Young British Artists (YBA)
Young British Art (YBA), or Britart, was founded in the 1980’s by a group of neo-conceptual artists led by Damien Hirst. The youthful, entrepreneurial talent of YBA developed at London’s Goldsmith College under the tutelage of conceptual artist Michael Craig-Martin and Richard Wentworth, among others. Fueled by the shock-value of the spectacle, Britart lacks the traditional separation between media and art. YBA recalls the influences of Marcel Duchamp with its emphasis on the found object
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Young British Artists (YBA)
Young British Art (YBA), or Britart, was founded in the 1980’s by a group of neo-conceptual artists led by Damien Hirst. The youthful, entrepreneurial talent of YBA developed at London’s Goldsmith College under the tutelage of conceptual artist Michael Craig-Martin and Richard Wentworth, among others. Fueled by the shock-value of the spectacle, Britart lacks the traditional separation between media and art. YBA recalls the influences of Marcel Duchamp with its emphasis on the found object along with witty and unconventional representations of everyday life, and Joseph Beuys’ contemplation of the artist’s place in society. The genre encompasses a wide range of media including video, photography, painting, collage, sculpture and installation art, but does not feature a unified set of techniques.
The 1988 exhibition "Freeze," curated and promoted by Hirst, pinpoints the official origin of the YBA group. Bypassing galleries, Hirst chose an abandoned Docklands warehouse for the exhibit. The "Freeze" warehouse show not only provided a raw industrial atmosphere but also placed the art in the center of Britain’s youth-driven culture boom of the late 1980’s. "Freeze" jump-started the careers of several featured artists including Hirst, Sarah Lucas, Gary Hume, Angus Fairhurst and Fiona Rae. During the 1990 Gambler exhibition, advertising executive turned art collector and gallerist Charles Saatchi bought Hirst’s first major installation, "A Thousand Years"; a large glass case filled with flies and maggots feeding off of a rotting cow carcass. Directly following this acquisition, Saatchi became the official collector/dealer of Hirst’s work as well as the main sponsor of the YBAs. From 1992-1996 Saatchi held a series of shows at his gallery entitled "Young British Art I-VI," permanently positioning the name YBA within the contemporary art world. Following the aptly named YBA shows, "Minky Manky" (1996), curated by Carl Freedman, featured art from the second generation of YBAs: Dinos and Jake Chapman, Ron Mueck and Tracy Emin.
The rise of the YBA movement culminated in the "Sensation" exhibition in 1997. Presented at the Royal Academy of Art in London, and including work from Saatchi’s collection from 42 artists (the Chapman brothers, Jenny Saville, Mona Hatoum, Chris Ofili and Rachel Whitereade to name a few), "Sensation" attracted a record number of visitors and sparked social and political controversy. Two years after "Sensation" opened at the Royal Academy, the show premiered in the United States at the Brooklyn Museum of Art. Controversial subject matter, such as Chris Ofili’s elephant dung-encrusted portrait, "The Holy Virgin Mary" (1996), met instant protest from political conservatives, including Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who petitioned the House of Representatives to halt government funding for the Museum. The negative publicity attracted even more visitors than the London exhibition.
In 2004, Fairhurst, Lucas and Hirst collaborated on the exhibition "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" held at the Tate Britain Gallery in London. The show focused on the commonalities found in their work, namely the diverse ways in which they use art as metaphor. "New Britannia," due to open in the summer of 2009 at Saatchi’s new London gallery, features more than 42 artists associated with the YBA movement. Additionally, Saatchi’s show will include the next generation of YBAs: Tessa Farmer, Donald Urguhart, Toby Ziegler and Barry Reigate. (hide)
Examples of Young British Artists (YBA) at Auction
Artists Associated with Young British Artists (YBA) — 21 artists:
