The Library: Archived Writings

Political

A New Mount Rushmore for a World on the Brink?
July 02, 2020 | TomDispatch

An Epic Wall Piece That Confronts Climate Change
January 24, 2019 | The New York Times

On the Coming Illegitimacy of the Supreme Court
September 19, 2018 | TheNation.com, by way of Project Syndicate

Prince Igor and Judge Gorsuch
April 03, 2017 | Democracy in Crisis

The Passing of the Great Cardinal Arns of Sao Paulo
February 03, 2017 | The Nation

A Conversation with Laura Kipnis
November 09, 2016 | NeueHouse

We Didn’t Have Politicians Up To the Task
November 09, 2016 | In conversation with Kanan Makiya

Trump at the Public Trough
October 31, 2016 | Lawrence Weschler with Gerri Davis

Do Unto Others: The Migration Crisis, Climate Change & the New Normal
July 04, 2015 | Salon.com

Terrorizing a Family of Human Rights Champions
September 11, 2014 | Truthdig, September 11, 2014

“Destroy This Mad Brute” The African Roots of World War I
August 21, 2014 | The Believer Magazine, September 2014

Gaza Triptych
August 04, 2014 | Truthdig

Of Baby Eagles and Human Prospects
June 27, 2014 | Truthdig

On James Baldwin
June 01, 2014 | Brooklyn Rail

Bahraini activist’s triumphant return
January 11, 2013 | Salon

A worthy, necessary Nobel honoring the Arab Spring
January 10, 2013 | Salon

A Guy Can Dream, Can’t He? Part 2
October 24, 2012 | Huffington Post

Time to Start Preoccupying Wall Street
December 09, 2011 | Truthdig

Tomgram: The Great American Shakedown
November 01, 2011 | TomDispatch.com

A Guy Can Dream, Can’t He?
October 27, 2011 | Huffington Post

Sentries
October 22, 2011 | Uncanny Valley

Exceptional Cases in Rome
October 22, 2011 | Uncanny Valley

Economy: The trouble with bubbles
May 23, 2010 | L.A. Times

International Humanitarian Law: An Overview
November 28, 2007 | Crimes of War

A Final Thought on Intelligent Design—and a Modest Proposal
April 01, 2006 | Virginia Quarterly Review


Arts & Politics

Discussing Ethiopia and artist Elias Sime with Maaza Mengiste
March 31, 2021 |

On artist and disability activist Riva Lehrer
November 08, 2020 | A contribution to Lehrer's new memoir Golem Girl

Scylla and Charybdis: On Truly Engaging Climate Change
October 15, 2020 | Two recent articles

A New Mount Rushmore for a World on the Brink?
July 02, 2020 | TomDispatch

An Epic Wall Piece That Confronts Climate Change
January 24, 2019 | The New York Times

A Convergence of Jews, Poles, & Pigs
August 15, 2018 | The Believer

In conversation with Jorge Tacla
December 28, 2017 | Catalog to Tacla show in Santiago - 2017

The Fraught Crossroads
October 22, 2017 | where race and class keep intersecting across American History, and who gets to address them

The Whitney in Black and White
April 24, 2017 | Project Syndicate

Dogged by Trees
November 07, 2016 | Artenol

A Conversation with Ramiro Gomez
May 31, 2016 | NeueHouse

Exiles in Paradise:  Hitler’s Cultural Refugees in LA in the thirties and forties
March 05, 2016 | Gagosian Gallery, February 2018

In conversation with Liza Lou about Beading in South Africa
February 22, 2016 | Neue Journal

Salome Lamas’ El Dorado XXI
January 11, 2016 | Artenol #3, Summer 2016

The Art of Ramiro Gomez
December 15, 2015 | The New York Times

Kienholz’s “Five Car Stud”
November 11, 2015 | at the Fraught Crossroads where Class, Race, Sex & Violence keep intersecting in America

A Thought Experiment Arising from a Consideration of Ed Kienholz’s Proposed Non-War Memorial
September 29, 2014 | Glasstire

Tomaselli’s Times
May 30, 2014 | Virginia Quarterly Review

Here in America: An Exchange on Transgressive Art, Censorship, Abuse, and Family
May 04, 2013 | The Believer

Memory and 9/11
August 07, 2011 | The Chronicle of Higher Education

The Hyperbolic Crochet Coral Reef
June 01, 2011 | Virginia Quarterly Review

The Emperor’s Deathbed: An Exchange
January 17, 2008 | Virginia Quarterly Review

Fevered Imagination
April 19, 2007 | The Nation

On the Art of the Disappeared
March 05, 2007 | The Believer, March 2007

A Berlin Epiphany
November 17, 2006 | Virginia Quarterly Review

The Graphics of Solidarity
January 17, 2006 | Virginia Quarterly Review

Valkyries Over Iraq—The Trouble with War Movies
November 11, 2005 | Harper's Magazine


Arts

A Conversation about Robert Irwin’s Getty Garden with Jim Cuno
July 11, 2021 | The Getty Foundation

