Time Sensitive

What do we really know about the world around us? And how much of what we deem to be true is shaped by what we can—and cannot—see? These questions have animated the provocative and probing work of the artist Taryn Simon for more than 20 years. For her latest exhibition, “Father Country I Do Love You,” on view at the Guggenheim Museum in New York (through March 14, 2027), a surreal cast of characters, events, and connections emerges from the stranger-than-fiction stories of an unnamed, retired F.B.I. agent whom she interviewed for nearly a decade. Shown across the museum’s rotunda in 42 chapters, the presentation marks her most personal body of work to date. Dedicated to her father, who’s been living with Alzheimer’s since 2020, it explores how his life and stories are, in circuitous ways, entangled with those of the agent.
This interplay of memory, narrative, and uncertainty has always been central to Simon’s practice. From her landmark 2003 series, “The Innocents,” focused on people wrongfully convicted in part due to the misuse of visual documentation, to her 2016 installation “An Occupation of Loss” at the Park Avenue Armory, which examined mourning rituals, her work raises fundamental questions about what we remember, what we believe, and what remains unknown.
On this week’s episode, Simon discusses her Guggenheim show, the impossibility of ever fully knowing another person, and how photography can serve as an act of love in the face of time’s inevitability.
Special thanks to our Season 14 presenting partner, L’ÉCOLE, School of Jewelry Arts, supported by Van Cleef & Arpels.
Show notes:
Taryn Simon
[5:25] “Father Country I Do Love You” (2026)
[6:11] Jim Thompson
[17:55] Jodie Foster
[17:55] Mayor Marion Barry
[17:55] Valerie Plame
[17:55] Karl Rove
[17:55] Vince Foster
[30:05] Frank Lloyd Wright
[36:04] “The Innocents” (2003)
[38:18] Innocence Project
[46:49] “A Living Man Declared Dead and Other Chapters I – XVIII” (2008–2011)
[49:38] “An Occupation of Loss” (2016)
[52:48] Zoroastrianism
[54:49] “A Cold Hole” (2018)

Who better to bring remarkable clarity to the density of Martin Heidegger’s Being and Time than the British philosopher and New School professor Simon Critchley? After decades spent studying and teaching the controversial German philosopher’s 1927 magnum opus, Critchley takes it on in his latest book, Heidegger Thinking: ‘Being and Time’ Explained, getting at the deceptively simple ideas at its core: Being is time. Time is finite. And to live freely is to reckon with that finitude. For Critchley, there’s a certain solace to be found in knowing our limits, giving up fantasies of total control, and more fully inhabiting the time we have.
On this week’s episode, Critchley—our first-ever repeat guest on the show—discusses Heidegger’s ideas of lived and ecstatic time, the distinction between anxiety and fear, and why philosophy, at its best, helps us see the world anew. He also explores how a suspenseful sports match can warp our sense of time; the peculiar way David Bowie’s music collapses past, present, and future; and poetry’s power to make the familiar strange.
Special thanks to our Season 14 presenting partner, L’ÉCOLE, School of Jewelry Arts, supported by Van Cleef & Arpels.
Show notes:
Simon Critchley
[01:03] Heidegger Thinking (2026)
[01:11] Heidegger
[01:15] Being and Time
[14:57] Walter Benjamin
[14:57] The Origin of German Tragic Drama (1928)
[16:17] Dasein
[29:42] The Existentialist Reader: An Anthology of Key Texts (2001)
[33:00] What We Think About When We Think About Soccer (2017)
[33:24] Jürgen Klopp
[43:36] Mysticism (2024)
[58:17] Wallace Stevens
[1:01:58] Things Merely Are (2005)
[1:11:32] Question Everything (2022)
[1:12:39] Bowie (2014)
[1:16:10] Moonage Daydream (2022)

Jacques Pépin has long found beauty in simplicity—a glass of warm milk, a freshly sliced lemon, a garden-ripe tomato—and in transmitting knowledge from one hand to the next. Now 90, the French chef, author, artist, and educator has spent nearly a century immersed in the world of food, beginning as an apprentice in France at age 13 and rising through Parisian kitchens before moving to the United States in 1959. Over the decades, Pépin has become one of the most influential culinary figures in the world, authoring more than 30 cookbooks and appearing in hundreds of cooking programs. This year marks the 50th anniversary of his landmark 1976 book, La Technique, recently reimagined as an expanded edition combining 600-plus foundational skills and 160 recipes.
For this “site-specific” episode of Time Sensitive, we joined Pépin at his home in Madison, Connecticut, where he has lived for more than 50 years, to discuss the relationship between technique and speed, how he’s developed what he calls his “taste memory,” and the extraordinary role of chance throughout his life.
Special thanks to our Season 14 presenting partner, L’ÉCOLE, School of Jewelry Arts, supported by Van Cleef & Arpels.
Show Notes:
Jacques Pépin
[09:19] La Technique (1976)
[09:27] Jacques Pépin Complete Techniques 50th Anniversary Edition (2026)
[14:28] The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen (2003)
[11:16] Craig Claiborne
[15:49] Le Répertoire de la Cuisine (1914)
[15:14] Société des Cuisiniers de Paris
[24:39] Charles de Gaulle
[25:03] Algerian War
[47:26] Julia Child
[39:20] Howard Johnson
[39:35] Le Pavillon
[42:37] Albert Camus
[42:37] Samuel Beckett
[42:37] Simone de Beauvoir
[43:09] Michel Foucault
[46:30] Voltaire
[55:30] Helen McCully
[57:47] James Beard
[1:09:40] A Grandfather’s Lessons (2017)

