20 Reasons Art Was Better in the '90s
Make art like its 1999.
Image via Complex Original
It’s almost hard to remember the days before Facebook and YouTube, but it was just over 20 years ago when you didn’t even have dial-up AOL yet. The rapid advancements in technology during the ‘90s changed everything before our very eyes. But as the World Wide Web opened up lines of virtual communication and information across the globe, some people still had to fight to protect their place in the real world. Civil rights struggles culminated in the Rodney King riots and the end of Apartheid, gay and women’s rights were also hot issues. Subcultures from grunge to goth, as well as skaters, b-boys, activists, and more emerged as another ways to claim an identity in an ever-expanding world.
All this diversity and newness also opened up some awesome possibilities and materials for artists, not to mention technologies like digital cameras, Photoshop, and CGI. Here are 20 Reasons Art Was Awesome in the '90s.
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Damien Hirst
20. Ugh. This guy.
Artwork: Damien Hirst, The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, 1991
Damien Hirst rose to fame as one of the Young British Artists who ruled the art scene in the UK and then found art world celebrity status in the US. Although Hirst has been a favorite in the art market, he has also been criticized by many in the art world (you tell him, David Hockney) for using assistants to make his works. Also, animal rights activists have unleashed their fury on Hirst because of his favorite medium—dead animals. While he may have been hot in the '90s, most of us are sick of the way he runs his art empire as a fine-tuned moneymaking machine.
Rachel Whiteread
19. Our lives got flip-turned inside-out.
Artwork: Rachel Whiteread, House, 1993
Along with Hirst, Rachel Whiteread was another of the Young British Artists that dominated the art scene in the '90s. For her work House, she cast the interior of a whole Victorian house in resin and installed it in the place where the house used to stand. Her work made us re-think space, urban fabric, and the changing city, themes that artists across the Pond in New York were wrestling with at the same time.
Gabriel Orozco
18. Sculptures messed with our perception.
Artwork: Gabriel Orozco, La DS, 1993
Like Whiteread, Orozco also wanted to challenge how we thought about space and reality. His sculpture includes a 1950s French automobile, a vehicle that was once a symbol of invention and progress. With the rise of the Digital Age in the '90s, our conception of reality was becoming distorted, and our idea of progress evolved right along with it.
Liu Xiaodong
17. Cynical Realism showed us what we really look like.
Artwork: Liu Xiaodong, Fat Grandson, 1996
By the '90s we had come a long way from the perfect statues of Classical art. The Abstract Expressionists of the '60s made us think that we would never seen a painting of a person again, but then the '90s artists decided to paint people in all their unattractive glory. Chinese artist Liu Xiaodong didn't shy away from the most unflattering portraits.
Kara Walker
16. We began to remember history a little more clearly.
Artwork: Kara Walker, Means to an End: A Shadow Drama in Five Acts, 1995
Black artists like Kara Walker, Lorna Simpson, and Glen Ligon broke down the white walls of the gallery world in the '90s with works that commented on race and black identity. Walker's famous cutouts showed disturbing scenes of slavery, mixing stories of horror with strangely jaunty silhouettes.
Vuk Cosic
15. There was no such thing as YouTube, but you could still see movies on the Internet.
Artwork: Vuk Cosic, ASCII History of Moving Images, 1998
In the '90s, babies were born who will never remember a time before the Internet, and along with this new Digital Age came the digital artists. Vuk Cosic, one of the founders of net.art, was one of many artists attracted to the computer. His work ASCII History of Moving Images is a history of cinema expressed through code.
Matthew Barney
14. Shrinkage, in the anatomical sense, was the key concept behind the Cremaster Cycle, considered by some to be among the greatest cinematic achievements of the time.
Artwork: Matthew Barney, Cremaster 4, 1994
Made over a period of eight years, Matthew Barney's magnum opus consists of five feature-length films, as well as companion works that span almost every medium of visual art.
Vanessa Beecroft
13. Models as medium.
Artwork: Vanessa Beecroft, Show, 1998
For the opening of the Louis Vuitton store in Paris, Vanessa Beecroft staged a performance with live models on the shelves next to the bags. Although some feminist groups were outraged, we imagine that many of the attendees had no problem with the human medium.
