The Way I See It

Latest Episodes:

Zac Posen on Constantin Brancusi's Bird in Space Dec 06, 2019

Show notes

Art critic Alastair Sooke, in the company of some of the leading creatives of our age, continues his deep dive into the stunning works in the Museum of Modern Art's collection, whilst exploring what it really means “to see” art.

Today's edition features American fashion designer, Zac Posen. His outfits have been worn by British royalty and Hollywood stars like Glenn Close and Reese Witherspoon, but what has caught his eye in the collection at MoMA?

Producer: Tom Alban

Main Image: Constantin Brancusi, Bird in Space, 1928. Bronze, 54 x 8 1/2 x 6 1/2" (137.2 x 21.6 x 16.5 cm). Given anonymously. Museum of Modern Art, NY, 153.1934. © Succession Brancusi - All rights reserved (ARS) 2018

Madeleine Thien on Vija Celmins’s Bikini Dec 05, 2019

Show notes

Today's edition features a work by a Latvian-American visual artist best known for photo-realistic paintings and drawings of natural environments and phenomena such as the ocean, spider webs, star fields, and rocks. Award-winning novelist Madeleine Thien has chosen "Bikini" Celmins's depiction of an atomic blast which took place in Bikini Lagoon on 25 July 1946, part of the United States’ Operation Crossroads – one of a series of twenty-three nuclear detonations in the western Pacific. What has drawn the novelist's eye to this work - and how does she see it?

Producer: Paul Kobrak

Richard Serra on Jackson Pollock Dec 04, 2019

Show notes

Today's edition features the choice of heavyweight sculptor of steel, Richard Serra. He chooses Jackson Pollock’s "One: Number 31, 1950" - but why choose this work, and how does it inform his own?

Producer: Paul Kobrak

Main Image: Jackson Pollock, One: Number 31, 1950. Oil and enamel paint on canvas, 8' 10" x 17' 5 5/8" (269.5 x 530.8 cm). Sidney and Harriet Janis Collection Fund (by exchange). Conservation was made possible by the Bank of America Art Conservation Project. Museum of Modern Art, NY, 7.1968. © 2019 Pollock-Krasner Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Bryan Stevenson on Jacob Lawrence’s Migration Series Dec 03, 2019

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Today's edition features the choice of American lawyer and social justice activist Bryan Stevenson. He has chosen The Migration Series, a set of paintings by African-American painter Jacob Lawrence. Depicting the migration of African Americans to the northern United States from the South that began in the 1910s, this a moving piece for Bryan Stevenson - but what does a civil rights lawyer see in the work that others might not?

Producer: Tom Alban.

Main Image: Jacob Lawrence, And the migrants kept coming, 1940-41. Casein tempera on hardboard, 12 x 18" (30.5 x 45.7 cm). Gift of Mrs. David M. Levy. Museum of Modern Art, NY, 28.1942.30. © 2019 Jacob Lawrence / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Fiona Shaw on Georgia O'Keeffe's Lake George, Coat and Red Dec 02, 2019

Show notes

Art critic Alastair Sooke, in the company of some of the leading creatives of our age, takes us on a deep dive into the stunning works in the Museum of Modern Art's collection, whilst exploring what it really means “to see” art.

Leading cultural figures in the series include Grammy- and Emmy award-winning Hollywood actor and comedian Steve Martin, one of the founders of minimalism – composer Steve Reich and stand-up comedian Margaret Cho. Each episode introduces us to an important art work in the collection, but asks how our own perspective affects our appreciation of the piece.

So, how does a jazz pianist see Mondrian’s Broadway Boogie Woogie? How does one of the first black women to write for Marvel comics see the difficult truths in Kara Walker’s sweeping image of African-American history? What does a top fashion designer decode from the clothes painted by an artist in Harlem in the 1930s?

We begin this second part of the series with the gaze of Emmy award-winning Irish actor Fiona Shaw, currently playing the sinister secret agent Carolyn Martens in the hit TV series "Killing Eve". She has chosen a work by an artist who has been described as the "Mother of American modernism" - Georgia O'Keefe. Best known for her paintings of enlarged flowers, New York skyscrapers, and New Mexico landscapes, Fiona has chosen an excellent example of her style; "Lake George, Coat and Red". But why has she chosen it - and why does she declare that she wouldn't like to own it?

Producer: Tom Alban

Main Image: Georgia O’Keeffe, Lake George, Coat and Red, 1919. Oil on canvas, 27 3/8 x 23 1/4" (69.6 x 59 cm). Gift of The Georgia O'Keeffe Foundation. Museum of Modern Art, NY, 65.1995. © 2019 The Museum of Modern Art / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

The Director's Choice Nov 01, 2019

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As the series reaches its halfway point, we're in the company of MoMA's director, Glenn Lowry. Overseeing a museum of the scale and prestige of MoMA, which of the works in his care stands out for him personally? Glen explains why Dayanita Singh’s Museum of Chance speaks to him above all the others.

