Joseph Kosuth, in “Art and Its Public” defined an artist community as “…a community of artists who collectively, through individual effort, define what is meaningful at a particular historical moment concretely within the practice of their activity.” And comedian Stephen Fry, while viciously ripping into a head of lettuce, asks why making a salad (with no other motive other than love!) (and a decent desire!) is so frustratingly futile. A number of artists and writers were invited to address the question: is there such a thing as an artist community? Do they feel a part of one? What constitutes it? What would it mean to be able to collectively define meaning today, in a diverse and ever-changing art world? 



Insert Press in collaboration with MATERIAL, an artist-run journal publishing and supporting the artist’s voice, has collected the responses to this question and created a publication of these texts that begin to describe our ‘particular moment.’ With cover design and screenprinting by Maggie White Lomeli and Insert Press, and interior layout design & typesetting by Daniel Lucas, The Futility of Making Salad features texts by the following artists: Harold Abramowitz
, Stan Apps, 
Marcus Civin, 
Ginny Cook, 
Dorit Cypis, 
Robin Dicker, 
Bradney Evans, 
Nicholas Grider, 
Dan Hockenson, 
Peter Kirby, 
Elana Mann, 
Melanie Nakaue
, Julie Orser, 
Adam Overton, 
Putting On 
Declan Rooney, 
Kim Schoen, 
Charlotte Smith, 
Jesper List Thomsen, 
Mathew Timmons, 
Jason Underhill.

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