Smithsonian’s Archives of American Art Announces ‘Articulated’ Season Four Showcasing Its Oral History Collection

Season 4 of “Articulated” chronicles the lives and work of ceramicist and textile artist Anita Fields (Osage), muralist Leo Tanguma, painter and photographer Lenore Chinn, and painter Pat Steir as they’ve navigated their careers over the decades

The Archives of American Art is launching a new season of “ARTiculated: Dispatches from the Archives of American Art,” highlighting artists who have continued to blaze their own trails. Through four thirty-minute monthly episodes, the series will spotlight four veteran artists: ceramicist and textile artist Anita Fields (Osage), muralist Leo Tanguma, painter and photographer Lenore Chinn, and painter Pat Steir. These artists showcase powerful combinations of experience and drive through their enduring creativity and adaptability; their stories reflect the strength and vitality of the visual arts across the United States. Drawing from the Archives’ oral history collections and new interviews, each episode gives listeners insight into the artists' journeys and enduring inventiveness.

“Articulated offers an opportunity for us to learn history through the experiences of those who shaped it, and we are particularly thrilled to illuminate stories from the Archives about artists who have made big moves later in their careers, as we celebrate continued experimentation and transformation,” said Ben Gillespie, the oral historian at the Smithsonian’s Archives of American Art and producer of the series. The Archives is home to the world’s largest collection of oral histories related to the visual arts, a growing body of interviews that give voice to the makers who craft history.

The artists featured in season four have each made their own path for decades, committing to their practice and finding ways to sustain and evolve.

Join us on Friday, January 31 from 6-8PM for Leo Tanguma: A Great Humanity - A Podcast Listening Party at the Dikeou Collection in Denver, Colorado. Leo Tanguma and Jeanne Stanford Tanguma will be in conversation with Ben Gillespies, oral historian at the Archives of American Art and producer of ARTiculated. This event is free and open to the public. 

Featured Artists

Each artist featured in this series will share their history through the lens of their distinct perspective of American history and culture.

December 3, 2024

Anita Fields (b. 1951 | Osage/Muscogee) is a ceramicist and fiber artist known for her fusion of clay and textile to explore and extend traditional Native techniques and forms. Throughout her career, Fields has pushed the limits of clay’s representative capacity, mimicking and transforming other objects through its malleability. Fields is based in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

January 7, 2025  

Leo Tanguma (b. 1941) is a Chicano muralist known for his works that integrate Mexican American heritage, spirituality, social justice, and autobiographical elements. Born in Beeville, Texas, he began his career in Houston with ambitious murals that advocated for social change. In the 1980s, he moved to Denver, Colorado, where his public works made waves in the Denver International Airport, and he continues to create murals throughout the Denver community, most recently at Ricardo Flores Magon Academy. 

February 4, 2025

Lenore Chinn (b. 1949) is a Chinese American painter, photographer, and queer rights activist based in San Francisco, California. Chinn co-founded the Lesbians in the Visual Arts and Queer Cultural Center and has been an active member of the Asian American Women Artists Association. While she began her career as a realist painter of queer life in the Bay Area, Chinn shifted to photography and eventually activist documentary, a practice she has cultivated in recent years.

March 4, 2025

Pat Steir (b. 1938) is a painter and printmaker whose work captures the kinetic energy of paint as a liquid. Emerging from conceptualism, minimalism, and abstraction, Steir is best known for her focus on the fluidity of paint through her waterfall paintings, which feature drips, pours, and splashes of paint in complex layers. She is based in New York City.     

The Archives of American Art is proud to facilitate, promote, and provide access to the world’s largest collection of oral histories related to the visual arts. This new podcast series will provide broader access to these more than 2,600 interviews to inspire artists, scholars, students, and anyone interested in learning about art in the United States. Listeners can download the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts and Spotify. The show’s schedule and notes can be found on our website.  

This podcast is sponsored by Next50, the Denver based national foundation that works towards creating a world that values aging.