This is the first in A.R.T.'s re-initiated Between Artists series: conversation-based books that document different positions and strategies in contemporary critical visual practices.
As the ninth installment in the series, this guide invites learners and educators to explore how Ault’s work addresses themes of access, democracy, and community engagement—values at the heart of A.R.T. that also resonate powerfully with our current cultural and political moment.
A.R.T. is celebrating Adrian Piper by distributing 25,000 free art books to 650 public libraries, schools, and prisons in her name.
The A.R.T. Library Program has distributed 597,224 free art books to a growing network of 9,601 public schools, libraries, prisons, and reading centers nationwide.
Rirkrit Tiravanija's practice insists that an artwork's meaning arises in its collective production and use.
"A primary function of a book is the possibility for continuation. Books distribute with a wider ranging reach and have an enduring material life."
"A.R.T. offers books that I myself wouldn't have considered purchasing because I hadn't heard of the artist until discovering it on its catalog. They are also books that many of the libraries in my state do not own, so I am providing materials to the entire state of Minnesota that the public did not previously have access to."
"The classroom, like Tiravanija’s work, can create the conditions for individuals to join a collective, observe the social tensions within the collective, and then reflect critically on that experience."
"We get letters all the time about how the art books we send out are so very valued and help humanize such a crushingly brutal institutional existence... the A.R.T. Library Program is a godsend..."
"The books offered by A.R.T. expand the spectrum in which literacy might be defined, allowing individuals from our community to immerse themselves in a range of information, from purely visual to entirely literary. A.R.T.’s catalog reflects the diverse relationships our artists have with literacy in its various forms."
"Literacy from the vantage of art prioritizes writing over reading, and artistic production as a process of creating forms over the appreciation of artworks. If we are good at fostering literacy from this point of view, we will prompt readers to shift from being consumers to authors. Books, like works of art, should be meeting places where power is not displayed but redistributed."