{"id":76482,"date":"2025-02-08T20:46:03","date_gmt":"2025-02-08T20:46:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/entertainment\/art\/how-the-80s-changed-the-art-world\/"},"modified":"2025-02-08T20:46:03","modified_gmt":"2025-02-08T20:46:03","slug":"how-the-80s-changed-the-art-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=76482","title":{"rendered":"How The 80s Changed The Art World"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n<\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"how<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
A decade of technology, new art forms, and neon leg warmers…<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n


<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

The 1980s was a decade of questionable
\nfashion, global change and technical innovation, all of which greatly
\ninfluenced the way art was created. Art became less traditional as technology
\nadvanced and artists began experimenting with new materials, tools, and
\ntechniques, all while venturing on to the path of creating entirely new art
\nmovements that would become symbolic of a decade that would also give us the
\nRubik’s Cube and neon leg warmers.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

This time, we explore how the
\n1980s changed the way we produced, purchased, viewed, and even thought about
\nart. We also explore how the technological advances of the 80s influenced the
\nart world and how the decade inspired a legion of young artists.\u00a0 <\/span>We also take a look at the brand new art
\nmovements that began at the very same time that Hill Street Blues, Dallas, and
\nMiami Vice were showing on TV in the days before we had reruns and inferior remakes.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

Whether you are anchored in
\nthe traditional practice of creating art using a brush and canvas or you are a
\ndigital artist pushing and pulling pixels, the 1980s had been a pivotal moment
\nfor the art world, even if those of us who lived through the decade hadn\u2019t
\nrealised it at the time. <\/span><\/p>\n

If you create art in the 21st<\/sup>
\nCentury, it\u2019s fair to say that how you create, view and sell your work today
\nowes a great deal to the disruption that technology and creativity was
\nresponsible for during that neon decade of mass consumerism, consumption, and a
\nthirst to find out what was next. So, we\u2019re heading back to the 1980s to find
\nout what exactly went on.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"art<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
That Was The Eighties By Mark Taylor<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n


<\/span><\/p>\n

I was born in 1969, not long
\nafter the moon landing. My recollection of the 1970s is a rose tinted history
\nof reading the Disneyland Annual, the hot summer of 1976, a picnic on the
\nschool sports field to celebrate the Queens Jubilee in 1977, and the Atari VCS
\nand for me, that was the beginning of my lifelong affiliation to all things
\ntech, and quite bizarrely, my lifelong addiction to creating art. <\/span><\/p>\n

By the 1980s, affordable home
\ncomputers were widely available and even if those computers were mostly being
\nused by the kids to play early video games, the inadvertent and almost subtle exposure
\nto art that by proxy of the ephemera that came with them would provide, couldn\u2019t
\nbe ignored. As a child, I had no idea just how much the art that accompanied
\nthe marketing materials was influencing me to set out on a creative career path.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Atari VCS, an early (but
\nnot the earliest) video game console, was strangely one of the inspirations
\nthat pointed me towards a career in the arts. The artwork adorning the boxes
\nthat held the game cartridges was incredibly powerful, but more than that, these
\nimages perfectly summed up the power of illustration and its ability to say the
\nsame thing in any language without using words. It was an almost perfect
\ndemonstration of how art could be effectively used in marketing campaigns to
\ntell the back story quickly and form a deep connection with the buyer. <\/span><\/p>\n

At the time, I hadn\u2019t quite
\npieced together how or why the style of the art used in the packaging could
\ncarry so much influence when it came to selecting new games. It was bold,
\ncolourful, and full of imagination, but more than that, there was a consistency
\nin the packaging and the design. As a child, it just looked very cool. As a
\nprofessional artist reflecting on the period, it was a masterclass in design.<\/span><\/p>\n

When you made the pilgrimage
\nto the video games store you would be met with a display of titles that would
\nspark any youngsters imagination. It wasn\u2019t until many years later that I
\nrecognised the design and style choices used for the boxes had been an act of savvy
\nmarketing that felt very different to anything that had come before. <\/span><\/p>\n

Looking back now, we can see
\nthat the original Atari 2600 game boxes had been a masterclass in creating brand
\nrecognition. Atari\u2019s logo, sometimes called the Fuji logo is still an iconic
\nimage today and instantly recognisable, even to those who didn\u2019t grow up through
\nthe Atari generation. <\/span><\/p>\n

