Shockoe Artspeak: Recent Episodes
Shockoe Artspeak
Anni Albers is widely considered to be the foremost textile designer of the 20th century. She made major innovations in the field of functional materials and at the same time she expanded the possibilities of single weavings and individual artworks. She was also an adventurous graphic artist who took printmaking technique into previously uncharted territory. ...
Seemingly overnight, every company and social media platform has an AI presence that promises you a better experience, a more efficient engagement, and all the promises of better tomorrows, greater wealth, and a four hour workweek. While science fiction, the harbinger of all things new, shiny and terrifying, has been telling us this was coming ...
Seemingly overnight, every company and social media platform has an AI presence that promises you a better experience, a more efficient engagement, and all the promises of better tomorrows, greater wealth, and a four hour workweek. While science fiction, the harbinger of all things new, shiny and terrifying, has been telling us this was coming for decades, it seems none of us got the memo, and now we are surprised (or perhaps distracted) by the shiny new object in the room. AI has ramifications in all areas of life, especially with the arts, where work has been avoided instead of praised in a society that looks at efficiency and ROI as golden calves worthy of consuming worship.
This week Ryan, Garreth, and Cody sit down with director, producer, writer, podcaster, and all-around-great-guy, Carey Kight, to talk about how AI may or may not change the landscape of advertising. In a creative industry that thrives on efficiency and productivity, is AI a tool to revolutionize processes, or is it more akin to opening Pandora’s box?
You can check out Carey’s work at the Circus Maximus website, on his personal website, or by following his podcast, Veteran Made.
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
Seemingly overnight, every company and social media platform has an AI presence that promises you a better experience, a more efficient engagement, and all the promises of better tomorrows, greater wealth, and a four hour workweek. While science fiction, the harbinger of all things new, shiny and terrifying, has been telling us this was coming for decades, it seems none of us got the memo, and now we are surprised (or perhaps distracted) by the shiny new object in the room. AI has ramifications in all areas of life, especially with the arts, where work has been avoided instead of praised in a society that looks at efficiency and ROI as golden calves worthy of consuming worship.
This week Ryan, Garreth, AND Cody sit down to continue their conversation around AI, its place, and its likely trajectory. While the marketing points of any emerging technology or progressive crystal ball may seem new, the discussions, the promises, and the workings of these things are anything but unique. There are things we can learn from history, and there are plenty of things we can consider as we clamor to incorporate something into art and design that has the chance to very well kill it.
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
Seemingly overnight, every company and social media platform has an AI presence that promises you a better experience, a more efficient engagement, and all the promises of better tomorrows, greater wealth, and a four hour workweek. While science fiction, the harbinger of all things new, shiny and terrifying, has been telling us this was coming for decades, it seems none of us got the memo, and now we are surprised (or perhaps distracted) by the shiny new object in the room. AI has ramifications in all areas of life, especially with the arts, where work has been avoided instead of praised in a society that looks at efficiency and ROI as golden calves worthy of consuming worship.
This week Ryan and Garreth sit down to continue their conversation around AI, its place, and its likely trajectory. While the marketing points of any emerging technology or progressive crystal ball may seem new, the discussions, the promises, and the workings of these things are anything but unique. There are things we can learn from history, and there are plenty of things we can consider as we clamor to incorporate something into art and design that has the chance to very well kill it.
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
Seemingly overnight, every company and social media platform has an AI presence that promises you a better experience, a more efficient engagement, and all the promises of better tomorrows, greater wealth, and a four hour workweek. While science fiction, the harbinger of all things new, shiny and terrifying, has been telling us this was coming for decades, it seems none of us got the memo, and now we are surprised (or perhaps distracted) by the shiny new object in the room. AI has ramifications in all areas of life, especially with the arts, where work has been avoided instead of praised in a society that looks at efficiency and ROI as golden calves worthy of consuming worship.
This week Ryan and Garreth sit down to begin a conversation around AI, its place, and its likely trajectory. While the marketing points of any emerging technology or progressive crystal ball may seem new, the discussions, the promises, and the workings of these things are anything but unique. There are things we can learn from history, and there are plenty of things we can consider as we clamor to incorporate something into art and design that has the chance to very well kill it.
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
This week Ryan, Garreth, and Sam Taylor sit down to talk with Richmond-area painter Rachel Jeffers. In Jeffers’ paintings, domestic objects take on the role of characters, forming a new tableau from one painting to the next. Each painting presents her with new visual problems to solve. A precarious, subconscious logic guides her way to solutions. Temperature, seasons, and time of day become central themes as the painted atmosphere emerges. In this invented world, interior and exterior spaces can be conflated. A rising sun turns out to be a fried egg; a stove burner in the form of a crescent moon is nestled amongst a constellation of drips. Forks and spoons jut from the earth like weeds. A brush stroke contains its own story while pointing to something else. Multiple realities coexist.
Rachel Jeffers was born in New Orleans, LA and grew up in a rural town outside of Nashville, TN. She holds an MFA from Maryland Institute College of Art’s Mount Royal School of Art and a BFA from Columbus College of Art and Design in Columbus, OH. She is currently enrolled in Turps Correspondence Course. Her work has been featured in New American Paintings and has been exhibited throughout the Eastern US. Her paintings have recently been included in group exhibitions at Stay Home Gallery in Paris, TN, Irving Contemporary in Oxford, UK, and My Pet Ram in New York, NY. She lives in the Richmond, VA area with her husband and two children.
Find Rachel on Instagram, her personal website, or submit to Passing Notes!
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
The American imagination has always had a sticky friend in travel. Movement from place to place has defined humanity for as long as we can recount, and travel–justifiably–has occupied our minds not just as a necessary pursuit, but also as a pleasure. Travel is known for many of its finer qualities from education and exposure to promise and prosperity. Travel speaks to the romanticism, adventure, and new sight that many artists have promised their viewers, and it has, likewise, given new eyes to those looking for larger answers in a world we have consistently and systematically made pitifully small. In the words of one American author:
“Once a journey is designed, equipped, and put in process, a new factor enters and takes over. A trip, a safari, an exploration, is an entity, different from all other journeys. It has personality, temperament, individuality, uniqueness. A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike. And all plans, safeguards, policing, and coercion are fruitless. We find after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us. Tour masters, schedules, reservations, brass-bound and inevitable, dash themselves to wreckage on the personality of the trip. Only when this is recognized can the blown-in-the glass bum relax and go along with it. Only then do the frustrations fall away. In this a journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you control it.”
