Giant floating houses, funk stations, and children’s bedrooms frozen in time are only some of the works of art on display at the exhibit, “Don’t Look Back: The 1990’s,” at the Geffen Contemporary at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Little Tokyo of Downtown Los Angeles.
Drawn from the permanent collection of MoCA, the “Don’t Look Back: The 1990’s” exhibit is intriguing, deliberately shocking and challenging, and a masterpiece representation of a decade.
Organized by MoCA chief curator Helen Molesworth, this collection features artworks that deal with the key issues of the 1990’s, emphasizing themes of identity through race, gender, and sexuality. As society continues to face the same controversies today as it did in the 1990’s, this exhibit takes the influential works of the decade previous to exemplify the continuation of the same issues.
The exhibit is divided into six sections, titled “Installation,” “The Outmoded,” “Noir America,” “Place and Identity,” “Touch, Intimacy, and Queerness,” and “Space, Place, and Scale.” Each of the exhibits deals with a different societal challenge of the 1990’s, whether it be the effects of the AIDS epidemic, continued discrimination of people of color, and the commercialization of society.
Upon entering the Geffen Contemporary at MoCA, visitors are immediately faced with the looming, billowing exterior of a house made out of luminescent material, suspended high above visitors so as to emphasize the sense of loneliness and overwhelmingness created by the industrialization and urbanization of cities during this decade.
The setting of the exhibit sectioned off the displays, allowing visitors to explore the exhibits at their own pace, looping through the various displays of fake Christmas trees in Paul McCarthy’s “Tokyo Santa” collection, after strolling by Barbara Kruger’s “Untitled (It’s Our Pleasure to Disgust You),” all of which featured various themes and subject matter pertaining to the 1990’s. This gave visitors the opportunity to focus on the areas of the exhibit that intrigued them the most, depending on their connection to the subject matter and the time period.
Hidden in the corner behind the main gallery of “Tokyo Santa” there is a piece of the exhibit titled “Touch, Intimacy, and Queerness,” featuring a piece by Jack Pierson titled “You Are Allowed To Touch Things.” This piece, as well as the other pieces in this part of the installation, deal with the prejudice and discrimination against those diagnosed with AIDS spurred from the fear of spread through contact, opening visitors up to the traumatic experience of those who were diagnosed during this fearful time period.
“You Are Allowed to Touch Things,” pairs stylistically with another piece displaying a typical 1990’s car painted with black hair pomade, both of which focus around the idea of temporary existence and instructional creation. Created from found movie letters and hair pomade, the simplicity and impermanence of each piece symbolizes each prejudice that each work deals with. The theme behind both of these objects is their existence and meaning that is created in their creation for the exhibit, similar to the hidden racism and prejudice that is silent when unseen, but meaningful when pieced together and put on display.
Another hidden feature of the exhibit is tucked into a room beneath the second floor gallery, which displays the part of the exhibit titled “Installations,” featuring many intriguing and slightly interactive installations that transport visitors to other time periods or experiences. The piece “When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth (Toys ‘R’ U.S.),” by Mark Dion, transports visitors back to a time when not only were things simpler as children because of the imagination linked to things like dinosaurs, but the commercialization of their favorite subjects as well, like the dinosaurs covering the room frozen in the 1990’s.
“Don’t Look Back: The 1990’s” is a gripping throwback to a decade riled with the identity crises of the century, as society grappled with issues of sexuality, racism, and commercialization, which were exemplified through these overwhelming installations and questionable themes. These nostalgic pieces remind society of the issues they faced a decade prior, and the repetition of these issues as the same controversies in these pieces are relevant today.
The “Don’t Look Back: The 1990’s” exhibit costs $12 for general admission and $6 for student and senior admission. It runs at the Geffen Contemporary at the Museum of Contemporary Art from March 12th through July 11th, 2016. Members and children under 12 are free. Admission is also free Thursday’s from 5 PM to 8 PM.
Leave a Reply