Episode No. 335 of The Modern Art Notes Podcast features artists Mary Reid Kelley & Patrick Kelley, and Aïda Muluneh.

The Baltimore Museum of Art is exhibiting "Mary Reid Kelley and Patrick Kelley: We Are Ghosts" through August 19. The exhibition features two new works by Mary Reid Kelley and her collaborator Patrick Kelley: This is Offal (2016) and In the Body of the Sturgeon (2017), as well as sets and costumes from the films and related lightboxes. The exhibition debuted at the Tate Liverpool before arriving in Baltimore, where it was curated by Kristen Hileman. Baltimore and the Tate produced a small catalogue for the show. As of posting time it's not available from the BMA's store. 

This is Offal debuted as a live performance at the Tate Modern on November 19, 2015. (The video from that performance is available below.) It was inspired by Thomas Hood’s 1844 poem "The Bridge of Sighs," in which a forensic pathologist (Patrick Kelley), is frustrated by the suicide of a young woman (Mary Reid Kelley) whose body is pulled from the Thames River.

In the Body of the Sturgeon tells the story of a fictional American submarine near the end of World War II and its learning of the American dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima via a broadcast from President Harry S Truman.

On the second segment Aïda Muluneh discusses her work, which is included in "Being: New Photography 2018" at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. The exhibition, which was curated by Lucy Gallun, is on view through August 19. Muluneh is an Ethiopian photographer whose work is in the collections of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art and the Hood Museum at Dartmouth.

See images of art discussed on this week's show. 

Episode No. 334 of The Modern Art Notes Podcast is a holiday weekend presentation of previously recorded interviews with curators Frederick Ilchman and Scott Shields.

Ilchman, a curator at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, is the co-curator of “Casanova: The Seduction of Europe,” a broad look at the over-the-top luxury of European art and decorative arts in the pre-French Revolution decades. It debuted at the Kimbell Art Museum last year, and is on view at the Legion of Honor in San Francisco through May 28. The show is built around the famed Giacomo Casanova, a courtier, lothario and schemester whose memoir provides one of the best insights to an era in which those at the top of society milked their countries for wealth and prestige, leaving little for others. The exhibition was co-curated by Ilchman, the National Gallery of Art’s C.D. Dickerson (who started work on the show while he was at the Kimbell), and the Clark Art Institute's Esther Bell (who worked on the show while she was at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco). The catalogue is absolutely terrific, a great read, a decadent look, and Amazon will sell it to you for $34.

Next, Crocker Art Museum curator Scott A. Shields discusses “Richard Diebenkorn: Beginnings, 1942-1955,” which the Crocker co-organized with the Richard Diebenkorn Foundation. The exhibition looks at work, especially work on paper, that Diebenkorn made before turning to figuration while living and working in Berkeley, Calif. It reveals Diebenkorn working through artists with whom his work is not typically associated, such as John Marin and Arshile Gorky. The exhibition is accompanied by an excellent, well-illustrated catalogue that mines Diebenkorn’s archive to find a surprising range of influences. Amazon sells it for $44. From Sacramento, the show will trael to the Owsley Museum at Ball State University, the Portland (Ore.) Art Museum, the Weisman Museum at Pepperdine University in Malibu, Calif., and to the Academy Art Museum in Easton, Md. Images of art discussed on the program are here.

Episode No. 333 of The Modern Art Notes Podcast features curators Emma Acker and Nathaniel Silver.

Acker is the curator of "Cult of the Machine: Precisionism and American Art," the first broad survey of precisionism in nearly 20 years. The exhibition opens at the de Young Museum in San Francisco this weekend, and remains on view through August 12. "Cult of the Machine" includes over 100 works, including paintings, photographs, works on paper and sculpture, and charts the emergence of the style and its roughly three-decade-long history. The exhibition's terrific catalogue, which features scores of illustrations of supplemental artworks, was published by the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco in association with Yale University Press. Amazon offers it for $52. The exhibition will travel to the Dallas Museum of Art in September.