― John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley: In Search of America
This week Garreth and Cody sit down to tell stories of a trip that shaped them. From unexpected journeys to planned trips with unplanned surprises, these journeys are not just personal experiences, but are moments of exposure to visual, emotional, and experiential knowledge that shapes the way we see the world and show the world to others. After a few years of closed doors and sheltering in place, it is time for artists and designers to lead the world in traveling so we can once again be a part of the tradition that makes something of the world.
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
The American imagination has always had a sticky friend in travel. Movement from place to place has defined humanity for as long as we can recount, and travel–justifiably–has occupied our minds not just as a necessary pursuit, but also as a pleasure. Travel is known for many of its finer qualities from education and exposure to promise and prosperity. Travel speaks to the romanticism, adventure, and new sight that many artists have promised their viewers, and it has, likewise, given new eyes to those looking for larger answers in a world we have consistently and systematically made pitifully small. In the words of one American author:
“Once a journey is designed, equipped, and put in process, a new factor enters and takes over. A trip, a safari, an exploration, is an entity, different from all other journeys. It has personality, temperament, individuality, uniqueness. A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike. And all plans, safeguards, policing, and coercion are fruitless. We find after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us. Tour masters, schedules, reservations, brass-bound and inevitable, dash themselves to wreckage on the personality of the trip. Only when this is recognized can the blown-in-the glass bum relax and go along with it. Only then do the frustrations fall away. In this a journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you control it.”
― John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley: In Search of America
This week Garreth and Cody sit down to discuss travel and its many personalities and promises. Far from a genteel activity for the elite, travel is an active part of almost all areas of public and private life. And this thing we do for pleasure and work has the ability to open eyes and grow minds.
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
You’ve likely seen the movie Apollo 13 where actor Ed Harris plays Gene Kranz, the Flight Director for the titular space mission. After some rather drastic problems threaten to strand a crew of American astronauts in space, Kranz utters the phrase “failure is not an option.” Now the situation at hand for Kranz and the rest of his team is different than many of us will ever be in, but nevertheless, failure is a very real part of our lives whether or not we can write it off as “not an option.” In fact, failure is so pervasive in normal human activity, that it is worthwhile to discuss and plan for how you deal with it for whenever it decides to rear its ugly little head.
This week Ryan, Cody, and friend-of-the-show Josh Williams sit down to continue asking each other questions that have been on their minds. It’s Ryan’s turn once again with the question “What do you do when you fail?”
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
Throughout human history, it has always been true that technology is ubiquitous. Paper is technology, pencils are technology, dig troughs for water to irrigate fields is technology. But technology changes, and we cannot assume that all technology is equal. Our digital age has given a great deal toward our perceived advancement, and has left us perpetually connected. This digital existence has benefits, but humans are far too quick to believe all benefits are free of detriments. Perhaps unfettered access, unlimited information, and constant connection are harmful to the work we do as artists and designers. It’s at least worth a discussion
This week Ryan and Garreth sit down to continue asking each other questions that have been on their minds. It’s Garreth’s turn this week with the question “How does our digital existence impact the way we pursue craft?”
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
Stories and narrative are so interwoven into our lives that we likely don’t realize how many times in a day we tell or listen to a story, and we definitely don’t take notice of the way we weave narratives into the reasons and explanations for why we do certain or actions or made certain choices. Stories and narrative are part and parcel to how we understand the world, learn new ideas, and relate to one another as humans. Kurt Vonnegut went so far as to say that stories are so central to human existence that there are only eight stories that have ever been told.
This week Ryan, Garreth and Cody sit down to continue asking each other questions that have been on their minds. It’s Ryan’s turn this week with the question “How do narratives shape us?”
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
We’re back!
We know, it’s been a minute, but between the new semester, being sick, and general life, things got a bit hectic, but we are all back on track, well, and staving off life for long enough to be in the studio for a few hours.
This week Ryan, Garreth and Cody sit down to begin asking each other questions that have been on their minds. Everyone came in with a questions that haven’t shared before, and–through the magic of rock, paper, scissors–Cody’s question was the topic first. Listen in as we throw around the question “where does the impulse to put two art forms together come from?”
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
It twas the Season, and it now tis the season: the season for resolutions. Every year, countless folks look back and look forward, hoping to have a new start in a new year. These resolutions have a tendency to all look the same, and the numbers say that it will only be a few weeks before 75% of these hopes are abandoned. Is there a better way to approach reflection as we work toward a better year or studio practice or life with others? Probably, and we’re all out here in these streets fighting to figure it out.
In this four-part (now five-part) holiday series, Ryan, Garreth and Cody are visited by four ghosts. These four ghosts can serve as warnings about what we do, why we do it, and how we can continue into a long career that doesn’t create our identity or a false sense of security but that connect us with our community, our work and our culture at-large.
Stream the Ken Gilbertson Band’s Christmas AlbumIn 2021, we helped Ken put out his second album after a multiple decades break. This four track EP has some of your favorite Christmas songs and features folks from Shockoe Artspace doing everything from back up vocals, instrumentation, and audio engineering and editing. Take a listen!
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
Go to any bookstore or do a quick scan of books on Amazon, and you will likely see a number of titles touting joy. They will either be dealing with a topic you should be experiencing joy with like cooking or hiking or some other activity, or they will be self-helping you into a sense of joy when you are hard-pressed to have any. Whatever the case may be, the proliferation of books leading us into joy points to the reality that, as a society, we aren’t good at joy, and we likely don’t understand it. Joy may seem enigmatic, but it doesn’t have to be. Perhaps it is even so commonplace that we fail to see it in the myriad ways its presents itself.
In this four-part holiday series, Ryan, Garreth and Cody are visited by four ghosts. These four ghosts can serve as warnings about what we do, why we do it, and how we can continue into a long career that doesn’t create our identity or a false sense of security but that connect us with our community, our work and our culture at-large.
Stream the Ken Gilbertson Band’s Christmas AlbumLast year we helped Ken put out his second album after a multiple decades break. This four track EP has some of your favorite Christmas songs and features folks from Shockoe Artspace doing everything from back up vocals, instrumentation, and audio engineering and editing. Take a listen!
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
The term self-control around the holidays usually is followed by some conversation on over eating or over drinking, but self-control is less about that in this conversation and more about the way we treat others and see the world around us. Our current culture prizes and even rewards reactionary outbursts as vindicating or justice, but a tempered response to the world around us seems to be a much more artistically minded way to approach life.
In this four-part holiday series, Ryan, Garreth and Cody are visited by four ghosts. These four ghosts can serve as warnings about what we do, why we do it, and how we can continue into a long career that doesn’t create our identity or a false sense of security but that connect us with our community, our work and our culture at-large.
