LETTER TO THE EDITOR: Boycott Art in America Magazine for its Price Hike!

April 2, 2:21 PMSalt Lake City Fine Arts Examinerqi peng

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Art in America advertisement off the website for the supposedly special deal. Courtesy of Brant Publications.

Dear Brant Publications:

This morning I went to grab the latest issue of Art in America magazine and it was the April 09 issue. It was fabulous to be able to check out some of the latest articles, particularly the one that contained the rather hilarious one with the Richard Prince rejection letter.

After skimming through the issue, I went to the front desk at Barnes & Noble to purchase the new issue and suddenly I was hit with the damn sticker shock. NINE DOLLARS? What the f--k were these guys thinking? Seriously, the last issue was only $5 for the month of March and now the publisher decides to levy a 80% price increase for single issues off the newstand.

This is the worst type of Ponzi scheme on devoted readers who choose to purchase single issues of your magazine as the shipping to home option may not be reliable. Or we prefer our magazine fresh and pristine looking as well. Unless the guys had a major investment in the Madoff investment firm or some delusion of grandeur, I do not believe that it is right for us devoted readers to have to suffer such a MAJOR price increase without some type of explanation. Considering that I am an impoverished conceptual artist living in Salt Lake City, is one issue worth two meals in a day?

Please disclose to us why each issue of your magazine have to be jacked up. It's not as if you increased the number of pages or reduced the advertising. And I hope that you peeps over there aren't increasing the bonuses because that wouldn't make us readers any happier for it. No kidding but considering that ArtForum, which has a larger size and more advertisements, prices a single issue for ONLY $10 then I see that would be a better deal considering that the information would be similar.

Thus, I will boycott your magazine unless the price goes back down or there is a full public disclosure about why production or shipping costs increased by 80% in one month. Until then, I will be grabbing ArtForum or ARTnews for the lowdown about what's going on in the contemporary art world.

And to anyone else reading this... please call up Brant Publications at (212) 941-2800 or (800) 925-8059 to protest this unsuspecting price increase for Art in America magazine. We love art here but we believe that full disclosure is necessary for us to want to foot a more expensive bill. We are hoping it's not the FORECLOSED penthouse suite in downtown Manhattan either.

yours truly on a rampage,

THE ART ASSASSIN