105: Which Is the Better Life: Material or Spiritual? – A Conversation with Julie Heffernan

In this episode, we speak with painter Julie Heffernan about getting lost in the woods with a baby, the Winchester Mystery House, the hidden wisdom encoded in paintings, flowers, nutmeg, Amitav Ghosh, volcanos, and the secret about spirituality that Vermeer was trying to expose. Julie’s work has been described by Rebecca Solnit as “a new kind of history painting” and by The New York Times as “ironic rococo realism with a social-satirical twist.” She’s received support from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York Foundation for the Arts, the Fulbright, MacDowell, Camargo, and others, and has served as an artist-in-residence at the University of Tampa in Florida and the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. Along with Virginia Wagner, Julie is a co-founder of the online journal Painters on Painting. She holds an BFA from the University of California at Santa Cruz and an MFA from Yale and now teaches fine arts at Montclair State University.