Stream the Ken Gilbertson Band’s Christmas AlbumLast year we helped Ken put out his second album after a multiple decades break. This four track EP has some of your favorite Christmas songs and features folks from Shockoe Artspace doing everything from back up vocals, instrumentation, and audio engineering and editing. Take a listen!
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
With Thanksgiving already in the past, the conversation of gratitude may seem like a non-starter for some, but gratitude is more about an entire mindset and way of seeing the world than as some Hallmark card type one-off statement whenever we may feel some guilt for our silence. Our parents, grandparents, teachers, or someone told us as a child to remember to say please and thank you, and it is easy to forget how important these words can be. Gratitude is less about just saying thank you and more about understanding what you have and how beneficial the things are that you didn’t do anything to receive, earn, or have. Gratitude is about knowing what you have and then doing something with it. It is not stationary, and it is not optional as a growing artist.
In this four-part holiday series, Ryan, Garreth and Cody are visited by four ghosts. These four ghosts can serve as warnings about what we do, why we do it, and how we can continue into a long career that doesn’t create our identity or a false sense of security but that connect us with our community, our work and our culture at-large.
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
While patience may not be the most exciting topic you could think of, patience tells you a lot about what you are doing, why you are doing it, and how you measure success. For artists and designers, patience is easily baked into parts of their process or outlook on career, but impatience may be the more familiar bedfellow. Impatience can look like burnout, despair, and even just flat out giving up. How we see the world and where we place hope can be a large judge of the level of patience we exercise, and patience may just be the thing that keeps you making long after the excitement has worn off.
In this four-part holiday series, Ryan, Garreth and Cody are visited by four ghosts. These four ghosts can serve as warnings about what we do, why we do it, and how we can continue into a long career that doesn’t create our identity or a false sense of security but that connect us with our community, our work and our culture at-large.
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
I heard about a faculty member at a top-tier art school who got ridiculed by another faculty member because they were teaching art students to run successful businesses. “You’re just turning people into whores,” the faculty member said. The only thing my friend could say was “Well maybe your opinion is bad and wrong.” Just like we have been saying all along in this series, art and entrepreneurship go hand-in-hand. Creative practitioners sometimes can’t stop the ideas, and every once in a while, those ideas turn into successful ventures and careers.
This week Ryan and Garreth sit down once more with Ian C. Hess to unveil his latest labor of love, Supply. Supply will be Richmond’s second art supply store and will be opening on December 2, 2022. There have been ups and downs, supportive folks and those eager to scoff, but whatever has been the case, this new store is by artists and for artists and seeks to build upon the already vibrant arts community in Richmond, Virginia.
You can follow Supply on Instagram, and you can visit the store in person starting December 2nd at 320 W. Broad Street in Richmond, Virginia.
We are on Patreon!
All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a month can make a huge difference. Check out more at patreon.com/shockoeartspace.
Stream our documentary The Builder!
For a limited time, our documentary The Builder is available to stream on Vimeo! The film centers on the art scene in Richmond, Virginia, with a focus on Oregon Hill native and contractor Don Childress, who–to the surprise of many–has an incredible contemporary art collection. This collection includes work from Francisco Clemente, Ron Johnson, and Bill Fisher to name just a few. Check out more at The Builder’s website.
It’s Turkey Day, and we just want to say thank you! We are nearly to 150 episodes, and we couldn’t have done it without YOU! We have so much to be thankful for and all our listeners and friends are definitely on that list. So enjoy the day off, have a big hunk or turkey ...
Just studio work: that’s the goal, right? All day every day in your studio. Getting to make the work you want to make. Not having to juggle the hassle of a 9-5 desk job or contract work in a field you just don’t really have a passion for. But how does that actually happen? And ...
This week Ryan, Garreth and Cody sit down with photographer, filmmaker and hip hop artist Tito Henríquez. Rapping under the name Dicho, Henríquez is the son of El Salvadoran parents who were displaced during the Civil War that lasted from the late 1970s until the early 1990s. Through family, his extensive travels to El Salvador, ...
This week Ryan, Garreth and Cody sit down with a long-time friend of the gallery, Richmond painter Curtis Newkirk, Jr. to hang out and just have a relaxed conversation. While the structure of a topic-based discussion is helpful in distilling information, conversations build relationships and can be more organic ways to get to topics that ...
“College can train you for a career.” “You’ll always be taught the skills you need once you’re hired.” “There are so many resources available to help you learn to do a new job.” All of these statements have their truth, but the category of skill they each refer to is hard skills: those skills that ...
This week Garreth and Cody sit down to give an update on what has been in the works for Shockoe Artspace and our team. The fellas check in with Ryan via phone about his time in Utah, and everyone gets to chat about his new solo show in Berkeley Springs, West Virginia. An unexpected guest ...
“College can train you for a career.” “You’ll always be taught the skills you need once you’re hired.” “There are so many resources available to help you learn to do a new job.” All of these statements have their truth, but the category of skill they each refer to is hard skills: those skills that ...
“College can train you for a career.” “You’ll always be taught the skills you need once you’re hired.” “There are so many resources available to help you learn to do a new job.” All of these statements have their truth, but the category of skill they each refer to is hard skills: those skills that ...
The most consistent thing about an artist’s career path is how consistently inconsistent they tend to be. The place we start and the place we find ourselves are often widely different, but the only way we get from Point A to Point B is by learning. Part-time jobs, jobs that use some of the skills ...
“College can train you for a career.” “You’ll always be taught the skills you need once you’re hired.” “There are so many resources available to help you learn to do a new job.” All of these statements have their truth, but the category of skill they each refer to is hard skills: those skills that ...
“College can train you for a career.” “You’ll always be taught the skills you need once you’re hired.” “There are so many resources available to help you learn to do a new job.” All of these statements have their truth, but the category of skill they each refer to is hard skills: those skills that ...
This week, Ryan, Garreth, and Cody spend a bit of time sharing some things that have been circling around their brains. It’s the end of the summer, and everyone is getting ready to get back into school, teaching or you’re just having to get out of summer vacation mode at work. Whatever the case may ...
This week, Ryan, Garreth, and Cody sit down for another installment of Design Stuff, a segment devoted to design, designers and their words and ideas. This episode is devoted to another looming name in the design canon: Paul Rand. During his 80-something years on Earth, he proved the breadth of designers and had no issues ...
Artists aren’t selling Tupperware. The idea of a side hustle usually revolves around some thing that you do in your time away from work that can make you some easy cash. The popular conversation leans more toward get-rich schemes and retirement before you’re 40, but the reality of productive side hustles are more about creative ...
