Inside Tate Britain’s The 90s: Art And Fashion

3 min read

Writer Sophia Benito attended the opening of what seems to be the most anticipated retrospective of the year, The 90s: Art and Fashion at Tate Britain. Let her walk you through the newest exhibition in town.

Jon Shard, Flesh at The Haçienda, 1996. Two women dancing in a club with an underground vibe. — **Jon Shard, Flesh at The Haçienda, 1996 Courtesy of British Culture Archive © Jon Shard British Culture Archive**

Tate Britain’s ‘first major exhibition of the 1990s’ revels in the nostalgia of a bygone analog era and presents a fusion of fashion, art, photography, and design emblematic of the monumental last decade of the 20th century. The 1990s, marked by a recession and following the social unrest of the previous decade, saw the ignition of a rebellious spark in a new generation of British artists and creatives who crossed the boundaries of what is and can be considered art.

Guest-curated by former British Vogue editor-in-chief Edward Enninful OBE, who was appointed fashion director of i-D Magazine in 1990 at 18 years old, the exhibition is conversant with his own lived experience of the 1990s and his close involvement in the cultural production of the decade. To capture this pivotal period, Enninful closely collaborated with Tate Britain curators Jessica Vaughan, Helen Little, Heyse-Moore, Celeste McEvoy, and Tate Britain’s Director Alex Farquharson.

**Sarah Lucas, Chicken Knickers 1997. Courtesy the artist and Sadie Coles HQ, London**

The 1990s were not defined by a singular movement. Instead of a chronological structure, the exhibition is sectioned by overarching connections and open-ended associations, presenting the artistic diversity of the decade. Each of the six rooms weaves together different media from the era, with more than 100 photographs, paintings, sculptures, and garments on display, bridging the gap between artistic forms and expressions.

The exhibition enters the decade with the undoing of perfected conventions. From the minimalist photographs published in magazines such as i-D, we soon find ourselves looking at Sam Taylor-Johnson’s self-portrait, in which she embodies a Botticelli-esque Venus, wearing a T-shirt bearing the provocative slogan: ‘Fuck, Suck, Spank, Wank.’ An early Stella McCartney mint green slip hangs high over the doorway into the next room, which segues into I can’t get no sleep, a documentation of youth nightlife and scenes of partying at iconic clubs, like The Haçienda in Manchester.

Room four, Body Shock, is the heart of the exhibition and focuses on the use and strategy of shock. A scarlet Alexander McQueen Joan of Arc-inspired dress from his 1998 Joan runway collection is next to Hamad Butt’s 1992 installation Familiars, composed of glass receptacles filled with three different types of toxic gas, which broke when exhibited at the Tate in the ‘90s.

Alexander McQueen's iconic red dress surrounded by flammes on his AW 1998 runway — **Alexander McQueen, AW 1998 Guy Marineau, Vogue, © Condé Nast**

The next room presents artists who worked to represent those excluded from the narrative of ‘Cool Britannia.’ This room is the most personal to Enninful, and he himself appears as a model in two photographs. Stripped-down minimalism, a lack of excess, takes center stage in the fifth room, with the 1999 Airmail dress by Hussein Chalayan, which mimics the texture of paper and could be shipped through the mail.

Photography and film captured the changing cultural landscape of the 1990s, a decade that blurred the boundaries of art and fashion, from print magazine to nightclubs, from mainstream to subculture. The decade pushed the boundaries of what is and can be considered art, represented through the conceptual turns of the decade with artists like Damien Hirst and his set of sharks encased in formaldehyde chase each other around a white elliptical bar.

Enninful’s journey in the ‘90s ends with the turn of the century and the dawn of a new age. The decade is tied together in a last room, reflecting on timelessness and the idea of sharing and borrowing across history and culture, with couture gowns by Vivienne Westwood and John Galliano, inspired by European history with a British twist. The exhibition closes with Yinka Shonibare’s The Swing (after Fragonard) from 2001, and ends looking toward the future.

Defining a decade, especially one as multifaceted and fluid as the 1990s, was no easy feat, and Tate Britain does so, telling its story through the spirit and energy that characterised this time. The exhibition represents what the ‘90s felt like: the freedom and grit, not what limited it.