On the second segment, Nathaniel Silver returns to the program to discuss his new exhibition "Fra Angelico: Heaven on Earth,"  which is at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston through May 20. The exhibition joins Angelico's Assumption and Dormition of the Virgin, acquired by Gardner in 1899 and the first Angelico acquired by an American, with its three companions from the Museo di San Marco in Florence. Conceived by Angelico (and his funder) as a set of reliquaries for the Florentine church of Santa Maria Novella, they tell the story of the Virgin Mary's life. The outstanding catalogue, complete with one of the most beautiful book covers you'll ever see, was published by the ISGM and Paul Holberton Publishing and is available from Amazon for $41.

For images of art discussed on the program, see MANPodcast.com. 

Episode No. 332 features artists Fazal Sheikh and John Akomfrah.

The Portland (Ore.) Art Museum is exhibiting "Common Ground: Photographs by Fazal Sheikh, 1989-2013," a 25-year survey of Fazal Sheikh's work. The exhibition focuses on Sheikh's portraiture, work that spotlights the individual humanity often forgotten or obscured by war and other ethnic, religious or misogynistic violence. It also includes Sheikh's landscapes, which often suggest the violence or migration that the land in his pictures sustained. The exhibition, which is on view through May 20, was organized by Eric Paddock and the Denver Art Museum. Julia Dolan oversaw the Portland installation.

Sheikh, who was born in New York to an American mother and Kenyan father, spent many childhood summers there. Upon earning a Fulbright scholarship after studying under Emmet Gowin at Princeton, Sheikh returned to Africa and found himself photographing people displaced from Somalia, Ethiopia, Mozambique and Rwanada who were living in refugee camps. Over the ensuing decades he continued to look at places where massive waves of migration, often caused by violence, impacted people and places. He is the recipient of a MacArthur Foundation 'genius' award. Museums such as the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, the Mapfre Foundation in Madrid, the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art have presented solo exhibitions of his work.

Sheikh's website includes a broad presentation of his work and free digital versions of all of his books. Among the series or projects he and host Tyler Green discuss on this week's program are:

• Early Work (in Kenya, South Africa);
• A Sense of Common Ground (in Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi);
• The Victor Weeps, book (in Afghanistan, Pakistan);
• Ramadan Moon, book (in the Netherlands);
• Moksha, book (in India);
• Ladli, book (in India); 
• Portraits; 
• Ether, book (in India); and
• The Erasure Trilogy (in Israel and the West Bank).

The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art is presenting the U.S. debut of John Akomfrah's Vertigo Sea in "Sublime Seas: John Akomfrah and J.M.W. Turner." The exhibition, which pairs a film installation Akomfrah made for the Venice Biennale in 2015 with Turner's The Deluge, will be on view at SFMOMA through September 16. It was curated by Rudolf Frieling.

In two weeks the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University will exhibit Akomfrah's Precarity, which debuted at Prospect.4. (The version of Precarity at the Nasher will differ slightly from the version shown in New Orleans.) The exhibition will remain on view through August 26. Later this spring, Akomfrah will return to The MAN Podcast to discuss Precarity.

Akomfrah has had many solo exhibitions and dedicated screenings around the world, including at the Tate Britain and at the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

Episode No. 331 of The Modern Art Notes Podcast features artist Senga Nengudi.

