Oral history interview with Marguerite Van Cook
name: label: Interviewee
content: Van Cook, Marguerite
label: Interviewer
content: Fialho, Alex, 1989-
label: Names
content: Visual Arts and the AIDS Epidemic: An Oral History Project
topic: label: Topic
content: AIDS (Disease) and the arts
label: Topic
content: Authors -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews
label: Topic
content: Filmmakers -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews
label: Topic
content: Performance artists -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews
acqinfo: label: Provenance
content: This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
creator: label: Interviewee
content: Van Cook, Marguerite
label: Interviewer
content: Fialho, Alex, 1989-
bioghist: label: Biographical / Historical
content: Interviewee Marguerite Van Cook (1954- ) is an artist, writer, and performer in New York, New York. Interviewer Alex Fialho (1989- ) is a curator and arts writer who is the Programs Director for Visual AIDS in New York, New York.
physdesc: label: Extent
content: 5 Items (sound files (5 hrs., 55 min.), digital, wav)
label: Extent
content: 87 Pages (Transcript)
unitdate: label: Date
content: 2016 September 19-21
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: Archives of American Art
identifier: label: Identifier
content: AAA.vancoo16
objectType: label: Type
content: Collection descriptions
label: Type
content: Archival materials
label: Type
content: Pages
label: Type
content: Interviews
label: Type
content: Sound recordings
altformavail: label: Existence and Location of Copies
content: Transcript is available on the Archives of American Art's website.
genre_format: label: Genre/Form
content: Interviews
label: Genre/Form
content: Sound recordings
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: An interview with Marguerite Van Cook, conducted 2016 September 19 and 21, by Alex Fialho, for the Archives of American Art's Visual Arts and the AIDS Epidemic: An Oral History Project, at the Visual AIDS office in New York, New York.
label: Scope and Contents
content: Interview with Marguerite Van Cook, conducted by Alex Fialho for the Archives of American Art, at the Visual AIDS office in New York, New York on September 19 and 21, 2016. Van Cook speaks of her childhood in Portsmouth, England and summers in France; early exposure to the arts; early sexual experiences; moving to Newcastle and forming the punk band The Innocents; moving to New York with the band; curating shows and installations and starting Ground Zero Gallery with her husband James Romberger; the devastation of the AIDS crisis on her East Village social milieu; advocating for HIV-positive homeless people; her body of visual and audiovisual artwork; raising her child during the AIDS crisis; being diagnosed, along with with Romberger, with meningitis and HIV in the mid-1990s; her current work as a doctoral candidate in French literature; her body of work as a writer; her experience of long-term HIV survivorship; and her reflections on living with HIV as a woman. Van Cook also recalls Edward Brennan, Martin Botha, Sarah Hall, Jamie Reid, Russ Meyer, Fiona Barry, Greg Van Cook, Martin Wong, Karen Finley, David Wojnarowicz, Michael Von Ofak, Luis Frangella, Keiko Bonk, Walter Robinson, Grace Borgenicht, Leonard Abrams, and others.