For most creative fields, there is the education you receive in the classroom and there is the education you receive in the field. From internships, to apprenticeships to straight-up training courses, the path to professional creative is one of constant learning. But when do you know when you are good to go out on your ...
Careers are funny things. For every person who knew exactly what they wanted to do at a young age, there are dozens who take a less direct path. This squiggly path from job to job and interest to interest only looks straight in hindsight, but it seems to be more the norm than not. There ...
Hospitality may get a bad wrap. Or, more precisely, it may just be misunderstood. Hotels, cruises, or your grandma’s house may be the thoughts that come into your head when you hear this term, but hospitality is core to making places, homes, and people feel welcome in private and semi-private spaces. You could even argue ...
This week, Ryan, Garreth, and Cody sit down for an installment of Design Stuff Bonus Round to pick up where they left off last week. And while you may not recognize the name, you have heard the name of one of his students: Saul Bass. Kepes’ work as an artist, educator and theorist was monumental ...
This week, Ryan, Garreth, and Cody sit down for another installment of Design Stuff, a segment devoted to design, designers and their words and ideas. And while you may not recognize the name, you have heard the name of one of his students: Saul Bass. Kepes’ work as an artist, educator and theorist was monumental ...
We do a lot of talking around here because we think the world is an incredibly rich and diverse place with a plethora of human experiences that require us to stop and take inventory of just what the heck is happening. But sometimes when we talk, there is still more left unsaid. Let’s be honest, ...
What does it look like to catalog a day in your life? How do you remember the small moments and interventions that cause you to stop for a brief respite from the bustle of a busy day? Seeing what is always there, and noticing what is ordinary, according to this week’s guest, is hard to ...
If you are a practicing maker long enough, you will likely have a place where all the things you have started and never finished live. Some of these objects might be simple notes about ideas, and some of these objects might just need the final bits of spit and polish. Regardless of how many there ...
Spend a few minutes thinking of all the terrible stereotypes of artists and see how angry or sad you get. While you certainly may know a person or two who fits into those spaces, the stereotype is definitely not where you want to spend your time. Now think of all the terrible stereotypes of entrepreneurs; ...
You’ve seen his work almost everywhere during your entire life, but you have likely never heard his name. Saul Bass’s career started when he was young and only came more prolific as he worked on some of history’s most iconic logos, film title sequences and eventually became one of Hollywood’s most sought-after visual stylists. From ...
In any given day, we are likely to come across more information and more content than our ancestors may have experienced in a year or several years or maybe even their lives. We are constantly being handed things to discover, ideas to interpret and news to accept without a second thought. We are saturated by ...
In any given day, we are likely to come across more information and more content than our ancestors may have experienced in a year or several years or maybe even their lives. We are constantly being handed things to discover, ideas to interpret and news to accept without a second thought. We are saturated by ...
In any given day, we are likely to come across more information and more content than our ancestors may have experienced in a year or several years or maybe even their lives. We are constantly being handed things to discover, ideas to interpret and news to accept without a second thought. We are saturated by ...
You’ve heard us say it at least a few times on this podcast: art and design. These two fields are so closely aligned, but can seem miles apart from one another. Historically, we see the separation of design from the larger body of art around the middle of the nineteenth century, but the fracturing in ...
During art school, having someone come into your studio and talk about your work seems like a normal thing: your friends come in, your studiomates come in, and your professors come in. But after graduation, when the studio is in your home, or in your backyard, those visits are fewer and farther between. Outside of ...
Milton Glaser is easily one of the three best known graphic designers in the United States, and his storied career has been marked by a constant pursuit of art and craft. He has had the distinction of one-man-shows at the Museum of Modern Art and the Georges Pompidou Center. He was selected for the lifetime ...
We see every episode as a chance to open up a conversation and provide a few handles so you can dig deeper into the ideas or thoughts we present. We never expect to be comprehensive in how we approach a topic. We are just a few folks with experiences and knowledge that we want to ...
As with everything else we talk about, a deep dive into freewill implicates a number of assumptions and ideas that we have about how and why the world works. Something simple has many moving parts, so it follows that something more complex (like the concept of freewill) has so many more including choice, responsibility, hiding, ...
For most of the world, it is assumed that everyday when we wake up we retain all the agency and choice for our lives. We choose our future, we choose our jobs, we choose our friends, and we choose where we live. We believe–as the poet William Ernest Henley wrote and Winston Churchill mused–that we are ...
We’ve all come across someone in life who we thought was just a bit too serious. And we’ve all come across other folks who were never serious enough. We know these folks, and what each leaning is missing is a nice mixture of humor and seriousness. It is actually possible (and some might argue preferable) ...
What’s a job anyway? Some folks are brought up thinking it’s just a thing we do in between sleeping. We always get asked what we’re going to do when we grow up, but did anyone ever really talk about how that choice happens? Or if it is even a choice at all? Whatever the case ...
The thing about Twitter is that, just like Dave Chappelle said, it’s not a real place. Sure, you can grab a headline or string together a few sentences into a thread, but at the end of the day it’s just another virtual space with disembodied experiences. Twitter may live on as the internet’s comment section, ...
Here we are in 2022, and we are pumped to be throwing more great conversation and topics your way. After a few weeks off and Garreth losing his voice, it is time to get back into the studio and focus on what it is we are doing as creative professionals and why it matters so ...
Like most of y’all, we spend the end of our year thinking back and dreaming forward. New Year’s Resolutions, or whatever you may call them, are fun ways to think about what the next twelve months may have in store. They are also good ways to plan for the work you hope to do. This ...
Here we are folks: we’ve finally made it to Christmas, and everyone deserves a break. We thought 2021 would be a rebound from 2020, but it was just as hard. Just like you, we will be taking a break, but we have a bit more in store before that happens. This week, Ryan and Garreth ...
We’ve always handed out our fair share of satellite brain debris, and this episode is no different, except that we have someone else who can roll with it just as easily. The thing about this debris is that it isn’t useless. The influences, thoughts, memories and connections we call brain debris are really just the ...
There is a great deal of mythology and mysticism that surrounds the arts, especially when it comes to suffering and death. For centuries artists have been seen as tortured individuals who have a special sense about life or unique view into death. Art works from around the globe show depictions of the most normal and ...
There is a great deal of mythology and mysticism that surrounds the arts, especially when it comes to suffering and death. For centuries artists have been seen as tortured individuals who have a special sense about life or unique view into death. Art works from around the globe show depictions of the most normal and ...
Remember when everything was better? Remember when grandma sent that sweater that one time and it was your favorite? Remember when…? Nostalgia can be a great thing as you reminisce or think back on good times. But does nostalgia play nicely with the art and design world? It’s hard to really nail down because memory ...
