Clark Coolidge (b. 1939, Providence, Rhode Island) is a poet and jazz musician. Coolidge was a contributing editor for Sulfur: A Literary Tri-Annual of the Whole Art, a premier publication of alternative and experimental writing, translations of foreign-language poets, visual art, and archival material from 1981-2000. Coolidge collaborated with Guston on Baffling Means: Writings/Drawings and served as editor for Philip Guston: Collected Writings, Lectures, and Conversations (2010).
Learn what made Philip Guston one of the most intellectually adventurous and poetically gifted modern painters from two of the people who knew him best: poet Clark Coolidge and his daughter, Musa Mayer. Harry Cooper, curator of Philip Guston Now and the National Gallery’s head of modern and contemporary art, moderates this conversation.
About the Presenters
Photograph by John Sarsgard
Courtesy of Musa Mayer
Musa Mayer (b. 1943, Iowa City, Iowa) is an advocate, author, and president of The Guston Foundation. Mayer established The Guston Foundation in 2013 to share her father’s work and further his legacy. Originally trained as a mental health counselor, Mayer is now recognized as a patient and research advocate for those living with metastatic breast cancer. While pursuing an MFA in writing at Columbia University, she published her first book, Night Studio: A Memoir of Philip Guston (1988). In addition to curating exhibitions, Mayer has authored several other books and catalogues on Guston in recent years, including the award-winning Philip Guston’s Nixon Drawings: 1971 and 1975.