Strategic Generosity: Collecting, Curating, and Championing Emerging Artists with Leslie Fram

In this galvanizing episode of What's My Thesis?, host Javier Proenza is joined by Leslie Fram—collector, curator, marketing strategist, MFA educator, and tireless champion of emerging talent—for a sweeping conversation that summons the urgent need for innovation as well as entrepreneurial literacy among artists today.

Fram’s multifaceted career is an exercise in forecasting trends. Formerly a dancer with the NYC Ballet, Fram studied art at Parsons, founded a fashion design company, became the Trends Editor of Cosmopolitan, obtained an MBA from Columbia University, segued into early Internet enterprises… and eventually arrived in Los Angeles to engage with the city’s emerging art scene. Fram has cultivated a holistic approach to art, deploying business models from the various industries she has worked in. Marrying aesthetics with infrastructure, community with commerce, her approach is unique.

Fram speaks candidly about the genesis of her annual MFAs of LA exhibitions, a curatorial endeavor born from her desire to showcase under-recognized artists while removing traditional barriers to entry for collectors. She shares her exhibition experiments in transparency, scale uniformity, collector-artist collaborations and her belief in art’s ability to generate new forms of economic and social engagement. Fram’s insights are consistently bracing, generous, out-of-the-box and solution-oriented.

Listeners will come away with a deeper understanding of how artists can reclaim agency in the marketplace, why building relationships is central to sustainability, and how Fram herself continues to assist emerging artists on their respective trajectories to success. Through direct mentorship, educating with her strategic marketing workshops, sharing information as a form of gallery-whispering, and many other modes, Fram is always advocating on the artists’ behalf.

Topics covered include:

• The economics of emerging art: why size, pricing and communal experiences matter
• Institutional resistance to business education in art schools: how Fram works around it
• Collectors: her plans to ensure new collectors enter the marketplace, offering artists more opportunities for sales; understanding that they are artists’ best supporters and how to build authentic relationships with them; perhaps, finding a different name for “collector”
• New models and formats: from artists’ managers to new apps and technologies
• The future: art sales, blockchain royalties, and the power shift away from legacy galleries systems

This episode is a masterclass in strategic vision, offered by someone who has not only built a practice around elevating others, but continues to do so with a rare mix of compassion, clarity and enthusiasm.

Guest Leslie Fram Follow her on Instagram: @lesfram

Host Javier Proenza

Astrology, Embodiment, and the Myth of Power: A Conversation with Alystair Rogers

In this episode of What's My Thesis?, host Javier Proenza is joined by artist Alystair Rogers for a searching, radically honest exploration of transformation—personal, political, and astrological. Traversing terrains of gender, spirituality, social critique, and visual language, Rogers shares the deeply embodied trajectory that led to his MFA thesis: an immersive installation confronting capitalism, queerness, and cosmic time.

With the insight of a cultural theorist and the intuition of a mystic, Rogers recounts how early encounters with Scott Cunningham’s Solitary Practitioner and a DIY magical practice laid the groundwork for a conceptual framework rooted in astrology, myth, and critique. From testosterone therapy and shifting social legibility, to trans embodiment and the slow violence of neoliberalism, Rogers discusses the pain and revelation of becoming, with humor and precision.

Their thesis installation—centered around a reclaimed domestic space lit by planetary lamps and anchored by a satirical infomercial titled Sea World: Spiral 'Til You're Free—is a poetic and confrontational meditation on how billionaires might be coaxed into their own undoing. Through this absurdist yet sincere gesture, Rogers dissects the mythologies of power, proposing alternative logics of time, value, and being.

What emerges is a searing, wide-ranging conversation that refuses binaries—between subjectivity and objectivity, spirituality and politics, or critique and care. Rogers makes a compelling case for astrology not as superstition, but as an expansive, generational clock—a way to read time not only in hours or revolutions, but in revolts and revelations.

Topics discussed include:

• Trans identity and the phenomenology of transition

• The astrology of Pluto in Aquarius and its revolutionary implications

• Queer embodiment and the aesthetics of self-determination

• The failures of liberal institutions and the weaponization of speech

• The installation Sea World, capitalist mythology, and speculative resistance

This episode offers a rare convergence of the personal and planetary, blending social analysis with an artist’s pursuit of symbolic coherence. Rogers’s work embodies a form of queer speculative myth-making—one that critiques the world as it is while gesturing toward the one that might be.

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Guest: Alystair Rogers Instagram: @alystair.rogers

Host: Javier Proenza Podcast: What’s My Thesis? Support the show: Patreon.com/whatsmythesis Leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify

#queerart #transartists #astrologyart #MFAthesis #artandpolitics #plutoinaquarius #socialpractice #whatsmythesis #aly stairrogers #artpodcast #decolonizegender #anti-capitalistart

Building Gene’s Dispensary: Community, Curation, and Creating New Art Spaces in Los Angeles with Keith J Varadi

In this wide-ranging conversation on What’s My Thesis?, host Javier Proenza welcomes artist, curator, and writer Keith J. Varadi, founder of Gene’s Dispensary, for an illuminating discussion on forging alternative pathways in the contemporary art world. Through candid reflection, Varadi shares their journey from painting to sound art, music, and ultimately to the establishment of their independent gallery space in Los Angeles—a project that has rapidly become a vibrant hub for creative cross-pollination.

Drawing on years of experience as both a practicing artist and an accomplished curator—with writing credits in Carla, Flash Art, Kaleidoscope, and Los Angeles Review of Books—Varadi discusses how health challenges, a deep commitment to community-building, and a rigorous interdisciplinary ethos led to the creation of Gene’s Dispensary. Operating in the heart of Los Angeles at 2007 Wilshire Boulevard, Unit 820, Gene’s Dispensary takes inspiration from DIY spaces, Black Mountain College, and the inclusive spirit of early L.A. dispensary culture.

Over the course of the episode, Varadi reflects on studying at Rutgers and Virginia Commonwealth University, their experience living in New York and Pittsburgh, and the evolving sense of belonging they found upon relocating to Los Angeles. Topics explored include the challenges and possibilities of starting an art space without institutional funding, building a collector base from scratch, integrating musicians, comedians, and writers into gallery programming, and the nuances of L.A.'s cultural landscape compared to New York.

Highlights include a behind-the-scenes look at Gene’s Dispensary’s chess tournaments, multidisciplinary performances, and the gallery’s mission to dissolve boundaries between visual art and other forms of creative practice. Varadi also offers insight into the gallery’s namesake, paying homage to socialist leader Eugene V. Debs and affirming a commitment to equitable practices within the art market.

Whether you are an artist seeking alternative models of sustainability, a curator interested in community engagement, or simply an art lover curious about the dynamic intersections of creativity in Los Angeles, this episode offers a compelling portrait of persistence, generosity, and invention.

Visit Gene’s Dispensary: 📍 2707 Wilshire Blvd, Unit 820, Los Angeles, CA 📲 Instagram: @genes_dispensary 🌐 Website: genesdispensary.co