It’s coming up on that time of year when schedules get full of even more great things to do. From holiday plans with family and friends to shopping and travel, the holidays can get loaded and make us all feel a little torn from our studio practice. The juggle is always real, and sometimes it ...
It’s an ironic thing that, after two conversations focused on suffering and death, Garreth and Ryan would both lose most of the last month to those very same topics. New episodes have been noticeably absent because extreme sickness and palpable death knocked Garreth and Ryan both out of commission. Garreth got a certain virus, and ...
As we are all recovering from the excitement and late night surrounding Halloween, we thought it would be good to revisit a solid conversation with multidisciplinary artist and Shockoe Artspace resident artist Chino Amobi. While 2020 was not the year any of us planned to have, we have finally found ourselves in a 2021 with ...
There is a great deal of mythology and mysticism that surrounds the arts, especially when it comes to suffering and death. For centuries artists have been seen as tortured individuals who have a special sense about life or unique view into death. Art works from around the globe show depictions of the most normal and ...
Here we are: 100 episodes, and we couldn’t have done it without each and every one of you listening to our conversations and interviews. When we started this over two years ago, we didn’t actually know how far this would go or even if anyone would even listen. To our surprise, we are still here ...
During art school we are constantly inundated with artists and their work, and during this time we are most focused on how we can stand out, be different or position ourselves as an original. For most of us, that marked difference between us and our mentors and influences never really happens. We kind of look ...
Last week folks all across the country got hit with some intense rain. Here in Richmond, it rained so hard that an entire side of the Interstate flooded! Schools were closed, businesses were damaged, and people were swimming in the streets. For us, that meant a small bit of roof damage in our recording studio ...
With Ryan away with work obligations, Garreth sits down this week to talk with painter and friend of the show, Ken Gilbertson. Ken’s gallery, The Hatchback Gallery, was stolen earlier this year, leaving him without a job and without a studio. We catch up with Ken to hear about how his practice has had to ...
This week Ryan and Garreth sit down with Detroit-based artist Richard Haley to discuss personal history, graduate school, and tacos. Richard’s solo survey show can be viewed from September 3 – November 27, 2021 at Shockoe Artspace. Richard Haley is an artist, curator and writer living in Detroit. His work has been exhibited nationally, including ...
Have you ever been focusing on a project in an intense way only to have a random idea, bit of pop culture or snippet of a song jack knife its way into your brain? Sometimes it’s hard to shake it, and other times, it just makes you have to hum a few bars before you ...
As some of you know, our friend Ken Gilbertson had his beloved Hatchback Gallery stolen off the streets of Richmond, Virginia. He has been getting by with some helps from friends, but he is still looking for a new hatchback so he can revive his gallery. In light of his present circumstances, we wanted to ...
Sometimes you just can’t help but be angry about some things. It seems that 2020 and 2021 was a free pass to take it to a new level. Anger isn’t so bad, but the way we process it and respond to it is a different story. Some people have even made a career out of ...
We were all there at one time or another: sitting in our bedroom floor drawing comic book characters or staring at paintings and trying to make ours look exactly the same. It seems the beginning of anyone’s journey into art and design always starts by looking at what is out there and trying to make ...
If you’ve ever been on a road trip, there are two things you have learned. The first is that there is never a restaurant where you want to eat near you when you are actually hungry, and the second is that your mind has plenty of time to think up things, spend a ton of ...
There are a lot of tough subjects in the art world, and one of them is how we deal with poverty. While there are organizations in various sectors that are doing fantastic work to fight poverty, the art world has had a difficult relationship with how it approaches the economically disadvantaged. Often times, the work ...
“Hey did you hear about the new person in accounting?” It’s no big deal, right? We’ve all done it. Gossip seems like the most common and most benign thing you could do. After all, the world has real problems that need to be dealt with, so something as small as widespread lying, behind-the-scenes manipulation, and ...
For most of us, the idea of vacation stirs up images of elaborate European hotels or luxurious stays at inclusive resorts. While there aren’t many folks who would turn down trips like this if they were given to us, there also aren’t many of us who could ever afford such things. Vacation seems far away ...
There are a lot of tough subjects in the art world, and one of them is how we deal with poverty. While there are organizations in various sectors that are doing fantastic work to fight poverty, the art world has had a difficult relationship with how it approaches the economically disadvantaged. Often times, the work ...
This week Ryan and Garreth sit down with Marisa Stratton to discuss painting, her relationship to social media, and her recent solo show, My Screen Time, on view at Shockoe Artspace from June 2021-August 2021. Marisa Stratton is a Richmond, Virginia based painter whose work explores the collective digital experience and its relationship to painting as documentation. ...
In his 1875 novel The Mysterious Island, Jules Verne wrote that “solitude, isolation, are painful things, and beyond human endurance.” For anyone who has experienced real isolation, it is very easy to agree. Isolation can be pure hell, so why do we as artists and designers romanticize the idea of being by ourselves, struggling against everything in ...
You can almost hear Capt. James T. Kirk say it: “Space: the final frontier…” The thought behind the opening lines to Star Trek are pretty clear: there is a lot of nothing out there and there is bound to be something in it. And while the classic television show may have posited space as the ...
Summertime has a lot of connotations. We all think of beaches, long weekends, cookouts and being just a bit more carefree. And you likely have a few songs that get you in the mood for ducking out of work early. Music has a lot of power, and it may not be that different from other ...
After a short hiatus, we are back! And this week’s conversation is entirely fitting to bring up after a break. We all have busy seasons in life: some are for work or school or because we just let things pile up all around us. Whatever the reason is, we need a break some time and ...
Do you remember when you were a kid and someone turned you on to all the great things about art? Do you remember when you were told you could do anything? And then do you remember when everyone started walking that back little by little? They said things like “except you can’t do X” or ...
It seems that the older you get the more you forget. Names, ideas, lines from that song you used to love: no matter what it is, forgetting is difficult to deal with. But what else do we forget? Is it just the inconsequential stuff, or do we have a tendency to get so much into ...
Tell me you’ve heard this word thrown around like it fills every need and gives every artist immediate credibility. If you haven’t, consider yourself lucky. Just like an As Seen on TV product boasts “New and Improved,” innovation seems to be the clarion call of academia. Just like original. Just like unique. Just like… Just ...
“When is the last time you used your imagination?” That’s probably a strange question to hear or read if you are like most folks. In our culture, imagination is something that is weird, off-the-wall, childish or even something you think people should eventually grow out of. But what if it is actually a larger part ...
It’s fair to say that we don’t all find our way into the arts through the same pipelines. While schools and our society push children toward the arts for different reasons, those initial categorizations don’t always shake out over time. Just because you like to draw, just because you might be a bit different from ...
