Nicole Eisenman hates talking about her work. She asked for a list of questions in advance, but has decided they’re too laden with -isms, so perhaps it would be better just to go for a chat. “When I’m in the studio painting,” she says, “I don’t think about any -isms. I have my own problems, like how to make a painting look good, how to organise the paint, how to organise shapes. It’s not about grappling with large ideas.”
We’re at Nottingham Contemporary, where Eisenman is co-curating a group show. Just opened, it’s called Ridykeulous: Ridykes’ Cavern of Fine Inverted Wines and Deviant Videos – and it’s as much of a blast as its name suggests. But I’ve come to interview the artist about something even more monumental: her career retrospective at London’s Whitechapel Gallery, which is opening this week.
