An eye-opening book about the 1980s New York art scene, its far-reaching effects on contemporary art, and the rise of some of the biggest names in the art world today.

This groundbreaking book, accompanying a major exhibition at the Hirshhorn, tells the story of the evolution of New York's downtown art scene in the 1980s--from a DIY counterculture in the East Village to a legitimate gallery business in SoHo. Coinciding with the rise of modern branding and the onset of the information age, artists' focus on commodities and consumerism began as satire but came to be much more...