The Art of Television 2025
“TV actors have often seemed more relatable, almost like casual friends we catch up with on a regular basis — unlike the glamorous movie stars of old who sat at a safe distance on a big screen. TV shows typically tell us stories that mirror our daily lives: in offices and hospitals, schools and apartment buildings. Now that the distance between movies and TV has almost disappeared, A-list stars and directors like Cate Blanchett, Michelle Williams, Jake Gyllenhaal and Ben Stiller have become small-screen regulars (and Emmy contenders). Norma Desmond’s cry could be remastered as “I am big. It’s the picture screen that got small.”
–Stefano Tonchi, Editorial Director, TheWrapBook
Contributors
Drawings by Lara Apponyi with a Meisterstück fountain pen in partnership with Montblanc.
Get Into the Groovy
We invited the cast of The White Lotus to a ‘70s-themed party. You can bet your bell-bottomed dollar that they were game and ready to dish on how they created one of the twistiest seasons of TV in memory.
The Trouble With Adolescence
For nearly three decades, Miami-based artist Hernan Bas has created narratively rich tableaux that use humor to unsettle the familiar, exposing the surreal and absurd elements that lie hidden within ordinary life.
Snapshots of the Season
Some of the biggest stars of the year’s most celebrated shows enter our photo booth—which was inspired by Andy Warhol’s famed series of Polaroid portraits—and share insights into their work.
Hollywood Goes Meta
Gregory Crewdson’s highly cinematic images are the result of extensive productions that mirror the scale and structure of a blockbuster film shoot.
Artists by Artists
Television is not there just to divert and entertain, but also to inspire. Consider these works by a baker’s dozen of primarily California-based visual artists working in paint, fabric and even marble to capture some of the small screen’s biggest stars.
Peak Demand
For decades, German fine-art photographer Thomas Demand has been creating spare interior landscapes that anticipated the look of the Lumon Industries offices in Severance. Now, Demand sits down with the show’s longtime cinematographer (and Emmy-nominated director) Jessica Lee Gagné to explore their parallel visions of corporate life.
Luna Landing
Reprising his most popular on-screen role in the Star Wars prequel series Andor, Mexican actor Diego Luna has won critical raves and mainstream fans. Can he finally take a breather and enjoy his success?
Dynamic Duos
Brooklyn-born Elbert Joseph Perez re-creates some of the season’s most memorable on-screen pairings in distinctive oil paintings.
Greed Is Good…for TV Drama
We know Barbara Kruger’s art when we see it. Big, bold words that put their finger on the most pressing issues we experience. What we like (shopping, fashion, entertainment) and what we want (power, money, control).
Fashion on Set
Style-conscious shows like The Studio and The White Lotus are inspiring viewers to seek out on-screen looks, creating opportunities for brand placement, collaborations and organic fashion trends.
Broad Anniversary
As The Broad marks its 10th anniversary, founding director and president Joanne Heyler reflects on the museum’s impact on downtown Los Angeles and the city’s cultural scene.
Set Pieces
They may no longer be a fixture in homes, but old-fashioned box TVs still inspire artists as symbols of mass media and objects of everyday living.
When Fashion Meets Film Meets Performance Art
For Tales & Tellers at Frieze New York 2025, Polish artist Goshka Macuga created a unique live performance drawing on 14 years of short films commissioned by the fashion brand Miu Miu.
Screen Shots
In this exclusive series of self-portraits, Mexico City-based art photographer Tania Franco Klein imagines a sepia-toned world filled with old-fashioned TV sets and noir-inspired fashion, a place where we can never seem to escape ourselves.
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