Created by George Opperman,
\nAtari\u2019s very first full time graphic designer, the logo was designed to
\nrepresent the letter A, created in a way that represented two players competing
\non the video game, Pong. The advertising executives who designed the marketing
\ncampaigns understood that focussing on building strong brand identity should be
\nfront and centre of their design choices and so they masterfully crafted
\ndesigns that felt almost futuristic, yet today remain timeless.<\/span><\/p>\n

The boxes used a recognisable
\nfont called “Harry” and artwork which told the story of the game
\ninside. This made them visually appealing and helped to create a consistent
\nlook for the Atari 2600 brand, the same principles were followed throughout the
\nmarketing campaigns of a number of their subsequent products. As a result, the
\nboxes almost begged you to collect them all. People didn\u2019t play video games, they
\nplayed Atari, and that was the confirmation the designers and marketers needed
\nto confirm Atari\u2019s dominant position as number one.<\/span><\/p>\n

This consistency of design
\nalso made it feel like everyone who bought into Atari was part of something
\nbigger. It created a sense of community among gamers who knew that they were
\nall sharing the same experience, and the visual appeal of the packaging meant
\nthat the products lent themselves to being collectible even though millions of
\nunits had been sold. The downside, the 80s was a decade of consumerism and it
\nwas disposable. Collectible or not, these boxes would usually end up in the trash,
\nleaving the games to gather dust on the shelves inadvertently leading to
\neveryone who owned a game console to blow the dust of the cartridges when they
\ndidn\u2019t work. <\/span><\/p>\n

As an artist, I\u2019m not sure I
\nhave ever found a better way to understand the importance of telling a story in
\nyour work than through studying period specific video game ephemera and box
\nart, especially from the 80s and early 90s. <\/span><\/p>\n

Art played a pivotal role in
\nearly video games marketing, with game boxes often including physical items
\nsuch as maps, user manuals, and in some cases, even full length books which
\nwould provide you with the back story to the game.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Again, it was another
\nmarketing masterstroke for the time, it meant that something that was primarily\u00a0 <\/span>a mix of a plastic case and a digital file on
\na silicon chip, also came with something that was tactile, even useful, to the
\nextent that the ephemera included in the package was often what made the
\nproduct more desirable than the game it contained. I lost count of the number
\nof games I collected on the premise that the included feelies represented way
\nbetter value than anything else on the shelf.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"art<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Time To Go Home by Mark Taylor<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n


<\/span><\/p>\n

Most of the artwork produced
\nfor marketing at the time would have been airbrushed or even sketched by hand, digital
\nmediums had yet to fully evolve and we were nowhere close to being able to
\ncreate anything that we would take for granted today. 80s art had quite a
\ndistinctive look, not only were creative processes different from today,
\nprinting processes were very different too.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the 1980s, colour printing
\nwas much more expensive than it is today, it was more difficult to print
\ncomplex designs with multiple colours, although the likes of Mattel and Hasbro
\nwould use more expensive bright and colourful packaging to appeal to children.
\nUsing fewer colours made the printing process simpler and much less expensive,
\nbut there was also an upside to using a limited colour palette, it lent itself
\nto creating strong brand identity, a design choice that is still used today.<\/span><\/p>\n

From advertisements for the
\nlocal supermarket to product packaging, everything had historically been
\ncreated by the hands of traditional artists who had far fewer tools than we do
\ntoday, which kind of proves that it is possible to create art with almost
\nanything. Paints and pigments were also less advanced during the 80s than they
\nare today, yet the designs created during the eighties across all sorts of
\npackaging still remain iconic to this day.<\/span><\/p>\n

It really is a testament to
\nthe skills of the many artists who would become involved across a very young
\nindustry, especially when you consider the limitations they were working with.
\nThere was no internet to influence an artists creativity so everything felt
\narguably more original than it does today, and also arguably, it was maybe a
\ntime when artists still had to think deeply about creating something unique. <\/span><\/p>\n

Today, creating art has become
\ncomparatively easier, we have the tools but we\u2019re often blinkered by some level
\nof digital influence. Be it following a trend that attracts likes and followers
\nor remaining in the comfort zone of a safe demographic, and I think that really
\ndoes take a lot of the creative uniqueness away from the art world.<\/span><\/p>\n

