by Jerry Saltz
First published 1991
Jerry Saltz walks through Manhattan galleries where neon sculptures pulse against white walls and painters mix corporate logos with classical imagery. The decade has transformed American art into something unrecognizable from previous generations. Saltz watches artists embrace commercial culture while galleries become battlegrounds between old guard critics and young rebels wielding spray cans and video cameras. He moves between studio visits in SoHo and opening nights in the East Village, documenting how money and media reshape creative expression. The art world splits between those chasing collectors and those rejecting the market entirely. Saltz finds himself caught between his role as observer and his desire to champion the artists who matter most. As the decade closes, he must decide whether the explosion of new forms represents genuine innovation or merely reflects the era's obsession with surface and spectacle.
Genres: art, 20th-century, contemporary, criticism, 21st-century, art-history
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: observer-perspective, surface-and-spectacle
Setting: Manhattan, SoHo, East Village
Period: 1980s
218 pages · Paperback · Electa