ART FICTIONS

About ART FICTIONS

ART FICTIONS is a monthly, contemporary art meets literature programme, created by artist Jillian Knipe. Each guest artist selects a piece of fiction, which we both explore, then use as a lens through which to view their artwork. We delve into the book‘s themes, context and characters, which opens up and steers a rich conversation about the artist‘s practice. The podcast bounces back and forth between art and text, all the while focussing on the ideas which govern both. It is a way of talking alongside art, rather than directly at it, getting close and personal with the origins of artistic ideas. Hosting is shared amongst a small group of artists, critics and curators, and artists are selected based on each host's area of specific interest. Support via PATREON (http://patreon.com/ARTFICTIONSPODCAST) or BUY ME A COFFEE (http://buymeacoffee.com/artfictionspodcast) and follow Art Fictions on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/artfictionspodcast?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet&igsh=ZDNlZDc0MzIxNw==) for images of works and links.

Publisher

Jillian Knipe

Category

arts

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

26 May 2020

Latest episode

24 Sept 2026

Latest episodes

65 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   24 Sept 2026

   Dual Characteristics and Naive Wonder (CLAIRE BREWSTER)

   Guest artist CLAIRE BREWSTER joins painter and producer JILLIAN KNIPE to discuss her practice via 'The Jeeves Collection' by P G Wodehouse. First published as a book by George Newnes in 1919, it tells of the daily interactions between a highly competent valet - Reginald Jeeves – who is referred to as Jeeves – and his wealthy, idle master - Bertie Wooster. Bertie and his chums are constantly getting into a pickle and Jeeves is constantly getting them out. Each story describes the interplay between dreaming and order in a timeless world. Claire and Jillian talk about freedom, drifters, sprites, storytelling, menopause, dreamers, timelessness, tinkety tonk, interior design, unhelpful thinking, fantasy worlds, growing up, delayed gratification, art consultants, murmurations of starlings, Day of the Dead and relationships in a chocolate bar. CLAIRE BREWSTER clairebrewster.com @claire_brewster Claire Brewster Artist ARTISTS + DESIGNERS + PERFORMERS Dirk Bogard Francisco de Zurbarán Frida Khalo Jonathan Cecil Jorgé Canete Kiki Smith Stephen Fry BOOKS + WRITERS Enid Blyton 'The Magic Faraway Tree' Harold Pinter Lewis Caroll 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' P G Wodehouse 'My Man Jeeves' Robin Maugham 'The Servant' William Somerset Maugham ART ORGANISATIONS + ASSOCIATES Sigrid Kirk Turps Banana

2. 

   20 Jul 2026

   Eco-mythical Exploration and Poetic Science (QIAN QIAN)

   Guest artist QIAN QIAN joins independent curator, consultant and Reike instructor BECCA PELLY-FRY to discuss her work via 'Cosmicomics' by Italo Calvino. First published in Italian in 1965 and in English in 1968, Cosmicomics is a collection of short stories, mostly circling around a character called Qfwfq, which connect to real events in the history of the universe. Becca and Qian Qian talk about parody, craters, peduncles, dinosaurs, fingernails, eclipses, tadpoles, surrealism, flipping, bitumen, seahorses, lentils, cartilage, honey, moulds, pollens, worms, resin, pepper, gravity, acrobatics , Galileo, astrophysics , labyrinth, apparatus, trilobites , embyro, starch crystals, sturgeon eggs, gelatinous matter, mineral salts, combustion residue, scabby terrain, Big Bang , scientific theory, amazing creativity, deep time, human urgency , banal mundanity, Milky Way, judging others, zinc cliffs, moon milk, imaginative worlds, Chinese medicine, resolution changes, zombie movie Monty Python, watercolor paintings, Scottish countryside, scientific imagery, hero's journey , space bodies, celestial bodies, measuring devices, zen philosophy, black hole, sepia tint, spiritual rebirth, cosmic egg , world building, participatory art, energetic realm, spiritual journey, drinking whiskey, evolutionary biology, invisible radiation, ancient civilization, traditional Buddhism, dusk til dawn, the Italian resistance, grumpy old men, thousand armed being, flights of fancy, pillars of ice, reasoning and logic, stream of consciousness, cosmic know-it-all, climbing onto the moon, being dragged into the story, combining science and literature, the dream inside the dream inside the dream, and the light of near-death experiences. QIAN QIAN qianqianart.org @ivyivymuami 'Fountains of Enceladus' Lychee One 30 April - 30 May 2026 'La Mariposa (Butterfly Woman)' Soho Revue 12 Feb - 15 March 2025 BECCA PELLY-FRY beccapellyfry.com @beccapf 'La Mariposa' ARTISTS Cecilia Charlton Holly Stevenson Lee Bontecue Leonora Carrington Marina Abramovic Takis (Panayiotis Vassilakis) William Blake BOOKS + FILM + WRITERS Alejandro Jodorowsky 'The Spiritual Journey of Alejandro Jodorowsky' Alejandro Jodorowsky 'The Holy Mountain' Clarissa Pinkola Estês 'Women Who Run with the Wolves' Galileo Galilei Italo Calvino 'If On a Winter's Night a Stranger' Italo Calvino 'Invisible Cities' Julio Cortázar 'Cronopios Famas' Monty Python 'Life of Brian' GALLERIES + EVENTS Gallery 66 Lychee One Open Art Folke Soho Revue