When we look back at the
\ntechnology, computer, and video games industries, there was no clear path for
\ntraditional artists to play a role, at least initially. Most artists at the
\ntime would have been working in other creative areas or would have already have
\nbecome established artists, often working on project after project anonymously
\nand then falling into the industry almost by accident rather than seeking the
\nindustry out as a vocation that they could anchor their creative skills within.
\n\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Artists such as Oliver Frey,<\/span> <\/span>Cliff Spohn, Steve Hendrickson, and Susan
\nJaekel had been amongst the early pioneers in creating marketing materials and
\nartwork for the industry, each of these already had a remarkable talent and a
\nlevel of artistic provenance. The industry attracted relatively new artists
\ntoo, some would join the industry perhaps accidently, some through helping out
\na friend of a friend, it was an industry that was simply too young to realise
\nthat it needed artists, yet artists would become pivotal in the marketing
\nefforts that would eventually make the video game industry financially more
\nvaluable than Hollywood.<\/span><\/p>\n

Many of those original artists
\nwho had worked on the ephemera and marketing materials used throughout the
\nindustry have long since established cult followings for their work especially
\namongst video game and popular culture collectors. Much of their work today is
\nhighly regarded and sought after within the industry and by collectors. Today,
\ntheir artistic styles are often replicated, but I often get the sense that
\nthose original artists are not celebrated anywhere near enough. <\/span><\/p>\n

It is only relatively recently
\nthat some of their work is finally being seen as collectible, not just for it\u2019s
\nartistic style but also for what the work represented during the 1980s, and it\u2019s
\nbecoming increasingly more challenging to find any of their original works,
\nsome of which probably won\u2019t have even made it to the 90s. The eighties was,
\namongst other things, a disposable decade.<\/span><\/p>\n

What ephemera hadn\u2019t been
\nthrown away during the 80s was extremely affordable up until around 2013, around
\n2010 it was literally being given away. Since then there has been a steady
\nincrease in value, and it remains just about affordable to collect right now,
\nbut values are escalating and it might not be quite so affordable for much
\nlonger because of a recent new focus on retro and preservation amongst
\ncollectors. Of course that collector bubble could burst, but the sweet spot for
\ncollectible years at the moment seems to be any ephemera created between 1977
\nand 1986, especially when it comes to VHS video cassette tapes. <\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s often cited by key
\nindustry insiders who had been involved with the industry at the time, that
\nmost of what was produced in the early 80s was thrown away when the next new
\nthing came along. For todays collectors, thankfully a lot of what was produced
\nhad been produced in high volumes, so it\u2019s not always especially rare whenever
\nyou do come across items from the 80s, but what still exists usually ends up in
\nprivate collections which reduces the overall supply. <\/span><\/p>\n

Back in the 80s, as a society,
\nwe had no real concept of preservation, neither did we have the technology that
\nmakes preservation quite as easy as it is today. \u00a0<\/span>Even those who had been pivotal in building
\ntechnology empires during the early part of the decade have since admitted they
\nhad thought that this new wave of technology would be just a passing phase, and
\nthere was no compelling reason to save or preserve things. Attitudes were very
\ndifferent, this was as much the golden age of making a fast buck as it was the
\ngolden age of technology.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"boy<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Riding in the Rain by Mark Taylor<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n


<\/span><\/p>\n

Many of those original artists
\nwho had suddenly found themselves in this very new and unfamiliar tech-industry
\nbrought something fresh to what for a while had been a very narrow niche. They
\nalso introduced art to an audience who perhaps wouldn\u2019t have considered
\nthemselves as being previously appreciative of art, but there was just
\nsomething very different about box art and the ephemera that accompanied many
\nof the products.<\/span><\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t\u00a0 <\/span>just games, even the instructions for the
\nlatest kitchen appliance would have had hand-drawn illustrations, but the
\nstories that were being told through the art that accompanied video games appealed
\nto the younger generation and had massive appeal to inquisitive young minds who
\nhad mostly enjoyed the wave of B movie sci-fi during the 70s. <\/span><\/p>\n

The art had to convey a story,
\nit had to appeal to a specific demographic, yet a lot of the marketing strategies
\nfrom these new industries were having to be made up on the fly as the industry
\nexpanded. I think there was some element of the industry being taken by
\nsurprise at its rapid growth.<\/span><\/p>\n

The illustrations and art that
\nwould appear on marketing materials at the time appealed to young people for a
\nvariety of reasons. It was colourful, vibrant, dynamic, exciting, aspirational,
\nand then it would be placed front and centre in a social setting. If you need
\nart to appeal to the TikTok generations of today, that\u2019s still kind of the recipe
\nfor success that you need to follow. <\/span><\/p>\n