Senga Nengudi came to prominence in the 1960s and 1970s with abstract sculpture made from common materials, work that was often fused with a performative element. Her work is the subject of two ongoing solo exhibitions and her work is included in one ongoing group exhibition:

• The University of Southern California Fisher Museum of Art is showing "Senga Nengudi: Improvisational Gestures" through April 14. The exhibition was curated by Elissa Author and Nora Burnett Abrams for the MCA Denver and the University of Colorado-Colorado Springs Gallery of Contemporary Art. The exhibition includes performance documentation, sculptures and two video works.
• The Baltimore Museum of Art is showing "Head Back & High: Senga Nengudi, Performance Objects (1976-2015)" through May 27. It focuses on Nengudi's sculpture and her collaborative performances with her friend and fellow artist Maren Hassinger. It was curated by Christopher Bedford with Cecelia Wichmann, and will travel to Art + Practice in Los Angeles this summer.
• Nengudi is included in "An Incomplete History of Protest: Selections from the Whitney's Collection, 1940-2017," an examination of how artists have addressed sociopolitical issues. It was curated by David Breslin, Jennie Goldstein and Rujeko Hockley with David Kiehl and Margaret Kross. It will remain on view indefinitely.

Listeners may wish to see more about Nengudi in the Hammer Museum's digital archive for the 2012 exhibition "Now Dig This! Art and Black Los Angeles, 1960-80."

See images of work discussed on the program at manpodcast.com. 

Episode No. 330 of The Modern Art Notes Podcast features artist Jill Magid and archaeologist Thomas Wynn.

Jill Magid is included in the season's two most prominent group shows: "Stories of Almost Everyone," which is at the Hammer Museum through May 6, and "Art in the Age of the Internet, 1989 to Today," at the ICA Boston through May 20. "Stories," curated by Aram Moshayedi, is about our willingness (or not?) to believe the stories offered by works of contemporary art. Its catalogue was published by the Hammer and Delmonico Prestel.

The ICA Boston's show is the first major American examination of how the internet has influenced and impacted art-making. It was curated by Eva Respini with Jeffrey De Blois. Its catalogue was published by Yale University Press. (The ICA Boston is one of 14 area institutions to be examining the intersection of art and technology this season.)

Magid's work, presented as installation, sculpture, video installation or via the internet, often examines questions around surveillance, permission and consent. She's had solo shows at or has fulfilled commissions for the University Museum of Contemporary Art in Mexico City, the Berkeley Art Museum, The Intelligence Agency of the Netherlands, the Stedelijk, the Liverpool Biennial and plenty more.

Many of the works Magid and host Tyler Green discuss are presented on her website, including:

• Kissmask (1999);
• Lobby 7 (1999);
• Mirror Tools and Videos (2000-02);
• Surveillance Shoe (2000);
• System Azure Security Ornamentation (2002);
• Evidence Locker (project website) (2004);
• Composite (2005);
• Head (2005);
• Auto Portrait Pending (2005);
• Lincoln Ocean Victor Eddy (2007);
• The Spy Project (2005-10);
• Failed States (2011); and
• The Barragán Archives (ongoing).

On the second segment, University of Colorado at Colorado Springs archaeologist Thomas Wynn discusses "First Sculpture: Handaxe to Figure Stone," at the Nasher Sculpture Center. The exhibition presents ancient handaxes and figure stones as many as two million years old, and posits that their making was motivated by aesthetic decisions, which suggests that they may be considered works of art. Wynn co-curated the exhibition with artist and collector Tony Berlant. It's at the Nasher through April 28. The thought-provoking and beautiful catalogue was published by the Nasher, which offers it for $70.

Episode No. 329 features curators Lynette Roth and Mazie Harris.

Roth is the curator of "Inventur -- Art in Germany, 1943-55," which is at the Harvard Art Museums through June 3. It is the first exhibition to examine art made in Germany by artists who stayed in Germany throughout World War II. "Inventur" presents more than 160 works made by 50 artists, art made when Germans were forced to acknowledge and address the war, the Holocaust, their defeat and occupation by the Allies, and the beginning of the Cold War. The fascinating exhibition catalogue, which is full of new discoveries and analysis, was published by Yale University Press. Amazon offers it for $55.

Roth, the curator of the Busch-Reisinger Museum and the head of modern and contemporary art at HAM, was previously a guest on Episode No. 192, when she discussed her catalogue of the Saint Louis Art Museum's Max Beckmann collection.

