Get the Picture

'In Get the Picture - curious but not naïve, gossipy but generous, critical but admiring, hilarious but profound - Bosker probes the human thirst for art, examines the addictive high it gives and rescues the unfashionable idea of beauty, of the pleasure of creation, from the theorists and the marketeers. This book is sheer pleasure: the best book I've ever read about contemporary art' - Benjamin Moser, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of SONTAG and THE UPSIDE-DOWN WORLD


'A brilliant adventure through the fraught, frenzied, fanatical world of art and emerging artists. Bosker flings us into the epicenter of creativity and obsession, and with infectious curiosity, illuminates the surprising science, history and controversies at the core of our relationship with art. This book paints an extraordinary picture that will make your life more beautiful. Put simply, it's a work of art' - Nathaniel Philbrick, author of IN THE HEART OF THE SEA

'This book freaked me out. Bosker's accessible, conversational spelunking into the world of contemporary art so powerfully rehydrated the PTSD in me between the little kid artist I once was with the self-consciously constricted thinker I became in art school that at one point I simply had to put it down, shaken. If you've ever wondered 'what happened' to art - galleries, critics, collectors - and, of course, artists - then this book is a very companionable start. It's also very funny, to say nothing of very vivid. And, confoundingly, very, very difficult to put down' - Chris Ware, author of BUILDING STORIES