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Barbie Liberation Organization
12. Barbie got to experiment a little.
Artwork: Barbie Liberation Organization, Barbie Surgery, 1993
By the '90s, everyone was over the impossible feminine ideal represented by Barbie. In a guerilla art action, the Barbie Liberation Organization, changed the voice boxes on Barbies and G.I. Joes and re-installed them in stores. Little girls and boys got more subversive messages than how to look pretty.
Karen Kilimnik
11. Leonardo DiCaprio was royalty.
Artwork: Karen Kilimnik, Prince Albrechet at Home at the Castle on School Break, 1998
Mike Kelley
10. Stuffed animals were so cute and cuddly!
Artwork: Mike Kelley, Deodorized Central Mass, 1990
When we remember the '90s, we remember the toys: My Little Pony, Furbies, Tamagotchies. Admit it, you had a Beanie Baby collection, too. Artists like Mike Kelly decided to bring our stuffed animal fetish into the museum. This fall, his soft and furry installation heads to MOMA PS1.
Maurizio Cattelan
9. Although sometimes they were a little more raw.
Artwork: Maurizio Cattelan, Bidibidobidiboo, 1996
Along with Hirst, Maurizio Cattelan also enjoyed working with taxidermied critters. In a retrospective at the Guggenheim in 2011, all of his works (featuring animals or not) hung from the ceiling of Frank Lloyd Wright's building.
William Kentridge
8. Animation wasn't just for kids.
Artwork: William Kentridge, Stereoscope, 1998-99
South African artist William Kentridge used drawing and animation to tackle political and personal issues. His simple charcoal drawings pushed the boundaries of the medium to represent national themes.
Rikrit Tiravanija
7. Art was edible.
Artwork: Rikrit Tiravanija, Untitled (Free/Still), 1992
In the '90s, Rikrit Tiravanija got audiences to participate in his work, instructing visitors to eat the South Asian food he prepared and left in gallery spaces. His feasts were about social interaction and communication—a form of art more intimate that what was hanging on the walls.
Felix Gonzalez-Torres
6. Art had moves.
Artwork: Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Untitled (Go-Go Dancing Platform), 1991
For five minuets each day, a dancer in silver shorts would ascend Gonzalez-Torres otherwise unassuming platform and dance silently to a soundtrack of his choice. According to former Hammer Museum chief curator Gary Garrels, Gonzalez-Torres was re-thinking Minimalism, giving the art form, “a kind of poetic, romantic, social and cultural dimension.” It also seemed like a damn good time.
Roxy Paine
5. Art practically made itself back then.
Artwork: Roxy Paine, SCUMAK, 1998-2001
Roxy Paine's work SCUMAK made us question the role of the artist by bringing the machine into the gallery. His sculpture-making machine broke down romantic notions of the genius creator. The rise of 3D-printing only means this work has become more relevant overtime.
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Jeff Koons
4. Porn star-cum-politician Cicciolina was married to Jeff Koons, and he made sure we knew about it.
Artwork: Jeff Koons, Hand on Breast, 1990
The art world's other celebrity we love to hate (besides Damien Hirst), Jeff Koons, showed us a little too much about his love life in the '90s. Today, he has perfected the role of the businessman-cum-artist-cum-businessman.
Rineke Dijkstra
3. Teen angst met boy bands.
Artwork: Rineke Dijkstra, Annemiek, 1997
In Rienke Dijkstra's work, a grungy (it was the '90s) teenage Dutch girl lip-synchs to the Backstreet Boys. The self-conscious and uncomfortable video gave us shivers in a good way.
Andreas Gursky
2. One word: Photoshop.
Artwork: Andreas Gursky, 99 Cent, 1999
Andreas Gursky's large-scale images made us re-think both photography and landscape art. When artists started using Photoshop, the photo, a medium that used to be as close to real life as we could get, was completely thrown into question.
Annie Leibovitz
1. Two words: Kate Moss.
Artwork: Annie Leibovitz, Johnny Depp & Kate Moss, 1994
Moss was the hottest model in her industry, and Leibovitz was the hottest photographer in her industry. It was a winning combination. Leibovitz shot this image of then-couple Johnny Depp and Kate Moss, which may have been the sexiest photograph of the '90s.