This week Duncan MacKenzie and Ryan Peter Miller head north to the Door County Contemporary Art Fair to sit down with artist, curator, writer, gallerist, and all-around art evangelist Shane McAdams.
Broadcasting from a gazebo in Door County, Wisconsin, the conversation ranges from the weather, custard, and pontoon boats to larger questions about why contemporary art struggles to reach broader publics, why the Midwest needs more artist-run infrastructure, and how we might create healthier cultural ecosystems.
McAdams makes the case for a bigger, messier, more porous art world—one where commercial galleries, nonprofits, academia, collectors, artists, and curious newcomers all coexist.
This is a conversation about building bridges: between Chicago and Minneapolis, between contemporary art and regional audiences, between artists and the merely art-curious. It is also a reminder that art remains one of the few places where genuine meaning-making and community formation can still occur.
Name Drops
Shane McAdams
https://www.shanemcadams.com/
Door County Contemporary Art Fair
https://www.doorcountycontemporary.com/
Real Tinsel Gallery
https://www.realtinsel.com/
Saint Kate – The Arts Hotel
https://www.saintkatearts.com/
Peninsula School of Art
https://www.peninsulaschoolofart.org/
Claire Ashley
https://clairehelenashley.com/
David Letterman
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Letterman
Marcel Duchamp
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Duchamp
Robert Ryman
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Ryman
James Audubon
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_James_Audubon
Mark Glimcher / Pace Gallery
https://www.pacegallery.com/
Peter Buggenhout
https://www.axel-vervoordt.com/gallery/artists/peter-buggenhout
University of Chicago
https://www.uchicago.edu/
University of Georgia Lamar Dodd School of Art
https://art.uga.edu/
Trainspotting
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0117951/
Miami Art Week
https://www.miamiartweek.org/
