Isabelle Graw’s Vom Nutzen der Freundschaft is a first-hand account and social critique rolled into one. Written in the style of a fictional diary, the book contains personal notes on the benefits of friendship in a society geared to competition. With her focus on her own milieu—the art scene—she shows that friendships are neither completely selfless nor subsumed in their utility value. Graw also takes a critical look at her own friendship practices, in the form of autofictionalized prose. The first part of the book can be read as a lament, bemoaning the pitfalls and snares of ”friendships of utility“, while the second part is a paean to ”true friendships“, which the author sees as an existential necessity: friendship and the sense of intimacy with others that it brings are as vital to her as the air she breathes.
Isabelle Graw, writer and art historian, teaches art history and art theory at the Städelschule academy of fine arts in Frankfurt am Main. She is co-founder and editor of the Texte zur Kunst magazine and lives and works in Berlin and Frankfurt am Main. Her recent publications include High Price: Art between the Market and Celebrity Culture (2009), The Love of Painting: Genealogy of a Success Medium (2018), and In Einer Anderen Welt: Notizen 2014 – 2017 (2020).