Despite a lack of experience
\nacross the industry in marketing this entirely new technology, the successful
\nmanufacturers and publishers very soon came to understand that art can connect
\nwith people on a deep level, just as it has with traditional art forms for
\ncenturies. They embraced this principle, creating vibrant and dynamic art that
\nappealed and resonated with those they wanted to reach.<\/span><\/p>\n

There were no huge, or even accessible
\ndata-sets that could be mined to figure out who would be more likely to buy into
\nany of this stuff, neither was there any sense of just how big the technology
\nmonster would become, and even above this,\u00a0
\n<\/span>there were simply no rule books that set out how to do any of this which
\nled to even more innovation and a lot of what we take for granted today has
\nroots back to these almost experimental marketing campaigns.<\/span><\/p>\n

Retailers and manufacturers
\nonly began to introduce what we would know today as loyalty schemes, in the
\nearly 90s. Prior to this, loyalty schemes had mostly been about rewarding
\nbuyers with something like Green Sheild Stamps, collect enough stamps and trade
\nthem in for a gift, and some retailers would hand out more stamps then others
\nwhich meant that buyers would be more likely to shop at one store over another.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

By the early 90s, the schemes
\nand developed into mass data gathering tools that would allow retailers to
\nidentify not just shopping habits, but also people and they began to realise that
\nby piecing together this data they could better understand what else connected
\na person to a product.<\/span><\/p>\n

The technologists, the
\nprogrammers, the scientists, the manufacturers, the publishers, and let\u2019s not
\nforget the artists, whatever product they were working on at the time, were
\nunknowingly the pioneers of the modern technology industry that we know today
\nbut they were also pioneering a lot of what we see today beyond the world of
\ntechnology. They were writing the book on how to connect a product with a
\nperson, they were learning how to influence before the world had an influencer
\naround every corner, they were creating something that modern day marketing
\ncampaigns owe a great deal to.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"art<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
The Retro Hoarder by Mark Taylor<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n


<\/span><\/p>\n

It was, as Bob Ross would say,
\nan happy little accident that the industry grew into what it has become
\ntoday.\u00a0 <\/span>In the 1960s and 1970s, unless
\nyou had been using mainframe computers in school or tended to live your life in
\na lab, the very idea that computers could actually be useful in the home would
\nhave been a completely alien concept. But by the 1980s, things had changed,
\ntechnology had advanced and it was miniaturised to the point that it was
\nfinally affordable enough to be brought out of the lab and into the front room.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

The next problem to overcome
\nwould be to figure out how and who these boxes of silicone would be sold to.
\nSome of the early manufacturers would bundle a recipe program that would allow
\nyou to maintain a small database of cookery ingredients, others would appeal to
\ntime-poor executives and bundle rudimentary accounting programs into the box,
\nand the savvier ones, well, they realised that they could appeal to children by
\nbundling in brightly coloured game boxes that promised hours of interactive
\nfun.\u00a0 <\/span>They literally threw everything at
\nthe wall and surprisingly, everything stuck.<\/span><\/p>\n

The even savvier one\u2019s would
\nalso bundle in education software that would appeal to the parents of the
\nchildren who really just wanted to play games, and some of those manufacturers would
\nalso target schools to drive forward the concept that computing would be the
\nnext big thing and they should be placing computer science on the curriculum.
\nThat alone ensured that schools would be continuously buying the technology,
\nbut the manufacturers had probably miscalculated that a schools typically low
\nlevel of funding wouldn\u2019t always stretch to an upgrade down the line.<\/span><\/p>\n

Given that there were no rule
\nbooks, no precedent, and no historic references that could be consulted,
\ncollectively, maybe a little by accident, the technology industry had come up
\nwith a genius marketing plan but the competition was growing and companies,
\nmanufacturers, retailers and publishers knew that they would need to stand out.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

It was big business, but the
\ncake wasn\u2019t quite big enough to feed everyone. One of the more recent historic
\nstudies determined that more than 500 companies had entered the same space during
\nthe early 80s, all selling broadly similar things, indeed, some were selling
\nthe same thing or an exact bootleg copy of it.<\/span><\/p>\n

