Ben Eastham

🌘 COVER ANNOUNCEMENT 🌗 “An immersing, crystalline debut novel that reaches out to a world in crisis; elegant, emotional, deeply serious and gloriously witty.” —Deborah Levy, author of AUGUST BLUE THE FLOATING WORLD by Ben Eastham is a cautionary tale of a young, newly widowed art critic who goes to work for a mysterious billionaire determined to build a geodesic-domed paradise to shelter the rich. At first glance, the Floating World seems like a paradise, but it soon becomes clear that all is not well beneath the shimmering dome. Why is the billionaire head of the corporation ensconced in his own residence on the far side of the island, surrounded by bodyguards? Why are the workers so reluctant to speak of their experiences? Our protagonist’s gaze is distracted from these indicators of some deeper disturbance by Selima, the uncannily familiar technical director of the exhibition. THE FLOATING WORLD is a dystopia and Bildungsroman, steeped in atmosphere and sparkling with intelligence, and signals the arrival of a major new talent on the fiction scene. Publishing September 29, 2026. PREORDER TODAY! /product/the-floating-world-9781662603631/

The international exhibition of the 61st Venice Biennale sets out an ambitious program of interlinking themes and perspectives, writes Ben Eastham, but is hamstrung by the absence of the one person who might tie them together. Read at the link in bio. #beneastham #venicebiennale #inminorkeys #labiennale @eastham_ben @labiennale Images: [1] Wangechi Mutu, The End, Where All began, EdEN, 2026. Photo by Andrea Avezzù. [2] View of 61st Venice Biennale, “In Minor Keys,” 2026. Photo by Marco Zorzanello. [3] Cauleen Smith, The Wanda Coleman Songbook, 2024. Photo by Marco Zorzanello. [4] Daniel Lind-Ramos , Guardaverde, 2024–25. Photo by Marco Zorzanello. [5] View of 61st Venice Biennale, “In Minor Keys,” 2026. Works by Sabian Baumann. Photo by Andrea Avezzù. Courtesy of La Biennale di Venezia.

Beginning in 1981, Paper Tiger Television aired 400+ programs exposing commercial influence over US media. Combining accessible analyses with wit and a DIY attitude, writes Ben Eastham, they model resistance to corporate media control today. Read at the link in bio. #beneastham #papertigertelevision #goldsmithscca @eastham_ben @goldsmithscca Images: [1, 2] View of Paper Tiger Television’s “It’s 8:30. Do you know where your brains are?” at Goldsmiths Centre for Contemporary Art, London, 2026. Courtesy Goldsmiths CCA. Photo by Rob Harris. [3] Herb Schiller Reads New York Times 2: New York Times and The New World Information Orde, 1981. Produced by Paper Tiger Television. Production photograph by Vicki Gholson.

✨ ACQUISITION ANNOUNCEMENT ✨ Astra House is thrilled to announce Ben Eastham’s debut novel THE FLOATING WORLD for publication in Fall 2026 alongside Fitzcarraldo (UK). On a remote island in the Aegean, a billionaire named Morel is constructing a utopian community beneath a giant geodesic dome. Our narrator, young and newly widowed, is offered a job working on the spectacular immersive installation meant to inaugurate the closed society. But nothing is as it seems beneath the glittering surface, and as the opening approaches, our narrator finds himself increasingly unable to distinguish dream from reality. THE FLOATING WORLD is a dystopia, satire and Bildungsroman, steeped in atmosphere and sparkling with intelligence, and signals the arrival of a major new talent on the fiction scene. @fitzcarraldoeditions

Onorate di ospitare su Yellow Dog il testo critico di Ben Eastham per la mostra "Anzi Parla" di Eloise Fornieles che si è tenuta alla British School at Rome dal 5 novembre al 19 dicembre 2025. La traduzione del testo in italiano è a firma di Marta Pellerini. Grazie per la fiducia @eloisefornieles @eastham_ben @britishschoolatrome @martapellerini Immagine: Eloise Fornieles, "Anzi Parla", 2025. Installation view, British School at Rome. Photo: Roberto Apa RUTH è: @manu_pcll @lolagboon @g_olden_trash @zollacollettivo @serenaschioppa

Back in London (indefinitely), would love to see you*

In our attention-deficient and hyper-politicized present, is it any longer possible or ethically responsible to become absorbed in art? The work of Pauline Boudry and Renate Lorenz, writes Ben Eastham, offers us a way out of that dead end. Read at the link in bio. #beneastham #paulineboudry #renatelorenz #istitutosvizzero @eastham_ben @istitutosvizzero Images: [1] Pauline Boudry and Renate Lorenz, (No) Time, 2020. Courtesy of the artists and Fonds régional d’art contemporain Bretagne. [2] View of Pauline Boudry and Renate Lorenz’s “how we always survived” at Istituto Svizzero, Rome, 2025.[3] Pauline Boudry and Renate Lorenz, All the things she said, 2025. Courtesy of Marcelle Alix, Paris and Ellen de Bruijne Projects, Amsterdam. Photos by Annik Wetter.

