The Way I See It

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BBC Radio 3 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced Third Programme.

BBC Radio 3

Radio 3

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The Way I See It: Madeleine Thien on Vija Celmins’s Bikini

Madeleine Thien on Vija Celmins's Bikini

Madeleine Thien on Vija Celmins’s Bikini

BBC Radio 3 - The Way I See It, Madeleine Thien on Vija Celmins’s Bikini

Booker-nominated author Madeleine Thien chooses Vija Celmins’s Bikini.

Booker-nominated, Chinese-Canadian author Madeleine Thien chooses a work by Latvian-Amercian artist Vija Celmins.

Art critic Alastair Sooke, in the company of some of the leading creatives of our age, continues his deep dive into the stunning works in the Museum of Modern Art's collection, whilst exploring what it really means “to see” art. 

Today's edition features a work by a Latvian-American visual artist best known for photo-realistic paintings and drawings of natural environments and phenomena such as the ocean, spider webs, star fields, and rocks. Award-winning novelist Madeleine Thien has chosen "Bikini" Celmins's depiction of an atomic blast which took place in Bikini Lagoon on 25 July 1946, part of the United States’ Operation Crossroads – one of a series of twenty-three nuclear detonations in the western Pacific. What has drawn the novelist's eye to this work - and how does she see it?

Producer: Paul Kobrak

Main Image:
Vija Celmins, Bikini, 1968. Graphite on acrylic ground on paper, 13 3/8 x 18 1/4" (34 x 46.4 cm). Gift of Edward R. Broida. Museum of Modern Art, NY, 673.2005. © 2019 Vija Celmins

Live music and the arts: broadcasts more live music than any other radio network. Classical music is its core. Genres include world and new music, jazz, speech and drama.

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Leading creative thinkers choose an artwork from MoMA and talk about how it inspires them.

Leading creative thinkers choose an artwork from the Museum of Modern Art, and talk about how it inspires or provokes, thrills or surprises them. Presented by Alastair Sooke.

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The Way I See It

Madeleine Thien on Vija Celmins’s Bikini

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