Private Guided Tour at DESTE Foundation

Drawing from the holdings of the Dakis Joannou Collection, Gen X: Tales from the Forgotten Generation brings together works by artists born between 1960 and 1980, the decades traditionally chosen as bookends for this generation. Outnumbered by the demographic dominance of baby boomers and millennials, this cohort grew up in the shadow of 1980s prosperity and the subsequent recessions. They became known as the “Forgotten Generation,” a moniker that also reflects the lack of parental supervision common in dual-income households.

The artists in this exhibition responded to these seismic shifts with varying degrees of sincerity, irony, and even cynicism. Often described as the “slacker” generation, they combined lowbrow aesthetics, self deprecation, and a healthy disregard for convention. Others explored the shifting borders of a new world order, capturing the early signals of a multicultural, globalized future. Debates around sexuality, gender, and the ongoing effects of the HIV/AIDS epidemic exerted a significant influence on the ways in which artists depicted bodies, birthing a disquieting army of decaying avatars, metallic cyborgs, and new mutant creatures. Identity politics emerged as a new battleground, while the media and fashion industries were analyzed, appropriated, and deconstructed in many of the works by this generational cohort.