The Center's Studio Podcast

Although he was born with a physical condition requiring prosthetic legs and braces to walk, John Williamson was a high-functioning professional with a long career in the technology industry until five years ago, when his body began to break down, making employment impossible. In this interview, Williamson describes how he discovered artmaking late in life, how it became therapy for him after his new circumstances in a motorized wh...

Two-time Emmy nominated writer James Best talks in this episode about his new one-act play, The Last Lake, which was a winner of the Art for Uncertain Times grant program of the Center for Latter-day Saint Arts. In addition to a discussion about the two-character play, presented in Zoom performances last week, and his upcoming projects, the writer describes his varied career in television, stage, and print, as well as advocacy work...

Painter Samuel Evensen in New York, New York is recovering from COVID-19 symptoms that have forced him into quarantine and attacked his body. A painter whose subject is the body, Evensen discusses the Spanish Flu epidemic, HIV/AIDS, and other global health crises and how artists such as Hyman Bloom and Egon Schiele chose to engage in the figure. His poignant advice for artists ends the episode. The music for all four segments is by...

In this special episode recorded during the COVID-19 pandemic, four artists discuss their current life and work. Each answers the same four questions: What is it like to make your art right now?; How does this pandemic affect content?; Are there works from the past, written in similar times or about similar challenges that are meaningful to you?; and What advice might you have for an artist in quarantine?

Playwright Javen Tanner in ...

Composer Deon Nielsen Price in San Francisco, California talks about her distinguished career writing music that is socially relevant including works about the Watts Riots and Vietnam. She finds comfort in poetry written by Japanese Americans imprisoned in internment camps during WWII, and she describes how her composer heroes Schoenberg, Stravinsky, Messiaen, and Cowell all used their periods of isolation or imprisonment to formul...

American composer of jazz, musical theater, concert, and choral music, Lisa DeSpain has not one, not two, but three operas in late-stage development—all winners of important commissions and grants. In this interview peppered with excerpts from the operas and with DeSpain breaking into song as she describes the compositions, the topic at hand is how an artist juggles different projects, collaborators, producers, and publishers at th...

In this episode, scientist and novelist Steven L. Peck discusses his newest novel, The Tragedy of King Leere, Goatherd of the La Sals. The book updates the Shakespearean tragedy to the near future, specifically, after a global climate change disaster. At turns funny, tragic, and frightening, the novel--and the interview--wrestle with the truths to be found in art as well as science.

Support the show (https://www.centerforlatterdaysa...

Painter Kent Christensen's Secrets of the Great Salt Lake is a virtuosic piece of visual satire representing early Utah history. Brigham Young rides a dinosaur in the lake while two trains bringing Jell-O, Snelgrove's ice cream, donuts, and toxic waste meet at Promontory Point for the driving of the Golden Spike. The state's animals frolic among recognizable tourist landmarks even while their existence is imperiled by c...

"Beleaguered but buoyant parents of five children between the ages of 6 and 16," as The New York Times described Erik and Emily Orton, "hadn’t even plotted an itinerary when they bought a 38-foot catamaran (sight unseen), flew to a Caribbean harbor and set sail on a Swiss-Family-Robinson-style adventure." The resulting adventure was only the beginning. In this episode, the authors of Seven at Sea: Why a New York Cit...

New Juilliard vocal faculty member, Darrell Babidge, discusses his career of training a generation of the world's opera singers. He discusses what it is like to be a vocal teacher of these elite musicians, what his voice lessons are like, and how he works with singers to perfect their craft. The interview is peppered with magnificent performances of his renown students, including Rachel Willis-Sørensen, Shea Owens, and Rebecca ...

The Center for Latter-day Saint Arts provides a weekly Art Companion for the gospel study curriculum, Come, Follow Me. This was the idea of Jennifer Wilcox who explores, in this podcast episode, how the project came to be, how she uses art in her church teaching, how she commissions new art for her students, and ultimately how the home is the perfect classroom and art space.

Support the show (https://www.centerforlatterdaysaintarts....

The former global acquisitions curator for the Church History Museum reflects on her tenure and influence on art in the Church with the aid of tributes written by artists and colleagues: Neylan McBaine, Walter Rane, Rose Datoc Dall, Alan Johnson, Valerie Atkisson de Moura, Annie Poon, Diane P. Stewart, Caitlin Connolly, and Jason Metcalf. Hurtado is the newly-named executive director of the Utah Museum of Contemporary Art.

Support t...

Starring on Broadway at the age of 11, Tade Biesinger played the title role in Billy Elliot the Musical and reprised the part in London and St. Louis. The experience left a strong impression on him but not in a way you'd expect; he learned at this tender age why he needed God in his life. This podcast episode was recorded three months before his departure as a full-time missionary.

Support the show (https://www.centerforlatterda...