Summer brings its own rhythm to the art world. Many galleries turn to group exhibitions, international shows draw audiences to scenic seasonal destinations, and the art fair calendar quiets until September. For artists, that change of pace can also create something increasingly rare: sustained time to read for pleasure.
Books, of course, are often inseparable from an artist’s practice. A memoir can offer a new way of thinking about a life; an unexpected case study can open up a line of research; a collection of essays can sharpen, complicate, or unsettle an idea already taking shape in the studio. Reading may be especially pleasurable in summer—on a beach, in a park, during a quiet stretch at home—but it is rarely only a diversion. Books can become sources, provocations, and points of departure, sometimes feeding directly into new bodies of work or exhibitions.
With that in mind, Artsy asked a group of artists with busy months ahead what they are reading this summer. As they prepare for solo and group exhibitions, biennial and fair participations, they share the books currently sitting on their desks, nightstands, and daybeds.
Hew Locke
B. Edinburgh, 1959. Lives and works in London.
Reading: V.S. Naipaul, Miguel Street, 1959
“The book I plan to reread is Miguel Street by V.S. Naipaul. There is a darkness in this book, alleviated by an equally dark humor—my mother read this to my brother and sister and me as a bedtime story, which in retrospect was quite an unusual, almost adult choice of book. I have read it several times but not for a number of years, so I am looking forward to picking it up again.
“As I get older, I see more and more in the book. It is a pleasurable read and is, in essence, a collection of beautifully written short stories about a boy growing up in Port of Spain in Trinidad during World War II, and in each chapter Naipaul brings to life one of the street's inhabitants in a short story. They are tragic—disturbing often—but also funny, such as Man Man, who lives on the street and declares himself the new Messiah.”
“The characters remind me of people I saw around me when I was growing up in Georgetown, neighboring Guyana. And this book has always been at the back of my mind for my whole career, for example in a new series of paintings of Knights Errant that I have been making recently.”