August 30, 2006
Christopher Lyon on art book publishing
In the September issue of Art in America, Prestel executive editor Christopher Lyon analyzes "a mounting crisis in art book publishing." Of course, like most fire-alarm essays of this type, what the author describes is simply a need for new thinking about a practice, not its decimation. The conflicts in the Middle East are crises; the world's environment is at a crisis point; the seemingly inevitable eradication of thousands of human languages can be considered a crisis. I have a harder time accepting the term used in relation to subjects like art-book publishing, art criticism, or classical music. Nonetheless, Lyon's article is a useful summary of recent changes in how art books are produced, distributed, and sold, with sidebars on "a short history of the art book" and "permissions purgatory." Here are his last two paragraphs:
Looking to the future of the art book, further consideration of the bifurcated market's implications might be useful. It may help us to frankly confront the apparent crystallization of the "us and them" attitude toward consumers of art books seen at MOMA, a seeming abandonment of the admittedly idealistic notion that modern art, clearly presented and clearly explained, can reach everyone. On the distribution side, recognition of the bifurcated market might help to speed the escape of niche and institutional publishers from the inappropriate sales environment of mass market retailing and the destructive discounting of the Internet giants, and encourage alternative channels, whether independent and museum bookstores or direct on-line selling.A fresh look at the trade publisher's "mission" might also be in order. Having a distinctive profile and high standards can provide a competitive advantage. Given the intense interest in emerging artists today, for example, it might seem tempting to jump in and publish the hottest new painter. But if art publishing works best as a long-term investment, perhaps it can be most effective in relation to new art when it offers seasoned observers the opportunity to step back, put new developments in context, and reevaluate veteran artists whose work provides the foundation on which younger artists build. And in the end we might simply ask ourselves, whether we are authors, publishers, museum professionals, or booksellers, is it important to us to connect meaningful art to with a larger audience?
What haunts this article, of course, is how these developments have changed the practices of Lyon's own company. Much of the essay is a lament for the decline of the sumptuously illustrated coffee-table monograph, which, based on what I know of Prestel (the most recently published book of theirs that I own is the 500-plus-page catalogue of the Neue Galerie's 2005 Egon Schiele exhibition), is precisely what they publish. Is the company diversifying its list to accommodate scholarly texts (in one direction) or larger-market "gift books" (in the other)? How is it helping to slot new artists into art-historical context, or to reevaluate mid-career and seasoned contemporary artists? What is it doing to ensure the distinctiveness of its profile?
UPDATE, 8/30: Jon Lackman just published a short post about Lyon's article, using different quotations, at the Art History Newsletter.