You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll flash an areola.

It all started with a strategically exposed tit.

Based on a twitter thread started by writer Nicole Tersigni, MEN TO AVOID IN ART AND LIFE pairs classic paintings (some of them creepy AF all by their lonesomes) with the gross things men say to women in the wild. From the always popular “you’d be so much prettier if you smiled” to the very meddlesome breastfeeding instructional, MEN TO AVOID IN ART AND LIFE is a veritable smorgasbord of white male privilege and awfulness.

There are your MANSPLAINERS:
http://www.easyvegan.info/img/men-to-avoid-03.jpg

Your CONCERN TROLLS:
http://www.easyvegan.info/img/men-to-avoid-06.jpg

Wannabe COMEDIANS:
http://www.easyvegan.info/img/men-to-avoid-07.jpg

So-called SEXPERTS:
http://www.easyvegan.info/img/men-to-avoid-08.jpg

And, not to be outdone, PATRONIZERS:
http://www.easyvegan.info/img/men-to-avoid-09.jpg

Books based on memes and Twitter feeds can sometimes be a little repetitive – too much of a good thing, etc. – but not so here. With just 76 pairings, this is a quick read that left me craving more. Sadly, there’s no dedicated Twitter feed where you can whet your appetite, just the original thread. Still, it’s something.
fwiw, I have no idea why they omitted “thanks I’m gay now” by norman rockwell from the book; this is something that will keep me up at night.

Ditto: https://twitter.com/nicsigni/status/1125453281344540674

Really the only thing that could have made this book better is if Tersigni paired this with screenshots of actual tweets. Still, it works. What woman among us hasn’t had a painfully unfunny joke explained back to us ad nauseam, as if the teller’s sexism will suddenly metamorphose into a sidesplitter upon the umpteenth retelling?

Love the premise and as a woman who has endured "mansplaining" on more than one occasion, it is overdue! Front cover is great!

This was quick and fun, and simply a book of memes basically. I do love browsing art and therefore enjoyed looking at the pictures and reading the clever, funny captions that mainly make fun of mansplaining and misogyny. Tough to critique a book of just pictures and funny captions, felt a bit like scrolling through a funny "feminist memes" reddit page and I enjoyed it.

Men to Avoid in Art and Life is a very funny and beautiful book that I would definitely gift to some of the women in my life.

Taking a break from the depressing and morbid reads, I requested this short non-fiction humorous read that combined classical fine art with memes and mansplaining - it was a glorious and light hearted interlude in-between all of the current chaos and disappointing reads I was picking up. Who doesn't love memes? My favourite kind of memes have to be the historical or classical art memes so this book was perfect for me. I definitely recommend this book, especially as a funny book to gift to friends or family. It was a very short read and I'm glad I requested it from Netgalley! If you have a blog and review books, definitely check out Netgalley as you might be able to read books before they are published for free.

This book is so funny and sadly accurate. There's some sad comfort in knowing that I'm not the only one who has has some of these phrases directed to me. I'd buy this book in bulk and give it out as a gift to bosses, exes, annoying friends of friends, and those guys you meet in airports.

This collection of famous art mixed with observations and snarky comments about men gave me quite a few laughs. Given the pandemic, that makes it worth a recommendation. Very funny!

Fine art plus captions suggesting what the man has just said to the woman, which may be come-on or condescension but is never anything good. It is essentially one joke, and doesn't even include my favourite of the genre ("Are you a software update because not right now"), which may have been someone else working from the same idea. But dear heavens, there's a definite skill at work here, matching each painting's expression (weary sigh, resigned, desperately attempting to retain composure) to just the right inciting idiocy.

(Netgalley ARC)

I would say only a quarter of these are funny (and no, I am not a white man to avoid!). The mansplainer ones were just like "here's a definition of mansplaining." Meh.

This book is full of classic art combined with modern/timeless captions. I didn't know whether to laugh or cringe! It would be a fun gift for an art fan or any woman who's heard "well, actually" one too many times.

We've all seen the memes floating around of classical paintings with a woman rolling her eyes, a man seemingly unaware of her displeasure, and a witty (modern) comment attached to it. I wasn't aware of Tersigni as the trend-starter, but I'm always amused by the memes when I come across them, so I was looking forward to a full coffee table book of them.

Some of the paintings-paired-with-comments were indeed bitingly funny, but others were quite hit-or-miss for me, not really outrageous enough to be hilarious. The book tries to "unify" the memes by putting them in categories of "men to avoid" (The Mansplainer, The Concern Troll, The Patronizer etc.), but a good amount of both comments and paintings seemed somewhat interchangeable. The "new" pairing of paintings and comments did make me look more closely at the paintings than I might have otherwise, and they're honestly fascinating in their own right - both for the low-key exasperated women and, more generally, for the types of scenes they depict ("the drawing lesson"? okthen).

