Poor Artists

our book Poor Artists is out now in hardback, audiobook and ebook. It is a fictional quest through the real art world. Using dialogue from anonymous interviews we did with people across the industry, we ridicule a contemporary art world that has turned art into artworks, art schools into art universities, and creative expression into cut-throat competition 👹 get it from an indie bookshop! or a big bookshop! or a library!

our BOOK COVER which has the title POOR ARTISTS on a bright pink background with an abstract digital painting of a lemon, featured on an artfully arranged pile of poor artist hard back books

WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING ABOUT THE BOOK:

“An incredible achievement. It was a book that we found endlessly important, surprising, playful and unflinching. A book that is both a brilliant rebuke to snobbery and an absolute riot to read. It is one of those books that you read and think oh, they’ve caught a little bit of magic in here somehow.” Jury of the Gordon Burn Prize

“A sharp and original take on the privilege and passion of the modern creative economy.” Publishers Weekly

“Unlike anything I’ve ever read before. Irreverent, provocative and funny.” Dazed

“Reads like a page-turning novel. A full-throated defence of the inherent value of making, experiencing and talking about art.” Frieze

“A landmark for art writing.” Natalie Olah

“Poor Artists is very funny; it’s also charged with a surreal sense of invention.” The Times

“It could very well be the best way to get a sense of what it’s like to be an artist today.” ELLE Canada

“If Poor Artists is poison for institutions, it is a tonic for the people.” The Skinny

“Refreshing, lucid, and plainly radical.” South Asian Avant-Garde Anthology

“Striking bathos and playful prose… like a Tim Burton fantasy.” AnOther

“Poor Artists is a triumph. A book with a unique form that plays off the tension between romanticism and indignation, combining fiction and journalism in a fresh and provocative manner.” Amar Patel

“The White Pube have shown that art criticism is at its most fun when it’s as unpredictable and leftfield as the art it critiques.” Prospect

“Thoroughly recommend you pick up a copy and comb through it cover to cover.” Polyester

“Poor Artists interweaves impassioned real-world critique with an exuberant narrative that’s by turns satirical and surreal.” The Telegraph

EVENTS 2024/25:

WHERE TO GET IT:

Still in the midst of putting this list together but besides the usual suspects, you can get the book from the following independent bookshops*

NORTH

MIDLANDS

SOUTH

LDN

IRELAND

WORLD

*If you are a bookshop, a talking bookshop, and you have Poor Artists then please let us know so we can add a link on this page. But i’m not gonna lie people in Greece and Uganda have tagged us in posts and I’ve lost them and I’ve just fully lost track of where this book has made it to god it’s been a weird year

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