Conversation with Federico Solmi
July 11, 2021 | Luis de Jesus Gallery, LA

Humanity vs (or within) Nature: Ren with artists Opdyke, Redniss, Chalmers and Prosek
April 07, 2021 | MANA Contemporary

Discussing Ethiopia and artist Elias Sime with Maaza Mengiste
March 31, 2021 |

On Larry McMurtry,  Kabbalah, and Why I Can’t Write Fiction
March 31, 2021 | The New Yorker, August 26, 1985

On artist and disability activist Riva Lehrer
November 08, 2020 | A contribution to Lehrer's new memoir Golem Girl

The Uncanny Tale of Shimmel Zohar
September 07, 2020 | The Atlantic

Robert Irwin: A Valedictory Show
February 13, 2020 | The New York Times

Tristan Duke Part 1: The Magus in His Youth
February 04, 2019 | Fabrik

An Epic Wall Piece That Confronts Climate Change
January 24, 2019 | The New York Times

Remembering Ricky Jay
December 02, 2018 | McSweeney's

The record smashing Hockney Auction
November 11, 2018 | The Atlantic

Abelardo Morell’s Flowers for Lisa
November 10, 2018 | The New York Times

Jessica Anne Schwartz & the art of the spoon
July 03, 2018 | The Paris Review

Natalie Frank does O
May 23, 2018 | A catalog conversation

Hidden Noses Across Art History
May 12, 2018 | The Paris Review

Matthew Shlian at Tamarind
April 26, 2018 | Catalogue essay

The End is Here! Melamid’s Asshole
April 06, 2018 | The Paris Review

Hockney at Pace
March 18, 2018 | Catalog essay

Erwin Redl in Madison Square Park
March 17, 2018 | 2018 Catalog essay

A Human Camera Obscura at the NYPL
February 21, 2018 | New York Magazine

Ren anchors a celebration of David Hockney at 80
September 06, 2017 | The J. Paul Getty Museum

Art and Science as Parallel and Divergent Ways of Knowing
January 30, 2017 | University of Wyoming

At Long Last - Robert Irwin in Marfa
December 19, 2016 | Modern Painters

Bill Morrison in Dawson City
September 15, 2016 | Vanity Fair

Wonder Quartet
June 26, 2016 | Renwick Gallery, Samuel P. Harn Museum, MASS MoCA, RISD

A Conversation about Walter Hopps
June 13, 2016 | NeueHouse

A Conversation with Ramiro Gomez
May 31, 2016 | NeueHouse

The Sense of Movement: When Artists Travel
January 24, 2016 | Hatje Cantz, BMW Art Journey Series

On Wonder
November 23, 2015 | Intro to the catalog for a show at the Renwick/Smithsonian, Washington, DC

Art as Philosophical Practice
October 02, 2015 | Weschler in Conversation with Alva Noë, from the Strange Pilgrims catalog, Austin Contemporary

Michael Delgado interviews Lawrence Weschler
June 19, 2015 | Art Report Today

Ernst Toch - my grandfather the forgotten composer who fled the Nazis
June 19, 2015 | The Guardian

The Metabolic Studio’s Liminal Camera
June 15, 2015 | Catalog essay, De Paul University Art Gallery, Chicago

Laurie Olinder: Paper Falls and Other Natural Wonders
May 30, 2015 | Greenwich Academy

Pillow of Air: Poolside with David Hockney, Richard Feynman, a pair of Twins and some Bugs
March 15, 2015 | Glasstire

In conversation with Latino artist Ramiro Gomez
January 26, 2015 | Chicago Humanities Festival, November 2015

Ren in conversation with Rob Storr on Louise Bourgeois and Alberto Savinio
January 08, 2015 | Center for Modern Italian Art, Oct 24, 2017

Theo Jansen’s Lumbering Life-Forms Arrive in America
December 06, 2014 | The New York Times, Nov. 26, 2014

The Kindergarten of the Avant Garde
August 03, 2014 | Glasstire

Variations on a theme by Duchamp
June 04, 2014 | Glasstire

In conversation with April Gornik
May 18, 2014 | Drawings, April Gornik, FigureGround Press, New York, 2014

On the film 52 Tuesdays
May 01, 2014 | The Monthly

Vermeer and the Hapsburgs
April 25, 2014 | Minneapolis Institute of Arts

David Hockney’s Timescapes - Reinventing Modern Art in the Shadow of Mortality
November 01, 2013 | Virginia Quarterly Review

A Conversation with Melbourne Video Artist Daniel Crooks
October 10, 2013 | Anne and Gordon Samstag Museum of Art Publication, June/August 2013

Radical Filmmaker Adam Curtis Storms the Armory With Massive Attack
September 23, 2013 | New York Magazine

Problems with Authority: Gerri Davis in conversation with Lawrence Weschler
September 17, 2013 | Bridge Gallery, NYC

Why David Hockney Has a Love-Hate Relationship With Technology
September 10, 2013 | Smithsonian Magazine

On Fictions of the Pose in Alice Neel and Harry Berger
November 05, 2010 | The Believer

