Jerry Saltz lays the creative process bare in How to be an Artist, the book

In 2018, New York magazine’s senior art critic Jerry Saltz won a Pulitzer Prize for his article, My Life as a Failed Artist. Gaining fans aplenty for his candor, Saltz followed up with a more pragmatic list of learnings called How to be an Artist, laying bare the creative process, the workings of the art world, and outlining how to hone and define your practice. The article featured 33 steps that “take you from clueless amateur to generational talent (or at least help you live life a little more creatively)”. These started with lessons like “Tell your own story and you will be interesting,” a quote from Louise Bourgeois, and “Feel free to imitate”; it then went on to explain “How to actually begin” making art (he says it all starts with a pencil), how to think like an artist, and how to enter – and survive – the art world.

Since publication, some of the art world’s biggest names have voiced their praise for the piece, including Tracey Emin, Sonic Youth’s Kim Gordon and Grayson Perry, who said: “I wish I had read these rules 40 years ago and carried them around like a bible. By chance or design I’ve followed most of them at some point but it took me a lifetime as an artist to find what worked. They are the generous, loving, enthusiastic, bullshit-free advice of a master communicator, just reading them makes me want to charge back into the studio.” Cindy Sherman herself said in response that Saltz is “so right-on it scares me”.

It’s seems a no-brainer that such a vast subject couldn’t possibly be done justice in a magazine article, so now Octopus Books is publishing an expanded version as a book, with the same title. Saltz has added dozens of new rules, exercises, prompts and tips, aiming to help conquer creative block, motivate, inspire and craft a unique artistic voice, building on his much lauded advice gleaned from decades analysing the art world. Intriguing subject matter includes “Recognize convention, and resist constraint,” and “Listen to the wildest voices in your head”.

How to be an Artist is published 17 March 2020 by Octopus.