In other news, I spent half the book totally distracted by the various animals in the paintings (the doves in that one post-coital scene? sure!), but I'm always distracted by puppies, so I guess that was to be expected. ;)

Just in terms of the book's layout, I found it well-designed but would have preferred the source paintings to have been named on their respective pages, rather than in a list at the end of the book. Flipping back and forth would have been quite time-consuming (especially in a digital format), and I did often find myself wondering where the paintings had come from.

I cannot even express how much I loved this book. Not only were the paintings nice to look at but the captions were spot on!
I laughed at most captions while some had me cringing at how accurate they are.
I've been recommending this book to all my friends. I will definitely purchase this book! I can't wait to see more from this author.

I'm typically a pretty big fan of everything Chronicle puts out, and this is no exception! A delightfully bitter little book that will get a laugh out of anyone.

It's unfortunate to have to attribute this book such a low rating, but the whole thing feels like a case of half-hearted attempts at humour and political correctness.

First of all, the Foreword by Jen Kirkman really does a disservice to this book. Rather than get me excited to read, the tone and forced jokes actually made me want to put the book down. With vague blanket statements like "Twitter is a daily reminder that I'm a woman" and an unnecessary, unfunny tampon joke, I just don't know what the point of her commentary was. (I also don't really know who she is... I googled her, I guess she's on the cover to help sales?) I would have much preferred something written by Nicole Tersigni herself, perhaps something reflective about the process of revisiting her content and putting the book together.

The content of the book is hit-or-miss, though there are some clever pairings made between the gorgeous artwork and comments that I've sure most women have heard from some men before.

This could be a good gift book, but unfortunately, I think it lacks substance.

This is a wonderful hilarious book for all women suffering from the men of the internet. It got that classical art memes feel to it, as the author chose a number of beautiful classic paintings to add some common sentences used by different types of men, online or IRL.

They're split into: The mainsplainer, The concern troll, The "comedian", The sexpert, and The patronizer. It was fun and I thank netgalley for the digital arc.

Saw this on @netgalley and had to peruse it and see what #art was used. This would be the perfect book to buy for your best office girlfriends. I have several former coworkers that I know would display this proudly on their desks! 📚📚📚 #reading #picturebook #booklover #bookreview #bookrecommendations #MentoAvoidinArtandLife #netgalley

An okay book to browse when you have nothing to do. Some funny comments next to the paintings. I do think you should be American to get them all. Don't expect a lot out of this book.

Men to Avoid in Art and Life was great, feminist fun! A hilarious take on famous paintings, this book had some truly brutal one-liners and i'm definitely here for it. From menstrual cramps to sexual harassment, to all the ways women go wrong, these oil painted mansplainers give some eye rolling advice to their female companions.

As a bit of an art nerd, I appreciated the different art styles represented in the book. Though each page shows a portrait, the variety in terms of art movements was abound. Alas, I did find it a bit disappointing that the source of the paintings were not included on each page but instead stuck at the end, in a list. I do get that it's for the aesthetic. But I would have enjoyed to see the sources as I flipped through this book, because it is as much a look at the art as it is the snarky male comments.

Overall, I enjoyed the humorous anecdotes in this book, and it will definitely make me look twice next time i'm strolling through a museum.

***Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for providing me with a digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review***
This book cracked me up! The commentary went perfectly with the art and it makes me wonder a little about the context of the art in real life.

Who'd have thought that so much of art history is actually just the mansplainer, with the roguish chap leaning into the well-presented woman and telling her where women go wrong, or where her attitudes to being leered at suck, or how women, you know, just aren't funny? Here's proof that it's gone on for a lot longer than we thought, and out in the open too – hung on gallery walls, and given approval by being the thing to see and therefore be seen doing. This book offers up a lot of examples of it, with what is allegedly the original captions and dialogue (sorry, monologue) splurged across them. And you know something else, for a novelty gift humour book, this is actually pretty damned funny – veering a bit towards the crude for some tastes in the chapter on the sexpert, but getting the right point across in the right way, and generally gifting the ideal words to the right image, and showing some forethought. What's more surprising still, perhaps, is the wealth of different images – yes, they're all of a type, generally staid portraits, with far too many King Charles Spaniels, but even the art expert will find some of them new to her. I don't know if it's the act of taking them out of the galleries and putting them in this context, but a lot of them do look a bit rapey, but that's a bit too serious for a funny/serious novelty book like this. I don't know what you gain by having this and not relying on the author's tw*tter series of such images, but I for one enjoyed it. I did wish that the attribution was there with each image and not in a list at the end, but still, four and a half stars.