Texts by Roland Barthes, Liam Gillick, Kenneth Goldsmith, Tom McCarthy, Ingo Niermann, Seth Price, Seth Siegelaub, et al.; excerpts from artist novels by Guy de Cointet, Henry Joseph Darger, Yayoi Kusama, Jill Magid, et al.

This publication is devoted to the phenomenon of the artist novel, and whether it can be considered to be a medium in its own right within the visual arts. Visual artists create different strategies to integrate their novels into their practice. Introducing traits that are particular to narrative literature into the visual arts implies the accentuation of some features over others, such as narration, fiction, identification, and the act of reading and its protracted engagement, as well as distribution in public space. An artist’s approach comes fundamentally from the visual arts. The creation of an artist novel doesn’t differ from any other artwork. Both processes feed into each other as they evolve within the same body of works.