Class inevitably raises awkward questions for the protagonists of contemporary art — about their backgrounds, patrons and ideological proclivities. Lapdogs of the Bourgeoisie investigates this latent yet easily overlooked issue, which has been historically eclipsed by gender, sexuality, ethnicity and nationality. This book creates a conversation on a sensitive subject, bringing together essays by art-world types including artists, curators and critics. On one hand, the ideas here raise the question of whether a given socio-economic background still helps define an artistic career — and to which point this career might reflect or consolidate the hierarchies in question. On the other hand, the project asks whether the traditional ways of analyzing class structure are actually helpful in an examination of who makes art today.

This publication examines the spaces, nations, and communities created by artists or indivuals to develop alternative modes of living. Throughout history individuals have continuously developed systems based on a mix of reality, fiction, and mediatization, create micro-nations, or fight for their existence. All these proposals are simultaneously real and utopic. By inventing identity signs (IDs, flags, constitutions, currencies, etc.), by practicing their beliefs (be it through dance, naturism, terrorism, or collectivism), and by working on the boundaries of reality (parallel worlds, isolationism, new territories, etc.), these proposals are challenging our definitions of normalcy and territoriality. The title Utopics is itself the free contraction of utopias, you, topic, topos, and pics.

Conceived as a glossary, the book includes artists such as Le Bélier, Carsten Höller, Clemens von Wedemeyer, Fabrice Gygi, General Idea, Lang/Baumann, Matt Mullican, Mai-Thu Perret, NSK (Irwin), Peter Coffin, Steiner & Lenzlinger, Superflex, as well as intitiatives such as La République Géniale (Robert Filliou), State of Sabotage (Robert Jelinek), micro-nations, L’Ecole de Stéphanie, etc.

Calling for a reassessment of the function of art in late capitalist society, Corporate Mentality focuses on the complex and ambiguous ways artistic production inhabits corporate processes, abandoning the autonomy of the artwork in order to elaborate resistant approaches to a world increasingly determined by commercial strategies and market concerns.

Based on an archive (1995–2001) maintained by Aleksandra Mir, it presents a diverse spectrum of artists who take on business as site, as material, and as subject of their work. As Will Bradley writes in frieze, “The book focuses on … an essential area of interest as artists wake up to the reality of the Clinton-era fantasy of ethical corporatism. The plan came out of Mir and Kelsey’s realization that the publicity industry wasn’t stealing artists’ ideas, but simply employing artists, like Mir herself, who needed a day job. ‘Radical’ aesthetics that had taken at least six months to travel (we’re in New York here) from downtown to uptown were now transferred almost instantaneously, causing artists to reassess their methods.”

This new monograph features work by the admired New York painter, Richard Phillips, whose brash, often pornographic paintings borrow from fashion, art, the news and other graphic media. Equally apt to take his motifs from glossy magazines as from art historical or kitsch icons, he blends Pop art with a contemporary critique of the representation which emerged in the “Picture Group” generation of the 1980s. Richly illustrated, the book features recent work as well as essays by musician Kim Gordon and artist Liam Gillick.