"I can resist everything", wrote Oscar Wilde, "except temptation". What is it that makes a painting so attractive, so irresistible? In this collection of essays, Dominic van den Boogerd writes with passion about the exhibitions he has seen, the painters he has spoken with, and the talks by artists that he has organised as the director of De Ateliers in Amsterdam. About the pleasures and pitfalls of painting, forbidden favourites and the flirtation between the art of painting and other muses.

Launching the series 'ArtEZ Press Essay Issues', this first instalment features feminist Nishant Shah, who argues that the idea of a future in crisis and future as fake pervades almost all our global and immediate dialogues. Whether it is climate change deniers, flat Earth advocates, anti-vaxxers, incels, men’s rights advocates, neo-Nazi supporters, or fascist states eroding democracy, these two aspects link them all together. However, if fake is not an absolute category and not an inquiry ...