Each semester, the Writing University hosts the 5Q Interview series with authors from the University of Iowa Press. We sit down with UI Press authors to ask about their work, their process, their reading lists and events. Today we are speaking with Aidan Ryan, the author of I Am Here You Are Not I Love You (University of Iowa Press, 2025.)
Aidan Ryan is a writer, publisher, and filmmaker. His first book is I Am Here You Are Not I Love You (Univ. of Iowa Press, 2025). His nonfiction and cultural criticism have appeared in the Millions, Public Books, Humanities, White Review, Colorado Review, and Annulet. The short documentary film version of I Am Here You Are Not I Love You earned nominations for best directing and best editing at festivals in Buffalo, Los Angeles, and New York City, and premiered on PBS in May 2025. He is a cofounder of Foundlings Press, senior editor at Traffic East Magazine, and literary curator at Artpark. He lives in Buffalo, New York.
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C1. Can you tell us a little bit about your new book I Am Here You Are Not I Love You?
I Am Here You Are Not I Love You is a biography of two visual artists, Andrew Topolski and Cindy Suffoletto, my uncle and aunt who died when I was a teenager. The book follows their lives from their emergence as working artists in the heady creative environment of Buffalo, New York in the 1970s, into New York City and the SoHo gallery scene of the 80s, through their retreat to the mountain hamlet of Callicoon in the early 2000s. Andy and Cindy act as guides to movements in art including postminimalism, Fluxus, and the Pictures Generation, along with epochal transformations in the economics, technologies, and celebrity culture around art-making. The book is also a memoir, as I trace Andy and Cindy's influence on my own development as a writer both during their lives and after their passing.
2. What was the inspiration for this work?
I gave Cindy's eulogy—I was 18 years old—and the job never quite felt finished. Almost a decade later, an envelope turned up holding photographs of Cindy and Andy on a trip to Paris in the late 80s, and this set me off on a journey of rediscovery. Who were these people? What did it mean to them to give their lives to art? What did it cost? I wrote the book because I felt I needed to correct the record of art history in the last quarter of the 20th century and restore Andrew Topolski and Cindy Suffoletto to their rightful places.
3. Do you have any plans for readings or events for this book, either in person or virtual?
Yes! Publishing a book is a great excuse to hit the road and see friends. I previewed the book at KGB Bar in New York last month and this past week celebrated the launch with readings at Hallwalls in Buffalo and Unnameable Books in Brooklyn. I'm headed to the Unnameable in Turners Falls, Massachusetts this weekend, to Seattle and Portland in June, to the mountains of Tennessee in July, and to Syracuse and the Cleveland Inkubator conference in September. I will pause in October to celebrate the release of the poetry collection Hell Yeah by Rachelle Toarmino (my wife) before we both head to Germany and Switzerland for readings and talks in November. At most of these stops I'll be in conversation with other writers, critics, and artists—so far including Laura Marris, Matt Kenyon, Howard Fishman, Charles Clough, Gabriel Bump, Jaydra Johnson, Madeline McDonnell, Zach Savich, and Caryl Pagel, with more to be confirmed.
4. What are you reading right now? Any books from other university or independent presses?
Yes, a lot of my reading these days comes from university and independent presses. Right now I'm reading Lonesome Ballroom by Madeline McDonnell and Bad Boy by Eric Fischl. And our whole Alice Notley shelf.
5. What is your writing routine? Do you have a daily routine?
I struggle to balance writing, reading, relationships, my health, and my day job. A typical life in America doesn't have room for all those things. But when I am in the throes of a big project, I do stick to a pretty rigorous schedule. I tend to believe that the first thing you do each day sends a signal (to yourself) about what's most important that day, the thing that other things will rearrange around. So I wake up at 5, put on a pot of coffee, meditate while it percolates, and then write. If I can manage a paragraph by 8:30, that's a victory. If it's 9 and I'm still flying, I'll sacrifice all the other things, skipping the gym, forgetting the litterboxes, canceling meetings. When the writing is done, there will be time for all that. But trying to fit writing in at the end of a typical weekday just doesn't work for me. Once the sun sets I want a glass of scotch and an episode of Real Housewives of Salt Lake City.
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BUY THE BOOK: I Am Here You Are Not I Love You