Iris van Herpen’s boundary-defying, otherworldly work exists somewhere between couture, sculpture, science, technology, architecture, and nature. For nearly two decades, the Dutch fashion designer has radically expanded the possibilities of what forms haute couture can take, combining time-honored craftsmanship techniques with cutting-edge technologies and material innovations, from 3-D—and, perhaps eventually, 4-D—printing to bioluminescent algae, plasma, and even particle accelerators. While her practice boldly and unquestionably points toward the future, it’s equally invested in ancient knowledge, deep time, and what might endure. Currently, a sweeping exhibition, titled “Sculpting the Senses” and showcasing some 140 of her designs, is on view at the Brooklyn Museum through Dec. 6.
On this episode of Time Sensitive—our Season 14 opener and first-ever fully filmed conversation, now available to watch on YouTube—van Herpen reflects on the significance of movement in her work the importance of carving out meditative time for creative exploration, and why going slower actually allows her to do more, with greater depth.
Special thanks to our Season 14 presenting partner, L’ÉCOLE, School of Jewelry Arts, supported by Van Cleef & Arpels.
Show notes:
Iris van Herpen
[33:21] “Sculpting the Senses”
[51:50] Philip Beesley
[51:50] Björk
[35:13] “Unfolding Time” (2024)
[21:41] Sonic Starquakes (2026)
[22:36] Lichtenberg figure
[47:54] “The Gates of Hell” (1880–1917)
[48:06] Musée Rodin
[49:28] “The Garden of Earthly Delights” (1490–1510)
[54:18] “Hybrid Holism” (2012)
[58:24] Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode

Dries Van Noten’s lifelong fascination with craft and making runs deep. He grew up in a multigenerational family of retailers and tailors in Antwerp, and in the 1980s, he was part of the famed avant-garde Antwerp Six group of Belgian fashion designers. From 1986 to 2024, across 38 years and 129 runway shows, Van Noten built one of fashion’s most admired independent houses. Since stepping away from the helm of his namesake label two years ago, he has turned his attention to establishing the Fondazione Dries Van Noten in Venice, Italy. Set within the 15th-century Palazzo Pisani Moretta on the Grand Canal, his newly opened foundation is dedicated to craft in its broadest sense—bringing together artists, designers, makers, and thinkers across disciplines and generations. Its debut exhibition, “The Only True Protest Is Beauty,” on view through Oct. 4, features a playful, eclectic assemblage of striking works from the worlds of haute couture, jewelry, photography, art, design, ceramics, and glass. 

For this “site-specific” episode of Time Sensitive, our Season 13 finale, Spencer meets up with Van Noten inside his foundation to discuss his lifelong fascination with making; beauty as an essential force in one’s life; and his conviction that, in our frenzied, fragmented world, craft offers a gateway to greater meaning and human connection.

Special thanks to our Season 13 presenting partner, L'ÉCOLE, School of Jewelry Arts.

Show notes: 

Dries Van Noten

[01:08] Fondazione Dries Van Noten

[06:47] Chiara Pisani

[12:41] “The Only True Protest is Beauty.”

[12:41] Phil Ochs

[15:11] Misha Kahn

[15:11] Ettore Sottsass

[15:11] Palazzo Pisani Moretta

[16:50] Steven Shearer

[17:50] Lionel Jadot

[19:13] Christian Lacroix

[19:20] Peter Buggenhout

[21:25] Joris Laarman

[34:59] The Antwerp Six (2026)

[36:45] Claude Montana

[36:45] Thierry Mugler

[36:45] Jules-François Crahay

[36:57] Comme des Garçons

[36:57] Yohji Yamamoto

[38:12] Xavier Mañosa

[43:04] Azuma Makoto

[44:09] Rei Kawakubo

[44:12] Mitsuhiro Matsuda

[45:36] Tadao Ando

[51:48] David Bowie