New York: Club Kids
Details
BY WALTPAPER
By Walt Cassidy. Foreword by Mark Holgate.
Hardcover, 11.25 x 8.25 in
375 Pages
English Language
Published by DAMIANI
About This Book
The embodiment of Generation X, the Club Kids were the last subculture of the analog world
New York: Club Kids is a high-impact visual diary of New York City in the 1990s, seen through the eyes of Walt Cassidy, known as Waltpaper, a central figure within the Club Kids. The Club Kids—named thus by New York Magazine in 1988—were an artistic, fashion-conscious youth movement that crossed over into the public consciousness through appearances on daytime talk shows, magazine editorials, fashion campaigns and music videos, planting the seeds for popular cultural trends such as reality television, self-branding, “influencers” and the gender revolution.
Known for their outrageous looks, legendary parties and sometimes illicit antics, the Club Kids were the embodiment of Generation X and would prove to be the last definitive subculture group of the analog world. The ’90s have come to be known as the last discernible and cohesive decade, cherished by those who experienced it and romanticized by those who missed it.
The first comprehensive visual document of ’90s nightlife and street culture, New York: Club Kids grants special access to an underground world, providing exclusive insight into the lifestyle of this celebrated and notorious clique. Featuring rare and previously unseen photographs along with magazine editorials and ephemera, the book culls from the personal archives of various photographers and artists—some celebrated, and many others whose recognition is long overdue.
PRAISE AND REVIEWS
Interview
A corrective to the default association of the Club Kids with the 1996 murder of Andre “Angel” Melendez by Michael Alig, Cassidy weaves a far more optimistic narrative where a bunch of misfits made a wonderland by being themselves.
AnOther Man
New York: Club Kids charts the history of the last underground subculture of the analogue age [...] when a new group of upstarts transgressed boundaries with singular aplomb, deconstructing the realms of fashion, music, drugs, gender, pop culture, and media to recreate themselves anew every week.
Dazed
The photos featured in the book depict a rich, layered story with New York City as the setting: the bold fashion, the memorable makeup details, the promotional fare-like flyers and posters, and the celebrities.
OUT
The Club Kids, a rag-tag band of misfits with oversized, personally crafted personas and outrageous looks...represented a seminal moment in culture.
Vogue
New York: Club Kids is a brilliant I-was-there chronicle of the glorious, gaudy, and gorgeous creatures who stalked the New York nights of the ’90s, an oddly touching and affecting remembrance of both youthful knowingness and innocence.
New York Magazine:Strategist
Multimedia artist and designer Walt Cassidy, a.k.a. Waltpaper, takes the reader through the ’90s underground club scene in New York City...in this “high-impact” visual diary filled with rare and previously unseen photographs, magazine clippings, and other media.
Artforum
Emerging at a moment of plentiful digital photography but little internet access, their colorful personalities had to be experienced in real time, in real communities, and now, finally, in a photobook whose snapshots ooze with that ever-elusive quality: authenticity.
