Spring 2023 Issue

Hans Ulrich obrist’s
questionnaire:
joy williams

In this ongoing series, curator Hans Ulrich Obrist has devised a set of thirty-seven questions that invite artists, authors, musicians, and other visionaries to address key elements of their lives and creative practices. Respondents make a selection from the larger questionnaire and reply in as many or as few words as they desire. For the first installment of 2023, we are honored to present the author Joy Williams.

<p>Joy Williams in Amherst, Massachusetts, 2016. Photo: Jonno Rattman</p>

Joy Williams in Amherst, Massachusetts, 2016. Photo: Jonno Rattman

Joy Williams in Amherst, Massachusetts, 2016. Photo: Jonno Rattman

Hans Ulrich ObristWhat is the role of titles?

Joy WilliamsTitles should be at the end of stories or concealed within them somehow. And prove to surprise or complicate the reader’s conclusions.

HUOWhat keeps you coming back to the studio?

JWI still harbor the hope (possibly delusion) that I might be able to create something marvelous through effort, chance, or inspiration.

HUOWhat is your unrealized project?

JWWriting hymns in the manner of the great Welsh hymnist William Williams.

HUOWhat have you forgotten?

JWHow to tan. I was once an expert. A true natural. Much admired.

HUOHow would you like to die?

JWWell, after reading sister Alicia’s research on the subject in Cormac McCarthy’s ”Stella Maris”, certainly not by drowning.

HUOHas the computer changed the way you work?

JWI’ve never used a computer. I think it would take an immediate and intense dislike to me.

HUOThe future is . . . ?

JW That which was ever intended.

HUOWhat ought to change?

JWExperimentation on animals must stop. The whole ghastly system—breeders—labs—vivisectors—should be shut down.

HUOWhat music are you listening to?

JWGlenn Gould playing anything. Albert Schweitzer on the organ. The piano music of G. I. Gurdjieff and Thomas de Hartmann. The symphonic works of John Luther Adams.

Black-and-white portrait of Hans Ulrich Obrist

Hans Ulrich Obrist is artistic director of the Serpentine, London. He was previously the curator of the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris. Since his first show, World Soup (The Kitchen Show), in 1991, he has curated more than 350 exhibitions. Photo: Tyler Mitchell

See all Articles

Black-and-white portrait of Joy Williams

Joy Williams is the author of five novels, most recently Harrow (2021); four collections of stories; and Ill Nature (2001), an essay collection that was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Her many honors include the Rea Award for the Short Story and the Strauss Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She was elected to the academy in 2008. She lives in Tucson, Arizona, and Laramie, Wyoming. Photo: Jonno Rattman

On Anselm Kiefer’s Photography

On Anselm Kiefer’s Photography

Sébastien Delot is director of conservation and collections at the Musée national Picasso–Paris and the organizer of the first retrospective to focus on Anselm Kiefer’s use of photography, which was held at Lille Métropole Musée d’art moderne, d’art contemporain et d’art brut (Musée LaM) in Villeneuve-d’Ascq, France. He recently sat down with Gagosian director of photography Joshua Chuang to discuss the exhibition Anselm Kiefer: Punctum at Gagosian, New York. Their conversation touched on Kiefer’s exploration of photography’s materials, processes, and expressive potentials, and on the alchemy of his art.

The Art of the Olympics: An Interview with Yasmin Meichtry

The Art of the Olympics: An Interview with Yasmin Meichtry

The Olympic and Paralympic Games arrive in Paris on July 26. Ahead of this momentous occasion, Yasmin Meichtry, associate director at the Olympic Foundation for Culture and Heritage, Lausanne, Switzerland, meets with Gagosian senior director Serena Cattaneo Adorno to discuss the Olympic Games’ long engagement with artists and culture, including the Olympic Museum, commissions, and the collaborative two-part exhibition, The Art of the Olympics, being staged this summer at Gagosian, Paris.

BRONX BODEGA Basel

BRONX BODEGA Basel

On the occasion of Art Basel 2024, creative agency Villa Nomad joins forces with Ghetto Gastro, the Bronx-born culinary collective by Jon Gray, Pierre Serrao, and Lester Walker, to stage the interdisciplinary pop-up BRONX BODEGA Basel. The initiative brings together food, art, design, and a series of live events at the Novartis Campus, Basel, during the course of the fair. Here, Jon Gray from Ghetto Gastro and Sarah Quan from Villa Nomad tell the Quarterly’s Wyatt Allgeier about the project.

Jane Fonda: On Art for a Safe and Healthy California

Jane Fonda: On Art for a Safe and Healthy California

Art for a Safe and Healthy California is a benefit exhibition and auction jointly presented by Jane Fonda, Gagosian, and Christie’s to support the Campaign for a Safe and Healthy California. Here, Fonda speaks with Gagosian Quarterly’s Gillian Jakab about bridging culture and activism, the stakes and goals of the campaign, and the artworks featured in the exhibition.

Laguna~B

Laguna~B

An interview with Marcantonio Brandolini d’Adda, artist, designer, and CEO and art director of the Venice-based glassware company Laguna~B.

Frank Stella

Frank Stella

In celebration of the life and work of Frank Stella, the Quarterly shares the artist’s last interview from our Summer 2024 issue. Stella spoke with art historian Megan Kincaid about friendship, formalism, and physicality.

Hold a World: Lucinda Chua

Hold a World: Lucinda Chua

Multi-instrumentalist, singer, songwriter, and composer Lucinda Chua meets with writer Dhruva Balram to reflect on the response to her debut album YIAN (2023).

That Carousel of Thought: Lonnie Holley

That Carousel of Thought: Lonnie Holley

Lonnie Holley’s self-taught musical and artistic practice utilizes a strategy of salvage to recontextualize his past lives. His new album, Oh Me Oh My, is the latest rearticulation of this biography.

Richard Armstrong

Richard Armstrong

Richard Armstrong, director emeritus of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and Foundation, joins the Quarterly’s Alison McDonald to discuss his election to the board of the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, as well as the changing priorities and strategies of museums, foundations, and curators. He reflects on his various roles within museums and recounts his first meeting with Frankenthaler.

Wayne McGregor

Wayne McGregor

Alice Godwin speaks with the choreographer about his inspirations from literature, visual art, music, and more.

Willem de Kooning and Italy

Willem de Kooning and Italy

In tandem with the 60th Biennale di Venezia, the city’s Gallerie dell’Accademia is featuring the exhibition Willem de Kooning and Italy, an in-depth examination of the artist’s time in Italy and of the influence of that experience on his work. On September 20 of last year, the curators of the exhibition, the American Gary Garrels and the Italian Mario Codognato, engaged in a lengthy conversation about the exhibition for a press conference at the museum. An edited transcript of that conversation is published below for the first time.

Oscar Murillo: Marks and Whispers

Oscar Murillo: Marks and Whispers

Ahead of two exhibitions—The Flooded Garden at Tate Modern, London, and Marks and Whispers at Gagosian, Rome—curator Alessandro Rabottini visited Oscar Murillo’s London studio to discuss the connections between them.