Fast Forward: Painting from the 1980s

Jan 27–May 14, 2017

Two carved wooden figures stand beside a sad orange cartoon creature holding a drooping yellow flower.
Two carved wooden figures stand beside a sad orange cartoon creature holding a drooping yellow flower.

Julia Wachtel, Membership, 1984. Oil on canvas, overall: 65 7/8 × 80 15/16 in. (167.3 × 205.6 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase, with funds from the Painting and Sculpture Committee 2016.114. © Julia Wachtel

Fast Forward: Painting from the 1980s presents a focused look at painting from this decade with works drawn entirely from the Museum’s collection. 

In the 1980s, painting recaptured the imagination of the contemporary art world against a backdrop of expansive change. An unprecedented number of galleries appeared on the scene, particularly in downtown New York. Groundbreaking exhibitions—that blurred distinctions between high and low art—were presented at alternative and artist-run spaces. New mediums, including video and installation art, were on the rise. Yet despite the growing popularity of photography and video, many artists actively embraced painting, freely exploring its bold physicality and unique capacity for expression and innovation.

The exhibition includes work by artists often identified with this explosive period—Jean-Michel Basquiat, Sherrie Levine, David Salle, and Julian Schnabel—as well as by several lesser-known painters. These artists explored the traditions of figuration and history painting, and offered new interpretations of abstraction. Many addressed fundamental questions about artmaking in their work, while others took on political issues including AIDS, feminism, gentrification, and war. In the face of a media-saturated environment, artists in the 1980s recommitted to painting. Far from dead, painting came to represent an important intersection between new ways of seeing and a seemingly traditional way of making art. 

Fast Forward: Painting from the 1980s is organized by Jane Panetta, associate curator, with Melinda Lang, curatorial assistant.

Press Highlights

"The Whitney Revisits the '80s, a Decade of Macho and Money."
—The New York Times

“The powerful excitement of the decade has been languishing in a blind spot of art history. An exhibit at the Whitney comes to the rescue.”
—The New Yorker

"An absorbing group show that brings together about 40 paintings by as many artists."
—WNYC


“A show of 1980s American painting at the Whitney Museum includes serious and playful meditations on sexuality, AIDS, wealth, and politics.”
—The Daily Beast

"Painting From the 1980s, When Brash Met Flash"
—The New York Times

“The Whitney Exhibition Fast Forward: Painting from the 1980s Reinforces the Purpose of Painting”
—Forbes

On the Hour

A 30-second online art project:
Frank WANG Yefeng, The Levitating Perils #2

Learn more about this project

Learn more at whitney.org/artport

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