Gronk in Conversation with Paul Holdengräber

Event details Date: Thursday, August 27, 2026 Time: 7:30 PM Location: California Institute of Technology - Ramo Auditorium - 322 South Michigan Ave. Pasadena CA 91106 Cost: 10 Type: Lecture / Talk / Workshop Campus: Other Location Department: Fisher Museum of Art, Pacific Asia Museum Audience: Alumni, Faculty/Staff, Neighbors About this event USC Museums (USC Pacific Asia Museum and USC Fisher Museum of Art) present Moveable Feast in collaboration with Caltech. Please note: This program will take place at Caltech. Moveable Feast brings together arts partners and creative voices in conversation to shape collective experiences and deepen our understanding of the world and ourselves through the arts and humanities. The latest installment of the series features renowned visual and performance artist Gronk in conversation with Paul Holdengräber.  Gronk is the heir to Paul Klee: "A line," wrote Klee, "is a dot that went for a walk." Gronk maintains a fierce commitment to the dynamic nature of the line, to color, to repeated patterns and shapes like musical notations and graffiti. The importance of the gestural, of the hand, the love of Japanese calligraphy, of fluidity, is visible in Gronk's extraordinarily varied body of work.  In a far-ranging conversation, Holdengräber and Gronk will dive into the artist’s younger years in the avant-garde multimedia arts collective known as Asco (Spanish meaning nausea, disgust); together they will examine his numerous collaborations with stage designers, directors, and musicians. The conversation will reveal how deeply Gronk has made his own the words of the Polish avant-garde playwright, painter, philosopher, and novelist Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz from his 1920 absurdist play, They: "I don't even want to be an artist, which I longed to be throughout all of my miserable life. I want to be myself. That's all."  The Moveable Feast program is presented in partnership with USC Museums and Caltech, as well as the support of Selma Holo and Mei-Lee Ney. After the conversation, join us for light refreshments.  Information about the location: Ramo AuditoriumLocated at: California Institute of TechnologyAddress: 322 South Michigan Ave.Parking on the Caltech campus is free after 5:00 PM. More about the speakers: Gronk is a nationally celebrated painter and performance artist from Los Angeles. He was a founding member of Asco, the famed avant-garde multimedia arts collective. Gronk’s work spans many mediums, including drawing, painting, and performance art in collaboration with musicians and performers, as well as stage design. He is best known for his physical approach to painting. Paul Holdengräber is an acclaimed interviewer and cultural interlocutor. He was the founding executive director of Onassis Los Angeles (OLA) and founder and director of The New York Public Library’s LIVE from the NYPL cultural series, in which he interviewed and hosted more than 600 events featuring Official event details: https://calendar.usc.edu/event/gronk-in-conversation-with-paul-holdengraber