“The world, huh? Kind of ambitious, don’t you think?” You may have a point, but if it makes sense to consider your career or relationships, then it’s not very far-fetched to take an hour and rethink how you understand the world. Besides, big ideas and terms like this are the things we rarely work to ...
This month we held an opening exhibition celebrating the first ten years of our gallery, Shockoe Artspace. We have had an incredible outpouring of support and help as we have weathered the decade-long storm of building, maintaining and growing a non-profit art space dedicated to the holistic flourishing of artists and designers. We wouldn’t be ...
“The world, huh? Kind of ambitious, don’t you think?” You may have a point, but if it makes sense to consider your career or relationships, then it’s not very far-fetched to take an hour and rethink how you understand the world. Besides, big ideas and terms like this are the things we rarely work to ...
Titling work can be stressful. For some, the title of a piece is just an add-on that doesn’t affect the process of making the work very much. For others, it’s hard to even finish a piece before it has a title. Whatever the case may be, titles are no small matter, even though many of ...
When we all start out, whether in school or as a hobbyist, there is a large burden of originality. As our careers progress originality is supplanted by “new” and “next.” Whatever we call this perceived need for constant change, it is exhausting and it might actually make us harder to identify with. For the average ...
It’s kinda hard to be an artist or designer without a studio, right? Conventional wisdom would say yes, but there are more than a few of us who are working out of closets or off kitchen tables. While a dedicated studio might feel like a luxury, any place you get your work done is a ...
There’s that scene in the film Moulin Rouge! where you get a glimpse into the broken down apartment and living conditions of a group of artists who are scraping by in Paris at the start of the twentieth century. There is something oddly romantic about how the artists are relying on each other and scraping ...
It’s January, and everyone tends to be pretty quick to make resolutions, plan out the year, and promise that this one will be better. We’re no different, because we sit down each January and plan out what the next year will look like for the gallery, the podcast and all the hopeful things that are ...
We are a busy society. Whether it is work or school or hobbies, we are constantly in a state of movement. We scroll and consume; we click and binge. We rarely stop and think. And in this perpetual state of movement we can mistake our busyness for productivity and our activity for progress. At times ...
Effort-wise, art school is no walk in the park, but art school doesn’t even compare to the work and sheer number of hours that will be exerted after you receive that little slip of paper from your university. Where art school starts you off on the right foot with a deep skillset and many years ...
While 2020 was not the year any of us planned to have, we have finally found ourselves in a 2021 with a hopefulness that things will turn around. A new year is a time for many of us to make resolutions and start new habits, and, as we enter into the New Year season, it ...
While many of us are comfortable with the idea of grants, very few of us are experts when it comes to building a proposal or thinking through a project in a way that will be attractive to a grant committee. The world of grant writing feels foreign and impermeable. And with so much emphasis put ...
While many of us are comfortable with the idea of grants, very few of us are experts when it comes to building a proposal or thinking through a project in a way that will be attractive to a grant committee. The world of grant writing feels foreign and impermeable. And with so much emphasis put ...
It’s been a year to remember, and despite all the things we have all had to endure in 2020, there are so many things to be grateful for and look back on with joy as we go through the holidays and transition in 2021. Here at Shockoe Artspeak we had a slew of new guests, ...
It’s been a strange year, and it may be the most fitting thing ever to begin to wrap up 2020 with another visit from our good friend Ken Gilbertson. Shockoe Artspace recently partnered with Ken to help make a holiday album called That’s a Wrap: Something You Can Ride To, Volume 2. This four track ...
We grew up wanting to be the hero. The person who slayed the evil beast or rescued the people trapped behind enemy lines. Because heroes are cool, and the idea of a hero is woven into the stories we grow up reading and watching; heroes are the vibrant strands that permeate our cultural tapestry. But ...
Many of us struggle with the reality that the work we do does not fit neatly into a disciplinary box. Art schools and universities exist with single tracks designed to increase ability in a limited skill set. But, more and more, we are finding that this strict adherence to one medium, form, or discipline can ...
While many of us are comfortable with the idea of grants, very few of us are experts when it comes to building a proposal or thinking through a project in a way that will be attractive to a grant committee. The world of grant writing feels foreign and impermeable. And with so much emphasis put ...
In so many ways, we eagerly dive into the mediation the modern world passes over to us with open hands. Whether it is soulless screens or myopic conceptualism, we are greeted every day with a normalized world of subsidiary ideas and secondary experiences. Art gives us a chance to reconnect in real ways, but where ...
When we talk about space, we usually think of space as a limiting feature of the work we do: the panel isn’t large enough, the page count isn’t long enough, the studio isn’t spacious enough. We limit ourselves with the belief that the things we need outweigh the things we have. While our circumstances are ...
Most institutional art training pushes us to focus and to specialize. In order to excel, we are told, we have to push aside tertiary interests and give our creative practice our wholehearted attention. Something about this always feels off, though. While deep skillsets are necessary in the arts, there is a nagging feeling that there ...
Literally everything you do involves space, but how often do we really think about the area we occupy? Take it a step further, how often do you consider the space that your work occupies or the implications of space on the work you make. Sure, we give it a bit of thought every once and ...
It may not have always been this way, but it seems that grants and other sources of funding are the norm for artists and designers. From public arts grants to student grants to professional grants, there is an expectation that we write and receive grants for the projects we undertake. But how many of us ...
It has been nearly a year since Shockoe Artspace held an opening. Since then we have had cancelled events, shutdown spaces, and a lot of time separated from each other. Earlier this month we were able to open the space once more to have people come in a benefit from viewing art and sharing in ...
We all love to make things; it is the only thing that all of us artists and designers can agree upon. Some of us like the planning, some like the finishing, and some like the thrill of opening night, but we all love to make. On second thought, maybe there is more than one thing ...
Almost every practicing artist or designer can tell you that what we do is more than just a job or a series of mindless tasks. Regardless of why we do what we do, there is a shared sentiment that art and design does something in the world around us. Despite this, the assumption still remains ...
Shockoe Artspace made a documentary last year about an unlikely art collector and the community of artists, collectors, and curators that surround him. We recently started the screening and festival circuit, so we figured this week’s episode would be a great time to introduce everyone to our co-directors and discuss the film. This week Ryan ...
We couldn’t have made it this far without each and every one of our fantastic listeners, so thank you so much for helping us make this podcast what it is today. It has been a crazy 18 months. We wouldn’t have believed you if you had told us everything that has taken place in the ...
A whole lot of artists and designers have found a renewed sense and desire to engage more deeply with their work since the world began quarantine earlier this year. Sheltering in place and working from home may have its ups and downs, but many artists have found that the stress of the outside world and ...
