Between Thought and Expression: Stories About Stories

Laurie Anderson

In conversation with author Maggie Nelson

An icon of performance art and the indie music world, Laurie Anderson is one of the most revered artists working today. As a musician, performance artist, composer, fiction writer, and filmmaker (her most recent foray, Heart of a Dog, was lauded as an “experimental marvel” by the Los Angeles Times), Anderson seamlessly moves between the fine art world and the music world, and her interest in new media has made her an early pioneer of harnessing technology for artistic purposes long before the technology boom. However, regardless of the medium, Anderson’s storytelling has always been driven by language. Now in the first book of her full career to date, All The Things I Lost in the Flood, Anderson curates a comprehensive collection of her artwork—from an opera inspired by Moby Dick to installations addressing Guantanamo and the bombing of Baghdad—and offers an intimate understanding of her creative process. Discussing this landmark volume with award-winning writer Maggie Nelson, Anderson traverses four decades of breaking ground in the art of storytelling.