occupying Shutterbugs, 2014.

Humphrey describes the construction of a painting vis a vis his series of works about ecstasy. How can one depict that loss of personal boundaries? What are the formal characteristics of extreme emotion? How does the opticality of painting connect to the other aspects of the sensorium? Was Cezanne the original psychedelic artist?

We talk about what he means by “militant shallowness,” authenticity in art, and embedding popular/vernacular culture into his work; using once- or never-loved found images/objects from commercial production in painting or sculpture. This use of found source material also connects to Humphrey’s expansive view of collaboration, a mode of working (with real and imaginary collaborators) he’s enjoyed for decades.

David Humphrey has an upcoming show, porTraits, at Fredericks & Freiser gallery in New York, opening December 12, 2024. His work can be found on his website, and you can follow him on instagram.

From 2004-2008, Humphrey had a half-hour show on WPS1 art radio called Sound and Vision with a similar premise to the Selection Committee Radio Show. You can listen to those shows now on Apple Podcasts.

CORRECTION: Stravinsky’s piece The Soldier’s Tale Suite was written in 1918; 1968, the date I mentioned, was actually the date of the recording.

1. Megastorm, Trans Am
   
2. Little Umbrellas, Frank Zappa
3. The Mac Man, Archie Shepp
4. Bridge, Amon Tobin
5. The Soldier’s Tale Suite: II. Airs by a Stream; Igor Stravinsky, Columbia Chamber Ensemble
6. The Green, Jenny Scheinman
7. My Beautiful Leah, PJ Harvey
8. Gambia, Sona Jobarteh
9. One More, Weaves
10. Contort Yourself, The Contortions
11. Room Mate, Lizzy Mercier Descloux
12. As We Used to Sing, Bushman’S Revenge
13. Black Satin, Miles Davis
14. Fleurette Africaine (African Flower), Duke Ellington
15. Constant Velocity Is As Natural As Being at Rest, Candiria
16. Four Cypresses, Grizzly Bear
17. Section I; Steven Reich, Erik Hall
18. Fire Back About Your New Baby’s Sex, Don Caballero
19. One Is Conspiracy, Junior Electronics
20. Violin Concertino: III. Rotto; Kurt Rohde, Axel Strauss, Left Coast Chamber Ensemble, Matilda Hofman
21. Bullet Proff, This Is The Kit
22. Wild, The Inner Banks
23. Sons of Garvey, Joe Higgs
24. Extrapolation, John McLaughlin
25. The Unanswered Question; Charles Ives, Cincinnati Philharmonic, Gerhard Samuel
26. Ricercar, “Bonny Sweet Robin;” Thomas Simpson, Musica Dolce, Clas Pehrsson
27. Eguetmar, Noura Mind Seymali
28. Masquerader; Joan As Police Woman, Tony Allen, Dave Okumu
29. For Amiri Baraka, Vijay Iyer Sextet
30. I Want It All, Shey Baba
31. Sexual For Elizabeth, Tortoise

David Humphrey is a New York artist who has shown nationally and internationally. He has received a Guggenheim Fellowship and the Rome Prize among other awards. An anthology of his art writing, Blind Handshake, was published by Periscope Publishing. He teaches in the MFA program at Columbia University and is represented by the Fredericks & Freiser Gallery, NY who published a monograph on his work in 2020 by Davy Lauterbach.

Website: davidhumphreynyc.com
Instagram: @aikenhump

Jacob Jackmauh
October 22, 2024

Complete playlist below; tracks in yellow were cut for time.

For this breezy fall show, artist Jacob Jackmauh brings a selection of songs that run the gamut from the corporate innocence of a Kidz Bop cover of an Ice Spice/Nicki Minaj collab to the moody Witch House of S4lem. This playlist was definitely influenced by YouTube—check out the amazing video by Oneohtrix Point Never—and TikTok.

One of Jackmauh’s choices is a Lim Giong piece from the soundtrack of the 2004 Jia Zhangke film The World. The film takes place in Beijing World Park, a huge amusement garden containing models of iconic art and architecture from five of the seven world continents. Jake describes his interest in reproductions, models, novelty sculptures, and roadside attractions, and he tells us about his series of sculptures incorporating large fiberglass molds and how these objects relate to tourism and experience.

We talk about the complicated layering of form and meaning in a post-internet world, and what it means to think about mass culture(s) and navigate the spaces between childhood and adulthood today. Jacob chooses some big bangers from Lil Uzi Vert and Chuckii Booker, and explains how exposure to the internet and social media—“indexes of explorables”—introduces the algorithm to the forces of social networks and chance which create our cultural spheres.

We end the show on a more nostalgic note, with a selection from the original Mean Girls soundtrack and a couple of songs by Prince. It’s a great show!

1. Barbie World,    Kidz Bop Kids,    2024
   
2. Gloomy,    Lim Giong,    2004
   
3. heavenly,    Pat's Soundhouse   
   
4. Boring Angel,    Oneohtrix Point Never,    2013
   
5. Keep U Satisfied,    Kofi,    2012
   
6. Seconds (Human League Cover),    Keef Baker,    2014
   
7. Art Star,    Yeah Yeah Yeahs,    2002
   
8. Killer,    SALEM,    2010
   
9. Built This Way,    Samantha Ronson   
   
10. That Way,    Lil Uzi Vert, WanMor,    2020
    
11. Games,    Chuckii Booker (A G Cook Remix)   
    
12. American Teenager Rave Mix,    Ethel Cain x sadie   
    
13. Liebe in Stereo,    Baby B3ns, Yung Hurn,    2024
14. Hustler,    Simian Mobile Disco,    2007
15. Let Me Go,    Tyler Berrier,    2024
    
16. Being Harsh,    A. G. Cook   
17. Moment to Moment,    Shiny Two Shiny,    2014
18. Temptation Is Hard to Fight,    George McGregor & The Bronzettes,    1967
    
19. Love... Thy Will Be Done,    Prince,    2019
    
20. Why Should I Love You?    Kate Bush,    1993

Jacob Jackmauh (b. 1994 Boston, MA) lives and works in Queens, NY. He is a visual artist and co-direcor of Art Lot, an outdoor exhibition space in Redhook, Brooklyn. Jackmauh has recently exhibited at Parent Company, New York, NY; Bad Water, Knoxville, TN; International Objects, Brooklyn, NY; Eyes Never Sleep, New York, NY; and Subtitled NYC, Brooklyn, NY. Instagram: @jacob_jackmauh