JiaJia Fei is a digital strategist. She is also the founder of her eponymous agency, the first digital agency for art, where she helps art museums, galleries and artists translate their creative practice into the digital space. JiaJia has spent over a decade leading teams at the Jewish Museum and the Guggenheim, working at the intersection of digital marketing and branding to create web, mobile and social media content.
Which three books would you recommend?
Seven Days in the Art WorldSarah Thorton
I recently recommended this book to a young artist trying to find their place in the art world, which can seem really contrived and exclusive, because it is. Written from the perspective of a sociologist, the book dissects the inner workings of the art ecosystem: the auction, the critical, the fair, the prize, the magazine, the studio visit, the biennale, and how they all rely on each other for survival. Although the book was published more than ten years ago, many of the industry's cast of characters and rituals still hold true today, but some (in a post-COVID era) now read as straight up science fiction.
From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. FrankweilerE.L. Konigsburg
I'm pretty sure this book is the reason why I wanted to work at a museum! The charming story of two kids who run away from home to live at the Metropolitan Museum of Art sounded like the coolest thing in the world when I was in third grade. In fact, this fantasy never went away. I'm also pretty sure that every museum nerd I know obsessed over the book as a child (and perhaps still as an adult), and that's how I know we can be friends.
MidsummerDerek Walcott
There's a line from this book of poems that always brings me joy:
The frame of human happiness is time,
the child's swing slackens to a metronome.
Happiness sparkles on the sea like soda.
Whose reading list are you most curious about?
I'd very much like to know what Ruth Bader Ginsburg had on her shelves.