Episode No. 779 of The Modern Art Notes Podcast is a holiday weekend clips show featuring artist Stacy Kranitz.

This week Terrible Baby Books is publishing Kranitz's Ain't No Grave Gonna Hold My Body Down, a new book that examines the evolving representation of the Appalachian mountaineer, tracing how poverty in the region has been constructed, challenged, and reimagined over time. Work in the book will be exhibited this fall at the Biennale Images Vevey in Vevey, Switzerland, The Contemporary Dayton, in Dayton, Ohio, and at The Gallatin Galleries, New York University. Ain't No Grave is available from Terrible Baby for $70.

Kranitz's work, primarily made in the southern Appalachian Mountains, presents the complexity and instability of a rugged region on which industry has preyed. Her work is in the collection of museums such as the National Gallery of Art, Washington, Harvard Art Museums, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Her sold-out 2022 book As it Was Give(n) to Me was published by Twin Palms and was shortlisted for a Paris Photo-Aperture First Photobook Award.

This episode was taped in 2023 when Kranitz was included in "A Long Arc: Photography and the American South since 1845" at the High Museum of Art, Atlanta. The exhibition considered the South as a forger of American identity and examines how Southern photographers have contributed to both the advance of their medium, and the US project. It was curated by Gregory J. Harris and Sarah Kennel.

For images and links to images, please see Episode No. 620.

Instagram: Stacy Kranitz, Tyler Green.

Air date: October 8. 2026.

Episode No. 778 features artist Celeste Rapone.

The MCA Chicago is presenting "Atrium Project: Celeste Rapone" in the museum's two-story entrance space through Jun 20, 2027. The presentation was organized by Jamillah James with Korina Hernandez.

Rapone's work centers domesticity, intimacy, and daily life, particularly as experienced by women. She has been included in exhibitions at the Institute of Contemporary Art Boston and the Georgia Museum of Art; her work is in the collection of the Hammer Museum, University of California, Los Angeles, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Speed Art Museum, Louisville, and the Pérez Art Museum Miami (promised).

Instagram: Celeste Rapone, Tyler Green.

Air date: October 1, 2026.

Episode No. 777 of The Modern Art Notes Podcast features artist Jitish Kallat.

The Menil Drawing Institute is presenting "Wall Drawing: Series: Jitish Kallat" through August 8, 2027. For the exhibition Kallat has produced a site-specific wall drawing that grows out of his years-long engagement with Project A119, a partly declassified 1958 US Air Force plan to detonate a nuclear bomb on the moon. The drawing Kallat has made for the MDI, Wall Drawing / Redux: A119, presents enlarged images derived from Kallat's 2025 Accordion of Drawings / Project A119 / Early Intuitions, in which watercolors evoke an unrealized Cold War story of ambition, secrecy, and the exporting of global violence to the moon. The presentation was curated by Edouard Kopp.

Kallat's work often blends the intimate and specific and the immense, and references history, science, time, and philosophy. He has exhibited at institutions such as the Art Institute of Chicago, the Art Gallery of New South Wales, the Tate Modern, London, and the Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, and he has participated in biennials in Venice, Gwangju, Havana, and more.

Works discussed on the program and extensively documented on Kallat's website include:

• Epilogue, 2011;
• Public Notice 3, 2010;
• Covering Letter (Terrum Nuncius), 2018-20;
• "I draw, therefore I think" (curatorial project); and
• Conjectures on a Paper Sky, 2025.

Instagram: Jitish Kallat, Tyler Green.

Air date: September 24, 2026.

Episode No. 765 is a holiday clips episode featuring artist Hew Locke.

The Museum of Fine Arts Houston is presenting "Hew Locke: Passages," the first US survey of Locke's career, through September 13. Across sculpture, painting, photography and installations, Locke's work considers colonialism, its power, and the ways in which we respond to colonialism and its impacts. Locke, who is Guyanese-British, particularly focuses on British imperialism and how it was constructed, including through monarchy, trade, and (sometimes forced) migration. The show was curated by Martina Droth. The catalogue, which was edited by Droth and Allie Biswas, was published by the YCBA. Bookshop and Amazon offer it for $60-70. In-gallery materials are available here in both English and Spanish.

Locke's work has been featured in solo exhibitions at The British Museum, London, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Tate Britain, London, the Institute of Contemporary Art / Boston, Pérez Art Museum Miami, and more.

In addition to the images below, here are links to works and exhibitions discussed on the program:

• Hew Locke, Ark, 1994.
• Hew Locke, Menace to Society (series), 1999-2001.
• Hew Locke, The Nameless, 2010.
• "Hew Locke: what have we here" at the British Museum;
• "A Conspiracy of Icons: The Art of Donald Locke," at the High Museum of Art, Atlanta; and
• "The Other Story: Afro-Asian Artists in Post-War Britain" at the Hayward Gallery, London.

