An aspiring young artist’s journey makes for a critique of the art world, in novel form

The White Pube, the collaborative identity of critics Gabrielle de la Puente and Zarina Muhammad, have always pushed hard at the idea of art criticism. The name is a sardonic twist on both the “white cube” method of presenting art and the eponymous blue-chip gallery. The pair set up a website in 2015 and have become remarkable essayists and critics, refusing to conform to the expectations of the art world establishment. Each time they write, they seem to be asking themselves and the reader: what is criticism?

Poor Artists is their first book, and although they tell us directly in the introduction that we “are reading a piece of art criticism”, they also ask us to “let go of any expectations of rationality”. Most art criticism doesn’t feature a fictional main character, various monsters and ghosts, or a novelistic narrative arc. At the centre of the book is Quest Talukdar, an aspiring artist who is learning about the way the art world chews up and spits out its artists. Muhammad and De la Puente build the book around Quest’s quest (ahem) to make it as an artist. They interviewed 22 anonymous artists and art world people for the book, and they use this material as the basis for a series of strange Ali Smith-esque vignettes that feature talking babies, zombies, a professor made out of discarded art, beheaded critics, and the ghost of Gustave Courbet, among other oddities. Short chapters on real pieces of contemporary art, often performances that critique the art world itself, are also interspersed, along with references to real artists, galleries and people.