With an industry in it\u2019s
\ninfancy, a lack of consumer confidence in the quality of what was being sold,
\nthe general lack of knowledge from the public as to how these technical things
\nworked and little to no concept of \u00a0<\/span>how
\nand why they could be useful, the market became flooded and many of the
\noriginal companies folded just as quickly as they had arrived. <\/span><\/p>\n

Those who remained had to
\nthink differently. They had to address the quality control issues and they had
\nto show people how the technology could make their lives better. They also had
\nto work on the marketing materials which for a while in the late 70s and very early
\n80s was often created with a typewriter and a few badly drawn sketches. <\/span><\/p>\n

A cover and instructions for
\nsome of the early video games and computer programs was often little more than a
\nphotocopied piece of paper, typed out on a manual typewriter together with very
\nsimple illustrations. The photocopy would be inserted into a polythene bag
\nalongside a floppy disk or cassette tape and that was essentially how early
\nsoftware which had often been created by a single person writing code would be
\nsold. The issue here was that any retailer taking on stock had the problem that
\nno matter how they displayed the goods, everything looked the same.<\/span><\/p>\n

Publishers quickly realised
\nthat in order for their product to sell they would need to create packaging
\nthat appealed to those who owned or who were thinking of buying a computer, and
\nso they began to work on ever-more elaborate designs. <\/span><\/p>\n

The packaging had to quickly
\ntell a story, appeal to the target audience, and more importantly, it had to
\nlook better than anything else on the same shelf. For some, better also meant
\nbigger and retailers were happy to display huge boxes containing all sorts of
\nephemera and instructions. This is something that rarely happens today, everything
\nhas to be an exact size, the smaller the better, so the artwork and
\nillustrations that are used in product packaging today have become massively
\nmore critical to making the product stand out.<\/span><\/p>\n

Today, retailers demand
\nuniform, industry standard sizing that means you can fit an exact number of
\nproducts onto a shelf and more if possible. Redundant shelf space from the big
\nbox products as seen throughout the 80s and 90 is now viewed as lost profit and
\nlogistics and supply chains work on volumetric controls because no one wants to
\npay to ship air. Environmentally, we have moved on since the 80s and 90s, but
\nthe principles of using art within packaging design which had been first used
\nthroughout the 80s are still very much evident today.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"Artwork<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Magnetic Memories by Mark Taylor<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n


<\/span><\/p>\n

The 80s was the time when the
\ncover really did sell the book and anything else. Buying decisions would be made
\nbased solely on how excited you were from the art on the cover of a game, on
\nthe side of an arcade cabinet, or on any other product packaging that needed to
\nconvince the buyer to part with their cash. <\/span><\/p>\n

With little information available
\nother than whatever had been written in physical magazines or by word of mouth,
\nand with no such thing as online reviews, the artwork used in the packaging and
\nmarketing materials had to resonate with the target audience who would be
\nbrowsing a flooded market. Today, internet hype and a well financed marketing
\ncampaign seem to be enough to make the case for a sale for most things, and as
\nI have always said, even the bad stuff sells with the right marketing strategy
\nand enough advertising budget behind it.<\/span><\/p>\n

As we reflect more on the
\n1980s, we begin to realise how attitudes to art and design would begin to re-shape
\nthe art world as we know it today. It inspired many who grew up during that
\ndecade to appreciate art more deeply, even if that initial introduction had
\nbeen subconsciously made through something as simple as a video game box, or
\nthe cover of the \u00a0<\/span>video you\u2019re your parents
\nhad rented from the local video store. <\/span><\/p>\n

Many of the early technologies
\nthat had emerged during the eighties such as computer graphics and video art,
\nare now essential tools for artists. The art world and technical innovations we
\nwitnessed throughout the decade began to change the way artists approached
\ntheir creations, they no longer had to be confined by the edges of the canvas,
\nthey could create a fully immersive environment and comparatively very quickly.
\nIt was a complete step change to what had been widely available and done
\nbefore.<\/span><\/p>\n

Aside from the technology,
\nentirely new art movements had been created throughout the decade and many of
\nthem nodded to technology or the mass consumerism we were witnessing at the time.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

