10 Must-Read Art Books for Your Summer Beach Getaway

📚 Summer 2024’s Must-Read Art Books: Insight, Identity, and Imagination

With the summer sun inviting long, leisurely afternoons, there’s no better time to dig into a compelling art book. Whether you’re sprawled on a sun-drenched beach, relaxing in a shady park, or cozying up indoors with an iced drink, this season brings a host of titles that span biographies, exhibition catalogs, critical essays, and creative fiction — all centered on the transformative power of art. From legends like Yoko Ono and Jack Whitten to emerging narratives in Latinx and trans artistry, here are some top reads for art lovers this summer.

🎨 1. Jack Whitten: Notes from the Woodshed (Edited by Katy Siegel)
Reissued in time with his MoMA retrospective, this intimate journal from the late abstractionist Jack Whitten offers over 55 years of handwritten reflections — art theory, personal musings, and creative philosophies. Ideal for dipping in and out, its aphorisms, sketches, and crossed-out confessions offer readers a glimpse into the solitary yet richly imaginative life of a studio practitioner. It’s a reminder that even in solitude, artists are always in conversation with history.

🖌️ 2. Amy Sherald: American Sublime (Edited by Sarah Roberts)
Known for her vibrant realist portraits of Black Americans (including the now-iconic portrait of Breonna Taylor), Amy Sherald’s work resonates with historical poignance and playful color. This catalog, released with her Whitney Museum survey, maps out her trajectory and places her firmly in the canon of 21st-century American art. A soulful and emotional journey through portraiture.

🪡 3. MARSHA: The Joy and Defiance of Marsha P. Johnson (by Tourmaline)
More than just a biography, this book sheds light on the multifaceted life of activist and artist Marsha P. Johnson — not just as a queer icon, but a textile artist, caregiver, and radical thinker. Writer-filmmaker Tourmaline elevates Marsha’s role in visual culture, from performance art to banner-making, intricately tying her legacy to today’s trans and queer art movements.

📘 4. A Handbook of Latinx Art (Edited by Rocío Aranda-Alvarado & Deborah Cullen-Morales)
This ambitious anthology of essays offers a crucial rethinking of U.S. art history, spotlighting Latinx artists long excluded from both American and Latin American canons. From foundational texts to contemporary interventions, this book gives voice to artists who’ve shaped – and reshaped – the cultural narrative from the 1970s to today. The focus on Mexican-American, Puerto Rican, Cuban-American, and Dominican-American communities sets the stage for deeper explorations to come.

🎭 5. Yoko: A Biography (by David Sheff)
Few figures are as mythologized as Yoko Ono. Journalist and friend David Sheff cuts through decades of sensationalism to offer a layered, heartfelt portrait of the groundbreaking artist, activist, and peace icon. With special attention to Ono’s art (from “Cut Piece” onward), the book reclaims her significance in the global avant-garde and conceptual art scenes.

🏡 6. Vanessa Bell: Modern Living (by Rosalind McKever)
An ode to one of Britain’s most innovative modernists, this slim but rich volume explores Vanessa Bell’s multidimensional practice — from interior design and textile work to her formative role in the Bloomsbury Group. Readers are taken through Charleston House, the artist’s color-splashed, bohemian residence, and immersed in Bell’s belief that art and life should be in harmonious fusion.

📸 7. Hervé Guibert: The Only Face (Edited by Jordan Weitzman; Translated by Christine Pichini)
Photographer and writer Hervé Guibert captured fleeting, exquisite moments of life and love through prose and lens. In this translated gem, Guibert reflects on human connection, light, and perception in a monastic encounter turned essay-photo series. Sparse yet profound, this book is a poetic meditation on what it means to see — and to be seen.

🏛️ 8. The Nude (by C. Michelle Lindley)
In this art-fiction beach read, curator Elizabeth Clarke’s journey to a Greek island in search of an ancient sculpture turns into a psychological and aesthetic unraveling. Beautifully adorned with art history references and savory scenes of Mediterranean life, this absorbing novel fuses suspense with a reverence for classical antiquity.

🌲 9. Bad Outdoorsmen (by Katie Hargrave & Meredith Laura Lynn)
This wry and incisive exhibition catalog is both a send-up and a serious critique of the rugged individualist mythos. Through self-aware performances, camo-clad sculptures, and a spoof audition for survival-reality TV, the artists question the colonialist