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I landed at JFK in late December, 1984. I had graduated from New York University just seven months before, but the city felt different. The Eighties were here. All the way here. Whatever my generation was going to do, people were doing it. The future had arrived.
I called James and Elizabeth from the airport. I rode the subway with my large suitcase and dragged it up the subway stairs, arriving finally on James’ doorstep on still-dangerous Avenue B. I was tanned, thin, and worn-out from 14 hours of flying.
But there was hardly a second to waste. I jumped in the shower, borrowed a clean shirt, and we were off. Downtown New York was exploding with holiday parties.
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In 1977, the New York scene revolved around Punk. In 1984, it revolved around Art. Keith Haring’s puffy figures were all over the subway. A Puerto Rican street artist/painter named Basquiat had been discovered by Andy Warhol. Robert Longo had done his “Men in Cities” pieces which seemed to depict investment bankers being picked off by snipers. Cindy Sherman’s movie star self-portraits were lending a new sense of glamour to downtown.
A distinct classicism had returned to the arts, a new cultural conservativism, maybe mimicking Reagan’s presidency.
Whatever it was, people were wearing real clothes again. Long wool overcoats, stovepipe jeans, dress shoes. The loose and sloppy 1970s had finally, totally and irrevocably been put out of its misery.
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