Monica Nouwens

For more than fifteen years, Monica Nouwens has been portraying urban communities in America: from idealistic utopians, neo-hippy communities and anarchistic movements such as ‘Food Not Bombs’ to disillusioned, drug-addicted commandos returning from the war in Iraq. Nouwens is fascinated by the diversity of social manifestations in the city. Over the years she changed from being an outside observer into an involved insider. Ultimately this has formed the basis for her more independent work Look At Me (…). In this body of work her personal experiences with Los Angeles and its subcultures meet. Her commitment to the DIY subculture of youth, against the backdrop of a society facing a financial and moral crisis, is the main focus of the work.

Ryan McGinley

New Jersey-born Ryan McGinley studied graphic design at New York’s Parsons School of Visual Arts. In 1999 he sent 100 magazine editors and artists he admired a 50-page book of photographs he had produced on his desktop computer entitled The Kids Are Alright. The book consisted of exuberantly bacchanalian images of his friends in New York City. In these images, fellow artists like Hannah Liden, Dan Colen, Dash Snow and Emily Sundblad masturbate, roll joints, tag walls, and scamper naked in the woods.

Larry Clark

Untitled, 1963 (Tulsa series)

Larry Clark is a story-teller. His stories — which boldly confront themes of youth culture, sex, violence, and drugs — are told through two feature films (KIDS, 1995; and Another Day in Paradise, 1998) and four art books (Tulsa, 1971; Teenage Lust, 1983; 1992, 1992; and The Perfect Childhood,1993). While best known for the spiraling controversy in the U.S. and abroad surrounding the release of the independent film KIDS at the Sundance Film Festival in 1995, Larry Clark also remains notorious for his distinctive, sexually-charged photographic essays of youth culture and self-destruction.