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Joseph Staples

officesuppliesincorporated.com/nownownow

“When you compare pictures of people and abstract images, I think people feel a picture that looks like a person easiest to understand. But I can’t think of anything more abstract than people.”

Location:

Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

Professional title:

Visual artist

What do you do?

I have been making fan fiction in a visual form, using the characters as symbols to think about love, relationships, violence, group dynamics, images and disappointment.

Why?

I feel more settled when I am into a project. Writing and making things gives your life a focus outside of the usual feeds and dreary life problems that mostly don't matter. Its a reason to read, to watch things critically and to pay attention.

What should we read?

There are some great books below, but one you will not find on most lists is very good so I will stop to explain why here. Byung Chul Han is a professor of philosophy in Berlin. He writes about tech and modern culture and he is fantastic. His prose, especially in the later books is so tight, so clean of non-essentials that its like Western philosophy written by zen poets. It got me back into reading critical theory and philosophy. On Beauty was my first and a great intro. Any of the books are great, but the slimmer the better. Writings by Agnes Martin. In Praise of Shadows by Jun'ichiro Tanazaki. Arranging Things by Leonard Koren. Art of Seduction by Robert Greene. The French Art of Not Trying Too Hard by Ollivier Pourriol. The Tools by Barry Michels and Phil Stutz.