Neo-Expressionism was a
\nreaction against the Minimalism and Conceptualism of the 1970s with Neo-Expressionist
\nartists returning to figurative painting and sculpture, often using bold colours
\nand expressive brushstrokes. Works created by Julian Schnabel, Anselm Kiefer,
\nand Jean-Michel Basquiat are the standouts.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Pictures Generation was a
\nlose-knit group of artists who emerged in New York City in the late 1970s and early
\n1980s. They were interested in appropriating images from popular culture and
\nusing them in their work. Cindy Sherman, Richard Prince, Laurie Simmons, and
\nBarbara Kruger were amongst many artists who were influenced by a number of
\nfactors, including the rise of mass media and consumerism, the development of
\npostmodern theory, and the work of earlier artists such as Marcel Duchamp and
\nAndy Warhol.<\/span><\/p>\n

Street Art began to evolve as
\na significant art movement in the 1980s too and it was perhaps one of the most
\ndisruptive art movements to emerge. Using public spaces to create their work,
\noften a juxtaposition of graffiti, murals, and stencils, we witnessed the likes
\nof Keith Haring, Jean-Michel Basquiat, and Banksy quite literally turning what
\nwould have once been seen as vandalism into highly prized works of art that are
\nnow as sought after as the old masters.<\/span><\/p>\n

Neo-Pop was a revival of Pop
\nArt that had been the standout movement of the 1950s and 1960s. Neo-Pop artists
\nused images from popular culture in their work, but they often did so in a more
\nironic or subversive way than Pop artists had in the 50s and 60s. Jeff Koons,
\nKeith Haring, and Andy Warhol explored the relationship between high art and
\nlow art, and they often used their work to comment on consumerism, celebrity
\nculture, and other aspects of contemporary society<\/span><\/p>\n

Often characterised by its use
\nof bright colours, bold imagery, and mass-produced materials, Neo-Pop artists
\noften appropriated images from advertising, magazines, and television,
\nchallenging the traditional notions of beauty and taste.<\/span><\/p>\n

Young British Artists (YBAs)
\nwas a group of artists who had emerged in the United Kingdom in the late 1980s.
\nThey were known for their provocative and often shocking work. Damien Hirst,
\nTracey Emin, and Sarah Lucas have all become household names since. <\/span><\/p>\n

Yet another that had been influenced
\nby mass media and consumerism, the YBAs’ style is often replicated today. But
\nthe movement’s impact was rooted in its shock value. Attempts to recreate that
\nshock today generally miss the point. Mostly, these new movements had arisen
\nout of the popularity of the new technologies that had been rapidly evolving
\nduring the early part of the decade. <\/span><\/p>\n

By the end of the decade, the
\ntechnology had to have a significant impact on the art world. Both video art
\nand computer art became increasingly popular throughout the 80s and by 1989,
\nthese explorations in the new media would be legitimised as valid art forms. <\/span><\/p>\n

Artists such as Bill Viola and
\nGary Hill used video to explore themes of identity, memory, and perception.
\nArtists such as Charles Baudelaire and Jenny Holzer used computers to create
\nnew forms of art, such as digital prints and video installations, yet less than
\na decade prior, art had been mostly talked about in a more traditional sense.
\nIt had been a sculpture or canvas, the concept of it being completely created
\nwith the aid of technology hadn’t even been contemplated as something that
\nwould become mainstream so quickly.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"artwork<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
The Joy of Sticks by Mark Taylor<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n


<\/span><\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t just the Berlin Wall
\nthat came tumbling down in the 80s, and despite the developments in technology
\nand art movements other factors began to affect the markets. While there was a \u00a0<\/span>growing interest in feminist art, conceptual
\nart, and postmodernism, there were also some sticky moments that led to art buyers
\nlosing significant amounts of money.<\/span><\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t so much that there was
\na legitimate art market crash, it was more akin to an art market correction,
\nsomething the industry witnesses periodically, but this time it was different.\u00a0 <\/span>The 1980’s had seen a flood of incoming money
\nfrom Wall Street, the Japanese Yen was strong, and auction houses were
\naggressive with their pricing to take advantage of the seemingly surplus
\nwealth.<\/span><\/p>\n

19th<\/sup> and 20th<\/sup>
\nCentury paintings had been attracting big money buyers, and the practice of
\nspeculating on the next big thing and then flipping it on to the next buyer for
\na healthy profit was very much the order of the day. The return on any
\ninvestment was often significantly better than even the banks or stocks had
\nbeen paying. The 80s was amongst everything else, one of the most money
\nobsessed decades ever seen and the young, upwardly mobile had speculated hard
\nand bet big.<\/span><\/p>\n

