Mark Forman is a writer based in Onehunga, Auckland. His doctoral thesis formed the basis of his first book, a scholarly work published in 2011 by Cambridge University Press. Forman's personal interests in New Zealand contemporary art, biography and social history were the drivers for this project, for which he has been awarded a Whiria Te Mahara New Zealand History Grant, the 2024 Marti and Gerrard Friedlander Charitable Trust publishing grant, and a runner-up placement in the CLNZ / NZSA Writers' Award.