#30 – How Do You Blend Archive and Activism in Your Art? | Isaiah Winters

You know those moments when a photograph or film clip feels like it’s speaking hidden truths? New School professor and interdisciplinary artist Isaiah Winters returns to share how rigorous archival research fuels his photography, film, and mixed-media practice. From earning his MFA at Parsons to documenting pro-Palestinian campus protests and exposing housing inequities, Isaiah shows how historical fragments—old photographs, 16 mm and 35 mm film, collages—become living narratives that confront nationalism, indexicality, and structural racism.

• MFA to professor: completing his Parsons MFA and stepping into a full-time teaching role in The New School’s photo department
• Archival layering: fusing historical photographs, film, and collage to interrogate narratives of nationalism and memory
• “This Land Is Your Land” revisited: investigating segregation, Indigenous displacement, and public memory in national parks
• Unpacking housing myths: exposing GI Bill disparities, postwar suburbanization, and systemic racism in American housing
• On-campus documentation: capturing student-led pro-Palestinian encampments and the resurgence of fascist undercurrents
• Analog expansion: why he embraces 35 mm and experimental video to turn archives into urgent calls for change

Catch Isaiah Winters’s first conversation here: 

Whether you’re an educator, activist, or lover of visual storytelling, Isaiah’s approach will open new pathways for seeing archives as living tools—and may inspire your next creative act. 

Photograph by Isaiah Winters

Host: Rob Lee
Music: Original music by Daniel Alexis Music with additional music from Chipzard and TeTresSeis.
Production:

• Produced by Rob Lee & Daniel Alexis
• Edited by Daniel Alexis
• Show Notes courtesy of Rob Lee and Transistor

Photos:

• Rob Lee photos by Vicente Martin for The Truth In This Art and Contrarian Aquarian Media.
• Guest photos courtesy of the guest, unless otherwise noted.

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