Installation shot of “NYC 1993” (All photos by Hrag Vartanian / Hyperallergic)
Opening tonight, the New Museum’s NYC 1993: Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star purports to offer a time capsule, or, as the museum’s curator Gary Carrion-Murayari put it, a “form of collective memory” documenting a particular time in a particular art scene, namely, New York City in the ’90s.
Including well-known names like Annie Leibovitz, Mike Kelley, and Felix Gonzalez-Torres as well as more obscure artists, the exhibition succeeds in capturing a moment in time with its full-museum installation of every format of work imaginable. New Museum Director Lisa Phillips called 1993 (the year, not the show) a “turning point for the entire culture.” The art on view here reflects, obliquely and explicitly, the politics and social currents of its time.
What that time means, precisely, is up to the viewer to discern. See our photographs of the exhibition below.
Rikrit Tiravanija, “Untitled (1271)” (1993)
Kiki Smith, “Virgin Mary” (1992)
Left, Jessica Diamond’s “Tributes to Kusama: Infinity” (1992/93); right, Cady Noland’s “Gibbet” (1993/94)
Sarah Lucas, “The Old Couple” (1991)
Janine Antoni, “Lick and Lather” (1993)
Charles Ray, “Family Romance” (1992-93)
Daniel Joseph Martinez, “Museum Tags: Second Movement (Overture)” (1993)
Jack Pierson, “STAY” (1991)
Paul McCarthy, “Cultural Gothic” (1992)
Pepon Osorio, “The Scene of the Crime (Whose Crime?)” (1993)
Frank Moore, “Birth of Venus” (1993)
Felix Gonzalez-Torres, “Untitled (Couple)” (1993), in front of “Guaimaro, Cuba” (1992-93)
NYC 1993 runs at the New Museum (235 Bowery, Lower East Side, Manhattan) from February 13 through May 26.
a post in Spanish on this show at http://elriodellobo.com/