Artist, musician and writer Audrey Flack shares her firsthand accounts of the downtown New York City art scene in the mid-twentieth-century and a song she and her band, The History of Art, wrote about Jackson Pollock. 

Flack passed away in June. For more about her life, see “Audrey Flack, Creator of Vibrant Photorealist Art, Dies at 93.” 

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Katy speaks with Eleanor Nairne, who first introduced her to Lee Kranser’s work. Back in 2019, Nairne exhibited a groundbreaking retrospective of Lee Krasner’s work while she was senior curator at the Barbican Art Gallery in London. Today she is the Keith L. and Catherine Sacks Curator and Head of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. In this episode, a dive into Krasner’s artistic career. 

Artwork Discussed:

Joan Miro Constellations (1940-41)

Mosaic Table (1947)

Stop and Go (1949)

Prophecy (1956)

Birth (1956)

Three in Two (1956)

Pablo Picasso Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907)

Earth Green (1957)

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1956. New York City. After Pollock’s death, Krasner balances her new role as executor of his estate and her ambitions to continue making art.

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1955. Upper West Side. Jackson Pollock seeks help from a psychotherapist practicing controversial methods.

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1945. East Hampton. Lee Krasner and Jackson Pollock start a new life in a farmhouse 100 miles east of New York City.

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1942. Midtown. Peggy Guggenheim arrives, opens a gallery and gives hungry artists hope.

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1936. Brooklyn. A young Lee Krasner leaves home and starts to create a kind of art America has never seen before.

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1956. Paris. An artist named Lee Krasner learns that her husband is dead.

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On May 17th, Death of an Artist returns with an all new season hosted by Katy Hessel about the woman who made the modern art world: Lee Krasner. 

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A live audience and curator Patricia Margarita Hernandez join Helen at the A.I.R. gallery in this epilogue to the series. The conversation moves from generational shifts in the artworld to Helen’s own Robin Hood fantasy – and ends with some pushback from an audience member who knew Ana.

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In the wake of the #metoo and Black Lives Matter movements, art museums began publicly touting their dedication to diversity. In this episode, we hear from two arts journalists about whether there are actually more artworks by women and people of color on the walls.

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