If you were selling major
\nworks that were on collectors wish lists in the early to mid 80s, there really were
\nno upper limits to the value of these works. The world was generating more
\nbillionaires than millionaires and no one seriously thought that the bubble
\nwould ever burst, but burst it did. <\/span><\/p>\n

Wall Street traders thought
\nthey were untouchable, or at least they did until the 19th<\/sup> of
\nOctober 1987, a Monday morning that would later be known as Black Monday. This
\nwas the day when the financial walls of Wall Street would come tumbling down,
\nhard and fast.<\/span><\/p>\n

Post-crash, the economy slowed
\nand showed little to no signs of a speedy recovery. About 20% of the
\nimpressionist and modern works previously in demand had failed to sell through
\nthe big auction houses, a turning point that would initially send a shiver
\nthrough the bones of art collectors around the world, but art is a long game
\nand serious collectors knew what the speculators didn\u2019t.<\/span><\/p>\n

At the start of the 80s, art
\ncollectors had been largely outnumbered by speculators who had no real interest
\nin the work, their interest extended only to the monetary value of the work.
\nWhen Wall Street crashed, those who had placed their wealth in the game simply
\nto make a fast buck found themselves mostly burnt. <\/span><\/p>\n

The fallout from this is that
\nthe art world suddenly had fewer speculators, art prices once again began
\nreversing back to near normal values that were somewhere closer to being
\nrealistic, and the art market began to heal from the frantic trading that had
\nbeen happening for a number of years. Thankfully, for serious collectors, the
\nmarket would begin to go through a process and period of correction, although
\nthe journey to that correction had left behind many casualties.<\/span><\/p>\n

The art market depression
\ncontinued between 1988 and it would be 1992 before any new shoots would emerge
\nthat would indicate it\u2019s eventual recovery, the global nature of the art market
\nwould see the industry recover more quickly than other industries, such is the
\nresilience of the art world. <\/span><\/p>\n

There was then a period of gradually
\nincreasing values placed on artwork between 1993 and 1995, but by 1996, the
\nmarket was once again buoyant and artworks began reaching record highs. A stark
\ncontrast from the historic lows of the previous years since 87.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"artwork<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Connected by Mark Taylor<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n


<\/span><\/p>\n

The eighties, for some of us
\nat least, seems like it was only five minutes ago, but it wasn\u2019t. I\u2019m regularly
\nreminded that the technology I bought back then and still use today is mostly
\nfunctioning with the assistance of thoughts and prayers and a constant supply
\nof old electronic components which are becoming more difficult to source. <\/span><\/p>\n

But, even today it\u2019s difficult
\nnot to see the influence and impact that the 80s had on modern day life,
\nespecially when you look at technology, and the crash and subsequent market
\ncorrection between 1987 and 1996, serving as a reminder that art, like any
\nother commodity that can be traded, is as susceptible and volatile as any other
\ninvestment. <\/span><\/p>\n

The value of art might have
\nbeen more volatile during the late 80s, but that didn\u2019t stop artists from
\npushing the creativity needle forward. It was technologies turn once again to
\ndisrupt the norm. It was during this period that creative communities would
\nbegin to look for new ways to engage with their audiences. While the internet
\ndid not exist in its current form at the time, early online communities were
\nformed on bulletin boards that could be accessed using a personal computer, a
\ntelephone, and a device called an acoustic coupler. <\/span><\/p>\n

This was essentially a
\nprecursor to the internet and it allowed people to communicate and share
\ninformation with each other in a way that had never been possible outside of
\nthe military and academia before. Now, when I say share information, the
\ninformation was often the latest text adventure game for a home computer such
\nas the Commodore 64, but this rudimentary online access allowed real-life
\ncommunities to incubate and share their thoughts and their work. <\/span><\/p>\n

Almost any information you
\nfind on the internet today could be found somewhere in the world of bulletin
\nboards throughout the 80s and early 90s, you just had to know where to look,
\nand if you didn\u2019t know where to look, you would quickly hear of online
\ncommunities through word of mouth and user groups. <\/span><\/p>\n

Out of these communities,
\nvarious scenes would begin to take a foothold, often with groups collaborating
\non projects from around the world. Art and creativity had stepped into the next
\nphase, despite the turbulent years in between.<\/span><\/p>\n

Some of these communities were
\ninterested in the convergence of technology and art so they would create technical
\ndemos that would demonstrate their skills and create content that would appeal
\nto broader audiences. These demo\u2019s would frequently feature home brewed art and
\nmusic created digitally by these usually small community groups. <\/span><\/p>\n

