60: James Allister Sprang

Artist James Allister Sprang is one of my favorite people in the whole wide world. On a recent weekend trip down to Philadelphia, I had the privilege of catching up with James on the very day that he completed his MFA at the University of Pennsylvania. Moments after his final critique, we popped into a small room on campus and recorded this interview. James and I discussed the birth and evolution of his performance persona GAZR, the politics of sampling and appropriation, his interest in language as material, tricksters, the exploitable failings of voice recognition technology, concrete in the literal and metaphorical senses, his history with poetry, and hot take music jokes that might be a decade late. The outro music is “Midnight Service at the Mütter Museum” by Murder City Devils.