On the second segment, J. Paul Getty Museum curator Mazie Harris discusses "Paper Promises: Early American Photography," which is at the Getty from Tuesday, February 27 through May 27. The exhibition examines why daguerreotypes-loving Americans were so much slower to embrace paper photography than other nations, and what prompted the belated switch. The terrific catalogue for the exhibition is full of surprising history and is published by the Getty. Amazon lists it at $50.

Episode No. 328 of The Modern Art Notes Podcast features artists Deborah Luster and curator Béatrice Gross.

Deborah Luster is featured in Aperture magazine's spring issue, titled "Prison Nation". It spotlights how artists have responded to America's astronomical incarceration rate. The magazine will feature a suite of pictures Luster made in 2013 at Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola, a maximum-security prison. They show actors in The Life of Jesus Christ, a passion play staged by prisoners for the general public. Luster's photographs are also on view in Aperture's New York gallery, which is showing pictures from the issue through March 7.

Concurrently, Luster's work with poet C. D. Wright is on view in "The Art of Collaboration," an exhibition at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University. The exhibition examines how separate elements may come together to make projects deeper and more meaningful. Curated by Melissa Barton, Elizabeth Frengel and Nancy Kuhl, it will be on view through April 15.

Luster's work has most often looked at circles of violence and how they perpetuate themselves. Her work, including portraits of Louisiana prisoners and of places in New Orleans where homicides were committed, is in the collections of dozens of museums such as the Whitney Museum of American Art, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

On the second segment, curator Béatrice Gross discusses her exhibition "François Morellet," which is at Dia's Beacon and Chelsea locations through June 2. Morellet was a pioneering conceptualist whose abstract work was often built around systems and, later, randomness. This is the first in-depth examination of Morellet's work in the United States in over three decades. Gross's exhibition brochure is available for free download.

Episode No. 327 of The Modern Art Notes Podcasts features artists Deborah Roberts and Anita Witek.

The Spelman College Museum of Art is showing "Deborah Roberts: The Evolution of Mimi" through May 19. The exhibition features work Roberts has made in the last half-decade, work that uses collage and girlhood to examine issues of race, gender, and America's present condition. It was curated by Andrea Barnwell. San Francisco's Jenkins Johnson Gallery just opened an exhibition of Roberts's work called "Uninterrupted." It's on view through March 17.

Deborah Roberts was recently included in the group exhibition "Fictions" at the The Studio Museum in Harlem. Her work is in the collections of the Studio Museum, the Blanton at the University of T exas, and the Block Museum of Art at Northwestern University.

The Spelman College Museum has uploaded a conversation between Barnwell and Roberts. Part one is here.

On the second segment, Anita Witek discusses her new installation at the Wexner Center for the Arts. The work, titled Clip, is Witek's first site-specific photomontage to be shown in the United States. It's on view at the Wexner through April 15. Witek has previously shown at the Kunsthaus Wien, the Kunsthalle Graz, at the Leopold Museum and at many other European venues.

Episode No. 326 of The Modern Art Notes Podcast features curators Betsy Kornhauser and Joel Smith.

Along with Tim Barringer, Kornhauser  is the co-curator of "Thomas Cole's Journey: Atlantic Crossings," which is at the Metropolitan Museum of Art through May 13. The exhibition examines Cole's origins in the north of England during the Industrial Revolution and the impact Britain and travels through England and Italy had on Cole's career. The exhibition is the first time Cole's work has been examined in the context of Cole's European experiences and aims to present Cole as not just an American figure, but as a trans-Atlantic figure. The outstanding exhibition catalogue was published by the Met and is distributed by Yale University Press. Amazon offers it for $65.

On the second segment, Smith discusses "Peter Hujar: Speed of Life." The exhibition, on view at The Morgan Library through May 20, includes 140 photographs and surveys Hujar's entire career. The exhibition catalogue, published by Aperture, is easily the most important publication about Hujar. Amazon sells it for $34.