We are on Patreon!All of our episodes are sponsored by all the fantastic people we are pleased to call our listeners. You’ve all been a great audience and we want to give you more: more content, more types of shows, and more in-depth talks with more of your favorite artists and designers. Even $1.00 a ...
With the start of a new semester on the horizon, a lot of thoughts turn to school and all the things that define art school. Whether you are a teacher, an artist who has gone through art school, or a student currently hip deep in it, we all have been a part of critiques. And ...
Back in early March, we were all introduced to Ken Gilbertson, an artist with a unique passion for bringing art into places where it is not always present. Just like many artists and gallery owners, Ken has suffered some set backs this year and is trying to breathe new life into his own space–Hatchback Gallery–and is ...
This week, Ryan and Garreth sit down with Dontrese Brown, a designer who has had his hands in all kinds of experiences from teaching to branding to social justice. Despite how varied his work may seem, the theme of his work has been steadily promoting the good of other people and society. Sit back and ...
We’ve all had a lot more time on our hands over the last few months than possibly ever before. For most of us, that means we have had more of everything: sleep, food, and hopefully studio time. The studio can be a tough place when the ideas aren’t flowing, and maybe there is something you ...
The work of a maker can be extremely solitary at times, but that doesn’t mean those voices we contend with stop. Even when the voices of other people are quiet, there is a constant discussion in our heads of whether or not the work we are creating is good or should even be made. Some ...
After more than a few weeks of businesses and galleries being shutdown or operating at minimal capacity, many artists and designers are seeing opportunities dry up and disappear. While this is hugely problematic, creative professionals may be the most equipped to handle these problems and most capable in recasting them as opportunities. This week, spurred ...
Like many of you, we feel a lot of fatigue over the sadness and senselessness of the events that have been playing out in our country over the last few weeks. We’ve taken the time lately to listen and learn and process everything that has been going on. This is just the beginning, and–in some ...
The world is incredibly heavy lately, and it is hard to understand everything going on and see a way forward. People are dying, cities are burning, we are all hurting, and it is hard to get out of bed some days. But maybe the world needs the artists, designers and creatives the most right now. ...
For our 40th episode, we decided that it would be good to take a step back and revisit a few of the topics we have covered over the last year and a half. To help us clarify, our good friend Ian C. Hess joins us for the first in a recurring series where he quotes ...
Sometimes it seems like the only thing we are supposed to do as artists and designers, and sometimes it just seems like an imprecise buzzword. Whatever the case is, collaboration is always buried somewhere in our conversations about our practices. No matter where you enter the conversation, whether through economics, professional practice, or exploration, collaboration ...
Life in the times of global pandemic has brought up a lot of thoughts that we could easily brush aside when everything was normal before. Countless videos, podcasts and more have dealt with anxiety. We even revisited dealing with anxiety a few episodes back. It’s a great topic to talk about when we can all ...
Life in the times of global pandemic has brought up a lot of thoughts that we could easily brush aside when everything was normal before. Countless videos, podcasts and more have dealt with anxiety. We even revisited dealing with anxiety a few episodes back. It’s a great topic to talk about when we can all ...
We never get away from the basics. We’ve all heard that in school and life and everywhere else, so we decided to drop back into one: color. As a painter and a designer, Ryan and Garreth approach the basics from opposite sides at times, so it is worth unpacking what these approaches look like. How ...
Life in the times of global pandemic has brought up a lot of thoughts that we could easily brush aside when everything was normal before. Countless videos, podcasts and more have dealt with anxiety. We even revisited dealing with anxiety a few episodes back. It’s a great topic to talk about when we can all ...
It’s felt a little like an eternity for most of us. We’ve been stuck in the house, inundated with Zoom meetings, and we’ve been trying to think of creative ways to make life a bit more bearable while social distancing. This week, our episode is all about what we have seen, what we’ve done and ...
It’s been a bit crazy for you lately, huh? Same here. After a short hiatus due to (non-pandemic) sicknesses, we wanted to just check back in and talk a little about what we have seen–good and bad–in the last few weeks. Life is different in the gallery world, especially for a non-profit like Shockoe Artspace: ...
We wanted to drop you a quick note to let you know that we are going to be LIVE! and in MOVING IMAGES! We will be doing our first live podcast via Zoom on April 10th. Check out the details in this short update and do two quick things to get in on the action: ...
Things may seem dire, and in some places they are. But, we shouldn’t jump feet first into the boat of fear and anxiety. Just like it was a few weeks ago, there is plenty to take heart in and there is a ton of stuff we can learn about how to handle all the ebbs ...
It’s been a crazy few weeks for everyone as we have all had to learn what it looks like to live in a world with the coronavirus. For many of us, our jobs, home lives and social lives have been upended, and we have been forced to reorient while we socially distance and care for ...
We all got urged to start pursuing art and design from someone earlier in our lives, and for many of us, it was a teacher that poked and prodded us along. Some teachers encouraged or patted us on the back with congratulations, while others pushed us to do better and held us accountable when we ...
Inspiration can carry some weird juju with it. As a culture, we seek to be inspired: we hang inspirational sayings in our homes, we read inspirational books, but we still get writers’ block, designers’ funk, artistic logjams or whatever we want to call it. This can happen for a number of reasons, but sometimes, it’s ...
Origin stories are as much about who you are now as they are about where you came from. We all have them, and–if you think back–there is a something for each of us that seems like it started it all or something you have grown to look back at with greater and greater fondness. We ...
Damien Hirst once spoke about “the horror of being in a studio with a blank canvas,” and we all know what he means. Whether you are a fine artist, designer, filmmaker, writer or any other ilk within the creative spectrum, studio practice is something of a love/hate relationship. We love to be in our studios, ...
Most of the time, there is a huge gulf between those who are elite and those who are elitist. In this installment of 30 Below, Ryan and Garreth discuss two often misused terms and the way we can understand them within art and design practice. We usually feel that we know the difference, but it ...
While artists and designers are extremely varied, one thing that seems to tie us all together is the crippling, unwelcome visitor known as Imposter Syndrome. We’ve all felt its cold stare and heard its demeaning lectures, but how do we work against this (seemingly) unavoidable roadblock? Like most roadblocks, there can sometimes be good reason ...
It’s hard to navigate the grasp of the scrolling world of shared content. Does it help our work? Does it hurt it? We all came from somewhere and we know our work does, too, but with Americans spending an average of 2.5 hours on social media everyday, what kind of influence is it having on ...
