I was selected to participate in Sluice’s 10 Minute Talks series at Campbell Works in London. For this series, individuals from the art world are invited to give a 10-minute talk on anything or anyone that has been influential to their practice.
I chose to give my talk on Marcia Tucker, a former curator at the Whitney Museum of American Art and the founder of The New Museum in New York City. I read Marcia Tucker’s autobiography, A Short Life of Trouble: Forty Years in the New York Art World, in my early 20s when I was about to start my own “short life of trouble” in the art world. Marcia’s writing is intimate and deeply relatable even while her life is nothing short of extraordinary (part of me will always hold it against Richard Tuttle that he was the last show ever curated for the Whitney by Marcia).
I was, and continue to be, deeply touched by this book. A Short Life of Trouble should be required reading for anyone who has ever had a passing interest in art and anyone who has ever dreamt of doing something just slightly bonkers (like starting a radical new art space in a city like New York).
To date, this remains one of my favorite public speaking events I’ve ever done. I hope you enjoy learning about Marcia (and my relationship with her) as much as I did. The talk was later published as an article in a special one-off edition by Marmalade Publishers of Visual Theory in collaboration with sluice artist-run mag.
