Art21 is the world’s leading source to learn directly from the artists of our time. The mission of Art21 is to educate and ...

Pepón Osorio was born in 1955 in Santurce, Puerto Rico, and currently lives and works in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In 1975, Osorio left Puerto Rico and moved to the South Bronx in New York City, ...

Nick Cave was born in Fulton, Missouri in 1959. He creates “Soundsuits”—surreally majestic objects blending fashion and sculpture—that originated as metaphorical suits of armor in response to the ...

Glenn Ligon was born in the Bronx, New York, in 1960. Ligon’s paintings and sculptures examine cultural and social identity through found sources—literature, Afrocentric coloring books, photographs—to ...

Paul Pfeiffer discusses his diorama-inspired sculptures that play off of popular horror movies. ART21: Can you talk about Poltergeist? It’s one of the few sculptural pieces you’ve produced. I studied ...

Margaret Kilgallen was born in 1967 in Washington, D.C., and received her BA in printmaking from Colorado College in 1989. Shortly afterward, the artist moved to San Francisco, where she took up ...

Mary Mattingly was born in 1978 in Rockville, Connecticut, and lives and works in New York. Combining a visual-art practice with environmental activism and education, Mattingly wrote a manifesto that ...

Artist Pierre Huyghe discusses his 2003 short film, Streamside Day. ART21: There’s a very poetic element to a lot of what you create. HUYGHE: But it’s very difficult to say what’s poetic in my work ...

Artist Martin Puryear discusses his work’s connection to the history of abstraction and the inspiration for his 1996 installation piece, “Ladder for Booker T. Washington.” ART21: Your work is often ...

In this rare interview conducted in December 2017, Barbara Kruger shares her media diet, what she sees as art’s role in contemporary society, and the inspiration behind two of her earliest works.

Wolfgang Laib was born in 1950 in Metzingen, Germany. Inspired by the teachings of the ancient Taoist philosopher Laozi, by the modern artist Brancusi, and the legacy of formative life experiences ...

Susan Philipsz was born in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1965. Philipsz’s work explores the psychological and sculptural dimensions of sound, with recordings of her voice and a variety of reworked musical ...