3. 

   17 Jun 2026

   Self Otherness and Hybrid Beings (HOLLY STEVENSON)

   Guest artist HOLLY STEVENSON joins Freud Museum curator VANESSA BONI and JILLIAN KNIPE to discuss her work via 'Down Below' by Leonora Carrington. The original manuscript was "lost", so it was re-written via dictation and first published in 1944 in the surrealist journal VVV. Having fled from Nazi occupied France after her lover Max Ernst was arrested, the book describes first hand Carrington's traumatic confinement in a mental institution in Spain and her escape, eventually settling in Mexico City. It also connects directly with her 1940 painting of the same name. We discuss hybrids, psychosis, illness, seamstresses, figurines, transference, trauma, worms, bedsheets, potency, alchemy, lucidity, fetishes, limbs, candy, autofiction, worms, visions, rebirth, Oedipus, transference, psychoanalysis, surrealism, netsuki, genius, creative coherence, brutal rape, civil war, role reversals, mythological beasts, defending insanity, hearing ghosts, colour shifts, inner transformation, wild tiger, symptomatic gut, dynamic unconscious, mythic underworld, female identity, symbolic structures, being celiac, the drive to create, Nazi occupied France, the surrealist imagination, borders of knowledge, structure of the unconscious, orange blossom poisoning, green as a magic colour, the studio and the couch, the Santander sketchbooks, and alternative ways of engaging with reality. 'Leonora Carrington: The Symptomatic Surreal' curated by Vanessa Boni at Freud Museum 25 March - 10 August 2026 HOLLY STEVENSON holly-stevenson.co.uk @holly_stevenson MAC Museum of Contemporary Art Gibellina City of Culture The Sainsbury Centre RAMM The Royal Albert Memorial in Exeter 3 Oct 2026 - 21 Feb 2027 'Living Labrynths: Art and Fungi' 'Holly Stevenson: Tracing the Irretraceable' 14 May - 29 June 2025 including essays by Elizabeth Fullerton, Sharon Kivland and Emily Steer 'The Debate' Frieze 2023 curated by Fatos Üstek 'Another Mother' 2022 The Artist's Garden 'Mother Art Prize' 2020 ARTISTS Daniel Buren Dorothea Tanning Leonora Carrington Louise Bourgeois Max Ernst Tracey Emin Salvador Dali BOOKS + WRITERS + THEORISTS Ali Smith Professor Alyce Mahon Archive for Research in Archetypal Symbolism 'Book of Symbols' Carl Jung Jane McAdam Freud Leonora Carrington 'The Debutante', 'The Hearing Trumpet', 'The Oval Lady' Marina Warner Mikhail Bulgakov 'The Master and Margharita' Pierre Mabille Prophecy Cole 'The Shadow of the Second Mother' Sigmund Freud 'The Interpretation of Dreams' GALLERIES + GALLERISTS + INSTITUTIONS The Artists' Garden created by Claire Mander at thecolab.art support via change.org 'Long Live the Artist's Garden' Faro Santander supported by Fundación Banco Santander Freud Museum National Gallery Edinburgh Peggy Guggenheim Tate Gallery

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

4.0 / 5

1 ratings

Spotify

5.0 / 5

1 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 18 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

24

Social presence

0

YouTube

0

Engagement

32

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Guest appearances

Does not typically book guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.