Books like Legal Guide for the Visual Artist

I love this book because it not only explores the way in which art gets made, it delves into the reasons art often doesn’t get made, and the difficulties that cause so many artists to give up along the way.

All too often, the give-up factor is prevalent both in the art-making process and in the art-marketing process. I particularly liked the chapter “ Fears of Others,” which offers excellent insights into artists giving their power away. 

As a career coach and artist advocate, I was curious about what the author had to say about the inner workings of the art world. Quite happily, I read an insightful and humorous probe from a writer who sincerely wanted to understand art and its importance.

Bosker is not afraid of naming names when discussing critics, gallery owners, curators, collectors, and artists. She goes undercover, so to speak, and writes about her experiences as a gallery assistant, an artist’s assistant, a museum security guard, and a sales assistant at Art Basel Miami. And to add to her experiences, she tackles the use of the foreign language of “art speak.”   

I can open any page of this book and discover meaningful observations—with lots of food for thought. For two decades, the late artist and educator Walter Darby Bannard reflected on the question, why do young artists struggle to find their voices?

He answered the question with engaging insights based on his personal philosophy. At the urging of a former student, he put his thoughts into a book. But you don’t need to be an aspiring artist to treasure what Bannard has to say; artists at all career levels will be inspired by his words. 

Filled with many humorous pages of ridicule about the modern art world, one big reason that I love this book is Wolfe’s attack on “art speak,” the nauseating language used by critics and artists alike. He smugly suggests that in today’s world, visual art only exists to illustrate the text!

Pretentious prose has become a norm in art world communication. Although artists vehemently criticize this style of writing, unfortunately, many believe that their work will not be taken seriously unless they imitate what they despise.

Many kids love the Disney animated film Bambi, but how many know they have a Chinese American immigrant to thank for its lush and lovely look? Author Julie Leung tells the moving story of a boy named Wong Geng Yeo who traveled across an ocean from China to America with little more than the immigration papers he needed to start his new life. Chris Sasaki’s delicate illustrations detail how Wong dreamed of making art even as he worked as a janitor at night to pay the bills. The love and care that Tyrus Wong poured into what would become one of the great movies of love, friendship, and, years before The Lion King, of the circle of life, Paper Son is an exquisite reminder of the great gifts that immigrants have brought to America.

Of the many biographies of Andy Warhol this early one remains the best, written by a man who worked and partied with the artist in the heyday of the artist’s glamorous world (and I make another brief cameo appearance). Everything about the enigmatic icon of contemporary art continues to inform our culture and I was deeply influenced not only by Warhol’s paintings but by my friendship with him from 1964 until his death in 1987. In books and movies he has been transformed into a cultural icon rather than the complicated amusing hard-working artist I knew. Bob Colacello wrote this book shortly after Warhol died and for me is the best portrait of the “real” Andy Warhol and the era he helped to define.

I love this picture book.

It not only shares fascinating details about pop artist Andy Warhol’s life and artistic journey, but it also gets readers talking about what makes art, art.

Is it liking things? Is it about painting pretty things? Is it about seeing things in a new way? Who decides what art is, anyway?

I’ve got two kiddos, and between the bodily, emotional, and lifestyle changes alone, I’ve found motherhood to be a WILD ride. And I’ve never felt more seen as a mom than in this book.

From the heartbreaking joy to the numbing boredom to the rage and the shocking invisibility that can come with motherhood, particularly during those early days, it made perfect sense to me that the main character turns into a dog. Because motherhood does shape you into something else.

This book captures that loss, that feral transformation, perfectly. Also, I wish I’d come up with the title. 

Known to broad public due to the hilarious “Whistler’s Mother” starring Mr. Bean, James Whistler is a paramount American participant in the Fin-de-siècle artistic life of France and England and a predecessor of most important artistic endeavors of the 20th century. Daniel Sutherland combed all possible archives and produced a stunning study of Whistler’s private life, full of scandals, sufferings, travels, and triumphs. From the childhood Whister spent in the tsarist Russia to his vagabond life in Paris, his life is always a journey and a self-quest. Eminently readable and bright narrative of a somber and paradoxical character.

Basquiat is one of my heroes, and although this book is a bit disjointed at times, I give it full credit for visually representing his creative genius (and torment) in dynamic and interesting ways. The Downtown New York art scene of the 1980s was nuts–and this book takes you there!