Love for Sale

by Kate Linker, Barbara Kruger

The artist Barbara Kruger was an important thinker on postmodern and feminist issues. This survey includes her most famous pieces and discusses the ways in which her art challenges social values and the nature of art-making, and uses images appropriated from various sources to capture attention.

Genres: Art, Feminism, Nonfiction

96 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1990

About the author

Kate Linker is a critic and former associate editor of Tracks: A Journal of Artists Writings. Her articles have appeared in Artforum, Parachute, Studio International, and other publications. She recently curated the exhibition Difference: On Representation and Sexuality at The New Museum of Contemporary Art.

Reviews

[Jaimie · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was super excited to get my hands on another Barbara Kruger art book, but this one was honestly such a disappointment that I don’t think I have anything positive to say about it. Based on its over-sized pages, I expected some fully immersive examples of Kruger’s art in all their maximal glory, but instead we get a text-heavy layout where the imagery is pushed to the margins and presented in far too small a size to make an impact. The images that are presented full-page are lovely by themselves, but their presentation leaves them separated from the textual analysis to such an extent they might as well stand alone. I maybe would have tolerated the disconnect between the text and images better if Kate Linker’s writing was more approachable, but she fills her commentary with so much elitist art-world jargon that her actual message is lost in the minutia. I honestly can’t recall a single concisely made point from the text, even though part of it is a basic biography of Kruger, so clearly the impact that she was hoping to make missed the mark. The book might call itself “Love for Sale” (after Kruger’s cover artwork), but there is little love to be found within the pages of this book…

[Valorie Clark · Rating 3 out of 5]

Published in 1990, so this is a slightly outdated look at Barbara Kruger’s body of work. It focuses slightly more heavily on her works around gender and confronting patriarchy than Kruger’s work about money and the global economy. That said, it’s a great book to understand the early parts of Kruger’s career. It’s well-grounded in the theological constructs that underpin Kruger’s work, but also is careful to include Kruger’s perspectives and questions about those same theories.

[Marti · Rating 5 out of 5]

can't wait for the day these works are no longer relevant

[Carlos S V · Rating 5 out of 5]

Masterpiece

[Kevin · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the better books that explore Kugler's relationship to poetry and language and her feminist art.