In the first ever video edition of the Where It’s At podcast, created with Nowness, Tilda Swinton reflects on the significance of creative collaboration in her extraordinary, category-defying career
This autumn marked the opening of a new exhibition at Eye Filmmuseum, one entirely dedicated to – and in part curated by – the cinematic legend, Tilda Swinton. The exhibition, titled Tilda Swinton: Ongoing, not only captures the scope of the Oscar-winning Scottish performer’s career but paints a picture of the intricate web of lifelong friendships she’s formed along the way. Paying homage to her creative collaborations across art, film and fashion, Ongoing brings together moments from Swinton’s eclectic oeuvre with her closest artistic partners – Pedro Almodóvar, Luca Guadagnino, Joanna Hogg, Jim Jarmusch, Olivier Saillard, Tim Walker and Apichatpong Weerasethakul, among others.
In the latest episode of Where It’s At, the podcast series’ first ever video edition episode, exclusively created and presented by Nowness, Jefferson Hack meets with Swinton to discuss how these relationships have shaped her career. Together, the pair reflect on Swinton’s ever-expanding artistic legacy, exploring how these creative relationships continue to develop, redefining the boundaries of cinema. They meditate on the alchemy forged when minds come together, Hack’s curiosity only amplifying Swinton’s poetic disposition.
Swinton returns to her early work with filmmaker Derek Jarman, to filming the ”un-filmable” with Sally Potter, and channelling her grandmother’s make-up routine for Wes Anderson. She looks back at her friendship with David Bowie: “We became friends, we called each other cousin, and he was just so up for it and so ongoing,” she says. “I was one of the lucky people to fall into communication with him.”
When the museum first asked Swinton to come on board for an exhibition, she turned it down, mentally blocked from fathoming what form the show could take if not a retrospective. She subsequently found herself on a journey of self-reflection. “I asked myself what am I good for, what is my work made up of, what is the grain of it, what’s the seed of it,” she says, “and there is one answer – it’s my relationships.”
The result of her rumination was an idea that celebrates the creative partnerships she has nourished through her prolific career, which now spans nearly 40 years. When the museum inevitably asked her again, she proposed an idea that showcased new work; a “group show” (as she puts it), featuring previously unseen work by the creatives-cum-friends that she’s worked with time and time again. The exhibition became a unique opportunity to reflect – on process, not on product.
In this intimate and lively exchange about creative process and identity, art and life, friendship and collaboration, documented on film for the first time, Swinton shines as the infinitely curious, generous and mercurial artist she is. At once an icon and a muse.
Season 2 of Where It’s At is now available to stream on podcast platforms. Tilda Swinton: Ongoing is on show at Eye Filmmuseum in Amsterdam until 8 February 2026. The accompanying monograph is published by Rizzoli and is out now.