Most, if not nearly all of
\nthese demo\u2019s can still be viewed and seen today either through emulation or on
\nYouTube. Second Reality, a demo created in around 1993 was celebrated at the
\ntime for bringing digital and video art to life with its ground-breaking
\ntechnical effects, the likes of which were incredibly difficult to achieve when
\nit first came out. Many of these demo groups had names, in the case of Second
\nReality, the group was called Demoparty who had entered Second Reality into an
\nearly PC demo competition. <\/span><\/p>\n

The effects within that demo
\nhadn\u2019t been seen before, certainly not in a manner that presented such a
\nseamless visual experience, and certainly not using a computer to generate the
\neffects. With its bouncing polyhedron, Moir\u00e9 patterns, demonic like rotating
\nhead, plasma effects, and more, and a soundtrack that would later used in
\ncommercial recordings, the demo scene had arrived and visual arts would once
\nagain deliver a change in the way we produce, create and think about art. <\/span><\/p>\n

The demo scene at the time was
\nground-breaking in geek culture but it was also quite niche in that access was
\nrestricted to those who had an interest in technology and the means to access
\nit. Yet, the scene had a significant impact on, and influenced the art world as
\nwe know it today in a number of ways. It pioneered the use of these new
\ntechnologies despite those technologies being limited, the scene was as much
\nabout pushing creative and computational boundaries beyond what people had
\npreviously thought was possible.<\/span><\/p>\n

The scene also inspired a new
\ngeneration of artists, many of whom would go on to achieve major success in the
\nart world for their creative and immersive projects that challenged traditional
\nnotions of what art could be. Other demo artists never really left the scene
\nand continued creating demo\u2019s on what are now vintage systems and others began
\ncreating demo\u2019s on systems that were much more current. <\/span><\/p>\n

Many of the artists who stuck
\naround are still developing demos today, continuing to push old technologies
\nbeyond anything they were originally designed to do. A number of these demo
\nartists continue to do great things and frequently come up with creative
\nprojects that have never been thought of, let alone done before, yet very few
\nof them are widely known outside of the demo scene which is a monumental shame,
\nand more so, because their work often inspires others to create similar works
\nwhich others then get the recognition for.<\/span><\/p>\n

Thankfully, even if you don\u2019t
\nhave an easily accessible way to watch and listen to some of these demos, most
\nof them end up on services such as YouTube where they can be viewed. The files
\nare usually made freely available for those who continue to use old
\ntechnologies, and there are emulators for these systems which can be loaded on
\nto a home computer or even a Raspberry Pi. There\u2019s no excuse not to take a
\nlook, and especially if you are into art that provokes conversation and
\nthinking, or you\u2019re into just plain old weird. Some of these demos can be a
\nlittle out there, which is really the point of art, it doesn\u2019t have to be all petals
\nand landscapes, weird is really good too! These demos really should be
\ncelebrated and I think that they are worthy of opening up a new conversation
\naround what art is, and should be. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"artwork<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
The\u00a0Retro Junk Drawer by Mark Taylor<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n


<\/span><\/p>\n

For art, and technology, the
\n80\u2019s wasn\u2019t just a bold decade of neon colours and excess, it was
\ntransformative in so many ways. There\u2019s little doubt that the art world changed
\nas a result of many of the artists who throughout the 80s would create work
\nthat really pushed the boundaries of anything that came before. <\/span><\/p>\n

Artists throughout the 80s
\nweren\u2019t afraid of going there in terms of subjects that would have once been
\navoided, and then they embraced the technology, even though that technology, by
\ntoday\u2019s standards, was limited. <\/span><\/p>\n

It was a challenging decade
\nbecause everyone was kind of just making it up as they went along. There were
\nno rule books, maybe some heavy text from a university lab, but remember this
\nwas also pre-internet and there was no such thing as a Dummies guide. The world
\nwas much smaller and to some extent, I think that was in part something that
\nled artists to find their own inner creative souls, there was no point of
\nreference that was easily accessible which could easily influence an artists
\nhand.<\/span><\/p>\n

There were other innovations
\nand inventions that helped to define the 80s, many have been and gone but even
\nthose that are no longer used today had been pivotal in defining how we use
\ntechnology today, and as artists, how we create our work.<\/span><\/p>\n