A dialogue between artists Reba Maybury and Lucy McKenzie rejects crowd-pleasing subversion in favor of ambivalence and discomfort. Ben Eastham on a book and exhibition that challenge art’s claims to virtue. Read at the link in bio. #beneastham #rebamaybury #lucymckenzie #noplacepress #gtaexhibitions @eastham_ben @noplacepress Images: [1] View of Reba Maybury and Lucy McKenzie’s “Pervert or Detective?” at Ca’ Buccari, Venice, 2025. Image courtesy of Ca’ Buccari. Photo by Annika Wetter. [2] Lucy McKenzie, Vita, Funder Bakke, July 2024, 2025. Oil on canvas, 100 x 66.3 cm. Image courtesy of Ca’ Buccari, Venice, 2025. Photo by Annika Wetter. [3] Reba Maybury, Francis Bacon, German, Junior Art Advisor; 28, London, 2024 (II), 2024. Acrylic paint (24 colors) on printed canvas, 50 x 60 cm. Image courtesy of Ca’ Buccari, Venice, 2025. Photo by Annika Wetter.

Having escaped the genocide that claimed the life of his mother, Vosdanig Adoian moved to New York, taught himself to paint, adopted the name of a mythical hero* and a great Soviet writer to whom he then claimed to be related, and set about reinventing modern American art. Arshile Gorky’s story is one of the wildest in twentieth-century art, and it was a pleasure to be able to tell it through this book. It’s a story about New York as a place of shelter and community, about the foundational contribution of an Armenian immigrant displaced by ethnic cleansing to modern American culture, and of faith in the capacity of art to preserve traditions and identities not by fixing them in aspic but by reinvigorating them through exchange and combination. All of which feels relevant to the present moment. The book features brilliant essays by Adam Gopnik, Allison Katz, Tamar Kharatishvili, Christa Noel Robbins and Emily Warner. I edited it and contribute an introduction, and there are copious very beautiful images, accompanied by contextualising writing designed to appeal to the uninitiated as much as art historians. Much credit is due to the wonderful Saskia Spender and Parker Field at the Arshile Gorky Foundation. Arshile Gorky: New York City is published by Hauser & Wirth, and is out on June 17. You can pre-order via Artbook, and elsewhere.

Lina Lapelytė’s understated musical intervention into The Cosmic House, Charles Jencks’s architectural shrine to postmodernism, pits two very different ways of making sense of the world against each other, writes Ben Eastham. Read at the link in bio. #beneastham #linalapelytė #cosmichouse @linalapelyte @eastham_ben @jencksfoundation Images: [1] Lina Lapelytė, You Turn to Me, 2025. Lyrics by Ella Finer, music by Rebecca Horrox, 3:27 minutes. Video still by Martynas Norvaišas. Commissioned by the Jencks Foundation at The Cosmic House, London. [2] Lina Lapelytė, Cosmic Lullaby, 2025. Music by Anat Ben David, Rebecca Horrox, Sharon Gal, Lina Lapelytė, Nouria Bah, Angharad Davies, 5:17 minutes. Video still by Martynas Norvaišas. Commissioned by the Jencks Foundation at The Cosmic House, London. [3] View of Lina Lapelytė’s “In the Dark, We Play” at The Cosmic House, London, 2025. Conceived in collaboration with Nouria Bah, Anat Ben-David, Angharad Davies, Sharon Gal, Rebecca Horrox, and Martynas Norvaišas. Courtesy of the artists and the Jencks Foundation at The Cosmic House. Photo by Martynas Norvaišas.

Reviewed the 16th Sharjah Biennial, “to carry,” for e-flux Criticism. Link in bio. Images: still from Alia Farid’s Chibayish; the village built for Bedouins in Al Madam and since buried by a moving sand dune, in which a sound work by Raven Chacon was installed; a sculpture by Fatma Belkıs; from the archive of the Gazan photography studio, Photo Kegham; detail from a painting by Mangku Muriati.

Reviewed Kevin Killian’s witty, eclectic, oddly life-affirming “Selected Amazon Reviews” for e-flux Criticism. Link in bio.