Aesthetical Relations is a constellation of essays on art, fashion, cancer, comedy, Los Angeles, and your mom. Martinez whips elements of fiction and stand up material into bits and pieces addressing such concerns as: how many times you may kiss an art-world acquaintance, the theoretical stakes of sexting, and why German performance art is like French clowning. Aesthetical Relations is titled after Martinez’s ongoing conceptual comedy talk show of the same name.

This new revised and expanded third edition includes new essays written from 2020-2025.

*Signed edition; please leave instructions for inscription (desired spelling of your name, ‘this is for my nephew Bernice, general signature, etc.) or it will be signed with something impersonal that I thought of that day, possibly a recipe for soup

*Price includes shipping and handling anywhere in the US, and chef’s choice of bumper sticker while stock lasts

Thoughtful, rigorous essays from an original comedy voice that’s well worth hearing. —Kirkus Reviews

Conceived in 2016 as a talk show, Aesthetical Relations has taken the form of several kinds of performance, as well as a book of essays. As a writer, actor, art critic, and comedian, Martinez proves poised to keenly conflate the sunken depths of comedy with the spacey depths of theory. The fusion of the academic and the absurd, the theoretical and the theatrical, the humorous and the hermeneutical[…]This is where critical gesture meets comical jest. —X-Tra Journal

Martinez is so funny, so witty, so clever and quick on her feet that often she outpaces her audience, leaves her reader gasping for air… A polymath of unquantifiable largesse, breaking brains one cultural consumer at a time. —BOMB

A bewitching hybrid of standup, clown and performance artist, who also happens to be a talented essayist. —PBS

Martinez muddies the boundaries between documentary and fiction, trash and art, reality and fantasy. —INTERVIEW

She doesn’t exactly straddle the comedy and fine-art worlds so much as stir them both together. As a writer, whether for Artforum or in her collection of essays, Aesthetical Relations, Martinez mixes in elements of her stand-up. —Vulture

She’s like Naomi Klein meets Tallulah Bankhead. —Michelle Tea