In photos: The colourful, foreboding techno-optimism of the ’90s

From the ashes of the ​’80s, the 1990s emerged like a phoenix as a time of survival against the odds. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the seeds of neoliberalism took root, ushering in the New World Order boldly showcased at Davos 2026, while postmodernism emerged at the vanguard of the culture wars drilled into public consciousness with the arrival of the 24/7 news cycle. 

With the publication of The 1990s: A Visual History of the Decade (Thames & Hudson), author Henry Carroll revisits the Neo-Gilded Age with the knowing eye of one who experienced the era in real time. The book traces the evolution of visual language across art, photography, entertainment, media, technology, and design, mapping the dawn of the digital era amidst the last hurrahs of analogue life. 

Featuring a wealth of advertisements, album covers, film and video stills, and photographs by Janette Beckman, David Corio, Elaine Constantine, Nan Goldin, and Martin Parr, The 1990s is a prophetic look at the decade that bridged two millennia. Organised chronologically, the book unfolds in three acts: early, mid, and late ​’90s, each with their own protagonists propelling us into a future that was far more aligned with one of the decade’s greatest films, The Matrix, than we could ever dream. 

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Throughout it, there are premonitions of the future to come: then-Senator Joe Biden attacking Anita Hill for speaking out against sexual harassment, which helped ensure Clarence Thomas took a lucrative seat on the Supreme Court; the beating of Rodney King, the LA Riots, and ​“The Trial of the Century” a harrowing indictment of structural racism and police brutality; and the wrenching scenes of white supremacists slaughtering their classmates at Columbine High School – interlaced with scenes of supermodels, pop stars, and proto-reality television. 

Just 10 years old when the decade began, Carroll remembers his formative years set against the lurid backdrop of ​“progress”. While the first Gulf War raged, it was repackaged by Western media as content, creating a distance by which viewers could consume violence without the visceral realities of bloodshed in the service of imperialism. ​“At school we were fascinated by this new kind of digital warfare and the pixilated footage of bomb strikes,” Carroll remembers.

The 90s picks up where Carroll’s previous book, 1980s: Image of a Decade, left off, creating a direct line from the 2020s to the past. ​“The present sometimes feels almost illogically crazy. Like how the fuck did it come to this?” he asks. The answers can be found at your fingertips. Here the promise of technology is sugar coated by a sprinkling of colourful iMacs and Nokia phones, and a newfangled platform called the World Wide Web, while the cost of doing business was wholly removed from incipient signs of climate collapse. 

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While Jamiroquai warned of ​‘Virtual Insanity’, few could see the writing on the walls that would one day morph into a landscape of data centres polluting marginalised communities around the globe. With the benefit of hindsight, The 90s reveals the early workings of our present-day obsession with AI, memes, surveillance, fakes, and personal brands, while the co-existence of slick and raw imagery refashioned our ideas of reality. 

With the nostalgia industry complex working overtime, The 90s reminds us that context matters as much, if not more, than content. ​“There is a certain beauty to the clunkiness of early websites but that was such a functional visual language founded on technical limitations rather than the product of how we actually wanted it to look,” Carroll says. ​“So in some ways that aesthetic was always a means to an end, which makes me wonder if it’s worth revisiting, and if it is, how would it escape being superficial pastiche.”

Only time will tell if there is a future in which this question can be answered.

The 1990s: A Visual History of the Decade by Henry Carroll is published by Thames & Hudson.

Miss Rosen is a freelance arts and photography writer, follow her on X.

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