The Failed Painter is a personal book about material anxiety in Graphic design's creative work. It speaks of fascination for singular and multiple production processes, perfectibility, and imperfectability in times of virtual surface and hunger for authenticity. Writing out of the persona ‘The Failed Painter’, this book is a collection of essays on design and art spanning culture, race, nation, and sheer vandalism from the author of The Impossibility of Silence: Writing for Designers, Artists & Photographers. Within this highly curated, yet varied assortment of approachable writing on aesthetics: space exploration, mercenaries, puberty, instant nostalgia, precarious labor, and of course, zombies.