Most of my favorite people are artists. I admire them for their creativity, of course, but also their bravery. Our culture does little (except at the uppermost extent of the market) to encourage or reward artistic practice. And as little as we give, we get so much in return – generosity, conviction, intelligence, challenge.  

Many of my writings on contemporary art have concerned individual practices. Most have benefitted from direct conversation, and often friendship, with the artists in question. Among the people I’ve written on in depth are Nicole Cherubini, Isabelle Cornaro, Tracey Emin, Jeffrey Gibson, Gord Peteran, Stephanie Syjuco, Pae White, and Anne Wilson.  

I’ve also had occasion to write thematic essays about contemporary art, commissioned by venues like the ICA Philadelphia, the Whitechapel Art Gallery, and the ICA Boston. I’ve also contributed to books like Scale, The Studio Reader, and The Female Gaze, and collaborated with Julia Bryan-Wilson on the book Art in the Making: Artists and their Materials, from the Studio to Crowd-Sourcing. This project focused on the much-neglected issue of “production values” in contemporary art, and like a lot of my work, treats art, craft and design as overlapping areas of concern rather than distinct, mutually exclusive categories.