PRETENTIOUSNESS: WHY IT MATTERS
Dan Fox (Fitzcarraldo Editions)
Arguably relevant anecdote: the other day, I went into a shop while carrying this book, put it in my basket and instinctively, placed it cover side down so strangers wouldn’t judge me on the basis of its title. Fox, no doubt aided by his job as editor of an art magazine, is acutely aware of the power ‘pretentious’ wields as an insult, whether in the gallery, on the triple-disc concept album or the pages of a book-length essay like his. His case for its defence is robust: people creatively overreaching is an inevitable byproduct of them reaching at all. Many aspects of modern life we take for granted come courtesy of people who studied art, design etc. And the most vocally anti-pretentious are often accidentally pretentious themselves, faux-proletarian and protesting too much.
NG
Price: £12.99 paperback. Info: www.fitzcarraldoeditions.com