Jesus Christ! On the Rampancy of Christological Convergences Across the Western Pictorial Tradition
June 01, 2010 | Siennese Shredder

Double Vision: The Art of Trevor and Ryan Oakes
August 01, 2009 | Virginia Quarterly Review

David Hockney: A Return to Painting
November 17, 2008 | Virginia Quarterly Review

Embeddedness: Robert Irwin in His Seventies
April 17, 2008 | Virginia Quarterly Review

Unfinished: On Vincent Desiderio’s ‘Sleep’
November 09, 2005 | Virginia Quarterly Review

On Edward Snow, Breughel and Vermeer, Ganzfeld #3, 2003
March 12, 2003 | Ganzfeld #3, 2003


Interviews of Others

The Uncanny Tale of Shimmel Zohar
September 07, 2020 | The Atlantic

The Road to Oliver’s
August 26, 2019 | LitHub.com

Tristan Duke Part 1: The Magus in His Youth
February 04, 2019 | Fabrik

In conversation with Jorge Tacla
December 28, 2017 | Catalog to Tacla show in Santiago - 2017

A Conversation with Laura Kipnis
November 09, 2016 | NeueHouse

A Conversation with Ramiro Gomez
May 31, 2016 | NeueHouse

A Conversation with Oliver Sacks
August 26, 2015 | The Lannan Center, 2007

Ren in conversation with Rob Storr on Louise Bourgeois and Alberto Savinio
January 08, 2015 | Center for Modern Italian Art, Oct 24, 2017

In conversation with April Gornik
May 18, 2014 | Drawings, April Gornik, FigureGround Press, New York, 2014

A Conversation with Melbourne Video Artist Daniel Crooks
October 10, 2013 | Anne and Gordon Samstag Museum of Art Publication, June/August 2013

Problems with Authority: Gerri Davis in conversation with Lawrence Weschler
September 17, 2013 | Bridge Gallery, NYC

Interviews from The Believer: The Art Guys
October 01, 2012 | The Believer

Errol Morris, Forensic Epistemologist
June 18, 2012 | Public Books

Zelig of the Left: Bill Zimmerman with Lawrence Weschler
November 01, 2011 | Brooklyn Rail

Interviews from The Believer: Lena Herzog
June 01, 2011 | The Believer

Interviews from The Believer: Margaret and Christine Wertheim
January 31, 2011 | The Believer

Interviews from The Believer: Michael Light
December 01, 2010 | The Believer

Interviews from The Believer: Ed Keinholz
April 01, 2004 | The Believer


My Grandfather and Other Emigres

Salka Viertel and the Exiles in Paradise
January 24, 2019 | The Kindness of Strangers

Exiles in Paradise:  Hitler’s Cultural Refugees in LA in the thirties and forties
March 05, 2016 | Gagosian Gallery, February 2018

Toch Geographical Fugue - Medical Version
June 24, 2014 |

Popocatepetl: A Noodling Reminiscence
January 01, 2003 | Threepenny Review

Paradise: The Southern California Idyll of Hitler’s Cultural Exiles
March 28, 1998 | exiles + emigrés - The Flight of European Artists from Hitler

From Hitler to Hollywood
March 28, 1997 | Los Angeles Magazine

My Grandfather’s Last Tale
December 01, 1996 | The Atlantic

20th Century Woman, Marta Feuchtwanger
September 14, 1979 | Reader, Los Angeles' Free Weekly


Miscellany

On Larry McMurtry,  Kabbalah, and Why I Can’t Write Fiction
March 31, 2021 | The New Yorker, August 26, 1985

Harry Berger, Jr., Some Thoughts on his Passing
March 25, 2021 |

CORONA                       A Polyphonal Braiding
June 04, 2020 | April-May 2020

Remembering Ricky Jay
December 02, 2018 | McSweeney's

Eclipse Wedding Rabbi
December 27, 2017 | McSweeney's 51 - December 2017

Ren with Walter Murch on Waves Passing in the Night
December 16, 2017 | The Hammer Museum

Lead Into Gold: Wresting something from nothing from alchemy through finance
December 07, 2016 | Blackboard talk

Planetary Systems Reconceived in “Musical” Terms
February 22, 2016 | Walter Murch

Early on with Oliver Sacks
September 01, 2015 | Vanity Fair

Ren’s Residency at Transom.org, 2004
April 04, 2014 | Transom

Discussing Sacks in Seattle
November 11, 2013 | Elliott Bay Book Store

Back to Kindergarten! A Modest Proposal for a College of the Future
January 24, 2013 | Public Books

And Yet… And Yet…
November 01, 2011 | Popular Science

The Light of LA
February 23, 1998 | The New Yorker

An early overview of the Getty in LA
December 07, 1997 | LA Times Magazine

Chances Are, It’s Friday the 13th
July 13, 1979 | The Reader

Baseball Bearings: Why The National Pastime Strikes So Close to Home
May 08, 1979 | Reader, Los Angeles' Free Weekly, May 25, 1979