We Are Art People in conversation with Musa Guston Mayer

Author: Emily Nam
Published: Mon 07 Jul 2025
Episode Link: https://philipguston.org

Musa Guston Mayer is a writer, curator, breast cancer advocate and President of The Guston Foundation, living in Woodstock, NY. She is the daughter of the formidable painter, Philip Guston (1913-1980) and her Mother is, painter and poet Musa McKim Guston (1908-1992). Since his passing in 1980, alongside a team of committed champions of Guston’s work, Musa has been involved in shaping her Father’s legacy, who is recognized today as a Modern Master. Not bad, sonny. Pas mal

While pursing an MFA in writing at Columbia University, Musa published her first title — an intimate memoir, Night Studio (1988) — grounded in a personal account of being the daughter of Philip Guston. Musa’s process of writing as a way of self discovery and to deepen her understanding of who her father was, evokes an awareness of the fragility and beauty of life, through what feels to be a natural inclination for storytelling. Originally trained as a mental health counselor, Musa authored several books reflecting her journey and diagnosis with breast cancer; Examining Myself: One Woman's Story of Breast Cancer Treatment (1994) Recovery, Advanced Breast Cancer: A Guide to Living with Metastatic Disease (1998) and After Breast Cancer: Answers to the Questions You're Afraid to Ask(2003). She has curated exhibitions, and published amongst others, the award winning catalogue ‘Philip Guston: Nixon Drawings, 1971 & 1975’. Night Studio remains in print after 37 years.

We discuss the fragility and nature of living closely to an inner life, storytelling as an act towards activism and social-political commentary, and the value of Musa’s promised gift of 220 ‘Not.For.Sale’ paintings to The Metropolitan Museum of Art, for scholarship and in support of her Father's legacy. The Guston Foundation continues to further a dialogue with Philip Guston, to a wider public. Upcoming projects include an audiobook of Night Studio, narrated by Musa Guston Mayer (2027) and publishing the Journals of Musa McKim Guston, A Life with P. (2026).

Links:

@the_guston_foundation

www.philipguston.org

https://www.youtube.com/@TheGustonFoundation

Show notes:

Restoration of "The Struggle Against Terrorism", by Philip Guston and Reuben Kadish, Morelia, MX.

Musée Picasso — Philip Guston: The Irony of History [opens October 14 2025]

Arensberg Collection

Scottsboro Boys https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottsboro_Boys

Ira Progoff "Intensive Journal Method"

Giorgio de Chirico, The Gladiators' School: the Combat [1928]

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