Sensationalists: The Bad Girls and Boys of British Art

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Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media: Arts

The rebellious art students who took on the old guard and changed the art world forever.

Rebellious, provocative and unapologetic. The Young British Artists crashed the 90s art scene, making Tracey Emin, Damien Hirst and others household names. This is their story.

Series 1

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Keith Allen

Min Clough

Todd Austin

Bohemia Films

Sensationalists: The Bad Girls and Boys of British Art: Series 1: Young British Artists

Fame and Fortune

Young British Artists

BBC Two - Sensationalists: The Bad Girls and Boys of British Art, Series 1, Young British Artists

The Royal Academy’s Sensation causes a sensation, and the art world changes forever.

The Royal Academy’s iconoclastic Sensation is itself a sensation. 300,000 attend the show, causing protests and resignations. Meanwhile, Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin reach megastar status.

In September 1997, the Royal Academy puts on an iconoclastic exhibition at the heart of the art establishment – Sensation. It causes a sensation itself, with 300,000 people flocking to see Charles Saatchi’s taboo-breaking private collection of artworks by a new generation of young British contemporary artists. Inspiring protests, resignations and tabloid column inches, it rocks the art world to its core while cementing contemporary art at the heart of public consciousness.

Contemporary art and young artists are propelled into the limelight, with some, like Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin, reaching megastar status. Art is now attracting huge audiences, controversy grows around artworks such as Tracey Emin’s My Bed and Antony Gormley’s The Angel of the North, and contemporary art finds its dedicated national home with the construction of the Tate Modern.

Sensationalists: The Bad Girls and Boys of British Art: Series 1

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Sensationalists: The Bad Girls and Boys of British Art

Series 1

Young British Artists

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