Periodically, we pose questions about issues artists face in their work and lives. This month, we asked: Why is it important to you to incorporate real stories or real people into your art? Margo Guernsey, filmmaker Storytelling is as old as human beings. For me, telling real stories about real people is a way to ground us in a deeper understanding of who we are in this … [Read more...]
Artist Voices
Highlighting the work and voices of individual artists.
Daniela Petrova on Her Debut Novel Her Daughter’s Mother
In 2012, Daniela Petrova received an Artist Fellowship in Fiction/Creative Nonfiction. This month, she's publishing her debut novel, Her Daughter's Mother. The novel, which has already been featured in Publisher's Weekly and O: the Oprah Magazine, explores the complicated connection between a woman and her IVF egg donor. We asked the author about the process of writing the … [Read more...]
Sean Padraic McCarthy: In the Midst of the Sea
In 2016, Sean Padraic McCarthy won a Mass Cultural Council Artist Fellowship in Fiction/Creative Nonfiction. As he gets ready to publish his debut novel, In the Midst of the Sea on May 1, 2019, we asked him about his new book, the difficult balance of work+life+art, and what's next in his intriguing trajectory as a literary artist. What came first for In the Midst of the … [Read more...]
What Is Your Relationship to Your Early Work?
Periodically, we pose questions about issues artists face in their work and lives. This month, we asked: What is your relationship to your early work? Amy Podmore, sculpture and multi-disciplinary artist Coming across older works conjure in me a multitude of responses, from stunned or embarrassed, to satisfied that the work still has some resonance for me. There was a … [Read more...]
Tracy Strauss: I Just Haven’t Met You Yet
Writer Tracy Strauss is about to publish her debut book, I Just Haven't Met You Yet (Skyhorse Publishing, May 2019), an "open love letter" to her future life partner. It's a memoir about relationships, reckoning with abuse, and finding a way to seen and understood. The book - and its journey to publication - is also a remarkable story of persistence and commitment as an … [Read more...]