Producer: Tom Alban

Main Image: Dayanita Singh, Museum of Chance, 2013. 162 pigmented inkjet prints and teak structures, variable dimensions. Acquired with support from The Contemporary Arts Council of The Museum of Modern Art, The Modern Women's Fund, and Committee on Photography Fund. Museum of Modern Art, NY, 494.2017. © 2019 Dayanita Singh. Courtesy of the Frith Street Gallery, London

Renee Fleming chooses Colors for a Large Wall Oct 31, 2019

Show notes

Today's edition features American operatic soprano, Renee Fleming. Winner of the National Medal of Arts and Fulbright Lifetime Achievement Medal winner, she is the only classical singer ever to have performed the U.S. National Anthem at the Super Bowl. Renee has chosen Ellsworth Kelly’s 1951 work, Colors for a Large Wall - a collage of painted, multi-coloured squares. What is it about this work that hits Renee Fleming's high notes?

Producer: Paul Kobrak

Main Image: Ellsworth Kelly, Colors for a Large Wall, 1951. Oil on canvas, sixty-four panels, 7' 10 1/2" x 7' 10 1/2" (240 x 240 cm). Gift of the artist, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1067.1969.a-b. © 2019 Ellsworth Kelly

Hisham Matar with Man Sleeping Along the Seine Oct 30, 2019

Show notes

Today's edition features Art critic Alastair Sooke, in the company of some of the leading creatives of our age, continues his deep dive into the stunning works in the Museum of Modern Art's collection, whilst exploring what it really means “to see” art.

Today's edition features Hisham Matar , the American-born British-Libyan writer whose memoir of the search for his father, The Return, won the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Biography. He has chosen a photograph by Hungarian–French photographer Brassaï, which is biographic in its own way, featuring a man sleeping by the River Seine, taken in 1932. What inspiration will the award-winning novelist take from this image?

Producer: Tom Alban

Main Image: Brassaï (Gyula Halász), Man Sleeping Along the Seine (Homme endormi au bord de la Seine), 1932. Gelatin silver print, 11 5/8 x 9 1/8" (29.6 x 23.2 cm). David H. McAlpin Fund, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 2526.1967. © Estate Brassaï-RMN

Es Devlin on Felix Gonzalez-Torres's Perfect Lovers Oct 29, 2019

Show notes

Today's edition features British stage designer and sculptor Es Devlin. Devlin has made large scale touring stage sculptures in collaboration with Beyoncé, Kanye West Adele, U2, and the Royal Opera House in London, as well as designing the London Olympic Closing Ceremony in 2012. She has selected Felix Gonzalez-Torres’ Perfect Lovers - in which two synchronized clocks, like those typically found in offices and public spaces, are displayed side by side. One will inevitably stop before the other. Created whilst Felix Gonzalez-Torres's partner was ill, it embodies the tension that comes from two people living side-by-side as life moves forward towards death. Laycock died of AIDS six years before Gonzalez-Torres's own death in 1996. What will one of the world's greatest set designers see in this simple, poignant work?

Producer: Tom Alban

Main Image: Felix Gonzalez-Torres,"Untitled" (Perfect Lovers), 1991. Clocks, paint on wall, overall 14 x 28 x 2 3/4" (35.6 x 71.2 x 7 cm). Gift of the Dannheisser Foundation, The Museum of Modern Art, 177.1996.a-b. © 2019 The Felix Gonzalez-Torres Foundation, Courtesy Andrea Rosen Gallery, New York

Roxane Gay and Christ's Entry into Journalism Oct 28, 2019

Show notes

Leading cultural figures in the series include Grammy- and Emmy-award-winning Hollywood actor and comedian Steve Martin, one of the founders of minimalism – composer Steve Reich and stand-up comedian Margaret Cho. Each episode introduces us to an important art work in the collection, but asks how our own perspective affects our appreciation of the piece.

This week we begin with American writer and commentator Roxane Gay, author of The New York Times best-selling essay collection Bad Feminist. She chooses a work by Kara Walker, best known for creating black-and-white silhouette works that invoke themes of African American racial identity. Roxane has selected Walker's massive 11-by-18-foot collage “Christ’s Entry into Journalism” from 2017. Riffing off “Christ’s Entry into Jerusalem,” the piece is covered with ink drawings depicting figures real and imagined, past and present, from James Brown to Martin Luther King, Jr. and Donald Trump.

Producer: Paul Kobrak

Main Image: Kara Walker, Christ's Entry into Journalism, 2017. Ink and pencil on paper, cut-and-pasted on painted paper, 140 1/2 × 196" (356.9 × 497.8 cm). Acquired through the generosity of Agnes Gund, the Contemporary Arts Council of The Museum of Modern Art, Carol and Morton Rapp, Marnie Pillsbury, the Contemporary Drawing and Print Associates, and Committee on Drawings and Prints Fund, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 198.2018. © 2019 Kara Walker

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