Critique is a word that elicits different reactions. For some artists, it’s positive, complete with ideas about improvement, community and wisdom. But for others, the word may be burdened with some heavy–and even traumatic–baggage. Wherever you may find yourself on this spectrum, critique is a necessary part of any artist or designer’s life. So how ...
Social media gets a bad wrap…or maybe it doesn’t. While it is hard to imagine art and design practice without Instagram, Facebook, Twitter or any of the portfolio social media sites, it can also be debilitating, time-consuming and depressing. So how do we use it as a tool in our work without being consumed in ...
As artists and designers, we are always working with other people; but how do we do it well? People aren’t always the easiest things to work with or for, and we can’t promise that every day will be a good day with plenty of coffee and sunshine. So, what is cooperation? How is it different ...
We are live at Current Art Fair and answering your questions! In this third of five live episodes, we talk about all the stuff that surrounds your art. No matter what we make, it lives somewhere, and sometimes we forget just how important that environment is. How do we begin to think about where our ...
We are live at Current Art Fair and answering your questions! In this second of five episodes, we approach the juggernaut of graduate school and the mighty MFA. While a great avenue to pursue your passions as a maker and seek answers to your deeper questions about art and design, grad school isn’t for everyone ...
As artists and designers, we are always working with other people; but how do we do it well? People aren’t always the easiest things to work with or for, and we can’t promise that every day will be a good day with plenty of coffee and sunshine. So, what is cooperation? How is it different ...
We are live at Current Art Fair and answering your questions! In this first of five episodes, we tackle juggling all the things in life, how to push yourself to do more, and we even have time for a quick reference to Luniz’s I Got Five On It. All in under 30 minutes. No, for ...
On this episode, we speak with Carey Kight about professional projects, learning while doing, and LA-area mullets. Carey is a Brooklyn-based writer, director, producer, editor, and actor. He is a trained screen and copy writer who used the Post-9/11 GI Bill to study Film Studies at The Ohio State University and Creative Writing for Entertainment at ...
As we near the end of season one, we will be spending the next few episodes unpacking what we mean by the ecosystem of art and design. The ecosystem is the interconnected web of organizations, events and people who make up what we think of when we talk about art and design in our communities. ...
As we near the end of season one, we will be spending the next few episodes unpacking what we mean by the ecosystem of art and design. The ecosystem is the interconnected web of organizations, events and people who make up what we think of when we talk about art and design in our communities. ...
As we near the end of season one, we will be spending the next few episodes unpacking what we mean by the ecosystem of art and design. The ecosystem is the interconnected web of organizations, events and people who make up what we think of when we talk about art and design in our communities. ...
In today’s episode, we sit down with contemporary painter and VCUarts professor Ron Johnson to discuss fighting Joe Rogan, music, creativity and sports. From his background as a college athlete and later as a member of the band 50 Watt Alarm Clock, Ron leads us through the experiences in his life that brought him to ...
Third time is a charm, right? In today’s episode, we make our third and final lap into the swamp of anxiety and professional practice. Where the first two episodes focused on the causes of anxiety that we feel in our professional lives as artists and designers, this episode focuses on the things we do to ...
In today’s episode, we circle back and continue to discuss our experiences and how they have shaped our views of the balance or integration of work and life. And this time we sit for a while on the topic of anxiety in professional practice. “Oh wonderful!” you may be saying sarcastically. “I wanted to start ...
On this episode, we sit down and speak with painter, Ashlynn Browning. Browning’s work contains a hybrid of geometric and organic forms created through an intuitive painting process. Browning earned BA degrees in Studio Art and English from Meredith College in 2000 and her MFA in painting and printmaking from the University of NC at ...
In today’s episode, we discuss our experiences and how they have shaped our views of the balance or integration of work and life. And don’t forget the anxiety of professional practice. It’s a very big topic. A common question from our students and listeners revolves around how to make sense of all the things that ...
Raised in Richmond, Virginia, illustrator and painter Sterling Hundley earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Communication Art and Design from Virginia Commonwealth University in 1998. His work has appeared in Communication Arts, American Illustration, Print, 3 × 3, Graphis, Step by Step Graphics, and in publications of the Society of Illustrators of Los Angeles, the Society ...
Wesley Taylor is a print maker, graphic designer, musician, animator, educator, mentor, and curator. He roots his practice in performance and social justice. His work combines, oscillates between, and blurs these different disciplines. His work is multi-disciplinary as well as anti-disciplinary. Taylor’s individual practice is inextricably linked to his collective practice, yet his collective practice ...
On this week’s episode, we speak with Ryan Lauterio, Shockoe Artspace’s Director and Curator. Ryan is currently on faculty at VCUarts in Richmond, Virginia. Ryan received his B.A and M.A in Studio Art at CSU, Sacramento and his M.F.A in Painting and Printmaking from VCU. Ryan has been a part of VCUarts’ Art Foundation program ...
On this episode, we speak with Shockoe Artspace’s Design and Communications Director, Dr. Garreth Blackwell. Blackwell teaches in the Virginia Commonwealth School of the Arts Center for the Creative Economy (CCE) where his courses focus on professional practice and entrepreneurship. The CCE is an interdisciplinary unit within VCUarts that focuses on modes of thinking, innovation, ...
On this episode we speak with Will Connally, whose art practice encompasses photography, fiction writing, set design, and installation. He recently conducted a residency at Banff Centre for the Arts, and was awarded a Fellowship from The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Connally received his MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art, and currently teaches at ...
In today’s episode we discuss the past, present and future of Shockoe Artspace. In 2011 we started Shockoe Artspace to support artists in every way possible – not just by showing their work, but also by developing deep relationships as they navigated their careers. By 2016 we established Shockoe Artspace as a 501c3 nonprofit and ...
Lana Waldrep-Appl (b.1985 Fort Worth, Texas) is an artist who lives and works just outside of Austin, Texas. She is a self-confessed introvert and lover of paint. Her work highlights quiet and anonymous spaces and the complexity of simple things. Lana received her MFA in Painting from Virginia Commonwealth University in 2010 and her BFA ...
In this episode we speak with Chinonyeelu Uchechi Amobi, who is known professionally as Chino Amobi. As a polymath, Amobi combines art, painting, design, music, and film with a rich assemblage of styles and voices. Amobi is a co-founder of the independent record label NON Worldwide and creative director of EROICA. In 2016 he released the EP Airport ...
In this episode we speak with Virginia-based artist Nikki Painter about her large-scale solo exhibition Shape Shifting. Painter earned her BFA in Painting and Printmaking from Virginia Commonwealth University and her MFA in Studio Art from American University. Painter has participated in recent shows at the Huntington Museum of Art, and at the Daegu Arts Center in ...