Kevin Conley, a writer and editor who has covered contemporary art for The New Yorker, Vogue, New York Times Magazine, Wall Street Journal, and Town & Country, will be the guest speaker on Thursday, Dec. 14, at Lyme Academy College of Fine Arts of the University of New Haven. 

The lecture, the final in the fall series hosted by the college, is in the Chauncey Stillman Gallery, 84 Lyme St., Old Lyme. There is a pre-talk reception at 5 p.m., with the lecture beginning at 6 p.m. Reservations are $15 for the reception and lecture and can be made at www.lymeacademy.edu. Seating is limited.

For Conley, over the course of decades as a museum and gallery visitor, art critic and author, the idiosyncrasies he’s noticed in his own history of studio visits with solitary working artists have amazed and amused him — from the productive chaos of Walton Ford’s studio in the Berkshires to the evocative clutter of Betye Saar’s working home in Laurel Canyon to the busy magazine-like atmosphere of Hank Willis Thomas’s Chelsea warehouse.

Hear the observations from an experienced observer about: How much should the hand of an artist be involved in the production of the actual objects of art? Can artists be happy having their sculptures made by fabricators in another state? Must they paint every inch of the canvas, or can studio assistants fill in the busy background patterns, saving the more complex passages for the artists to do themselves?

The lecture is offered through the college’s Center for Arts Programming, established to enrich the quality of life throughout the region by developing a robust and dynamic experience in the arts.