Instagram: Hew Locke, Tyler Green.

Air date: July 2, 2026.

Episode No. 766 of The Modern Art Notes Podcast features curators Matthew Affron, Michelle Kuo, and Ann Temkin, and artist Nic Nicosia.

The Museum of Modern Art, New York is presenting "Marcel Duchamp" through August 22. The exhibition, the first Duchamp retrospective in the United States since 1973, features over 300 works from across Duchamp's career. The show was curated by Affron, Kuo, and Temkin, with assistance from with Alexandra "Lo" Drexelius, Helena Klevorn, Danielle Cooke, and Julia Vázquez. MoMA has published a catalogue for the show; Amazon offers it for $63.

The Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas is showing "Nic Nicosia: Everyday Surreal" through August 16. The exhibition surveys the last 25 years of Nicosia's career (the period since a 1999-2000 mid-career retrospective) a time during which he has particularly focused on sculpture, films, and drawing. The exhibition was curated by Jed Morse. The Nasher has published a valuable catalogue of the exhibition. It is available from the museum.

Air date: July 9, 2026.

Episode No. 767 features artist Young Joon Kwak and curator Laura Igoe.

Kwak is featured in the 2026 Whitney Biennial at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. Curated by Drew Sawyer and Marcela Guerrero with assistance from Beatriz Cifuentes and Carina Martinez, it's on view through August 23.

Kwak uses sculpture, performance, and collective action to explore bodily transformation, intimacy, and the politics of visibility. Through visually lush, often highly detailed sculptures, Kwak challenges traditional and dominant modes of representation while manifesting ways that trans and queer bodies might be seen. Kwak is the co-founder of Mutant Salon and lead performer in the electronic-dance-noise band Xina Xurner with Marvin Astorga. They have had solo exhibitions at museums such as the Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive, University of California, Berkeley; the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art, New York; and ARKO Art Center, Seoul. Kwak's work is in the collections of BAMPFA, the Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento; the Dallas Museum of Art; the Speed Art Museum, Louisville; and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

Igoe is the curator of "The Crossing: Picturing the American Revolution" at the Michener Art Museum, Doylestown, Penn. The exhibition looks at how artists have represented Continental Army commander-in-chief George Washington's crossing of the Delaware River on Christmas night, 1776. Upon reaching the New Jersey side of the river, Washington and his troops would attack carousing Hessian mercenary soldiers fighting for the British, earning a pivotal victory for the Patriots. "The Crossing" is particularly interested in how artists have built on and 'refuted' Emanuel Leutze's famed 1851 Washington Crossing the Delaware, which is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. The exhibition is on view through January 10, 2027.

As discussed on the program:

• Kwak's Glitter Mani Festo.

Igoe was a guest on Episode No. 732, when she discussed her election to the Jenkintown, Penn. school board.

Instagram: Young Joon Kwak, Laura Igoe, Tyler Green.

Air date: July 16, 2026.

Episode No. 768 features artist Derrick Adams.

The Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston is presenting "Derrick Adams: View Master" through September 7. It is the first mid-career survey of Adams' twenty-year career. The exhibition was curated by Dexter Wimberly and Tessa Bachi Haas. An Adams monograph was published by Monacelli in association with Gagosian, an art dealership chain, last year in anticipation of the exhibition.

Adams' work celebrates contemporary Black Life in works that emphasize joy and leisure. Among the institutions presenting solo exhibitions of his work are the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Hudson River Museum, Yonkers, NY, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver. His work is in collection of museums such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond; the Studio Museum in Harlem; and Adams' hometown Baltimore Museum of Art.

Series of Adams' work discussed on the program:

• Floater;
• Figure in the Urban Landscape;
• Profile Pics; and
• Family Portraits.

Instagram: Derrick Adams, Tyler Green.

Air date: July 23, 2026.

Episode No. 769 features a conversation with Betye Saar recorded in 2016. Saar died on Sunday a few days short of her one hundredth birthday.

Saar, known especially for her use of assemblage and her often pioneering address of complicated and often troubling US, and diasporic African and Caribbean histories, was one of the most influential artists of the last 60 years. Generations of artists, including Saar's artist-daughters Lezley and Alison, have found Saar's work foundational.

Even though Saar was recognized around the world as among the most influential artists of late-twentieth and early twenty-first century United States, remarkably, shamefully, and revealingly, none of Saar's hometown art museums ever launched a retrospective of her work.

Saar was a guest on The Modern Art Notes Podcast in 2016 on the occasion of a survey of her work organized by De Domijnen (which was formerly known as Museum Het Domein) in Sittard, the Netherlands in partnership with Scottsdale (Ariz.) Museum of Contemporary Art. For images of artworks discussed in this conversation, see Episode No. 222.

Air date: July 30, 2026.