There is a school of thought that takes issue with magazines and nonprofits that sort and platform artists based on age, citing the art world’s sometimes exploitative relationship to novelty and the need to make room for an idea of emergence that isn’t tied to youth.
CULTURED is one of those magazines. Every year for the past decade, we’ve nominated 20 to 30 artists aged 35 or under for the Young Artists list. Some were already market-endorsed when they were featured, others surfaced from staunchly underground scenes. Some received MFAs from lauded programs, others were lifelong autodidacts. Their practices have been equally wide-ranging: Among the 247 artists featured since 2016 are a clown, a comedian, a stonemason, and an aspiring actor.
We compile these lists with the firm conviction that looking to younger artists is about more than finding the next hot thing. Each time, the exercise brings us back to the drawing board: Who is shaking things up? Who is the art world overlooking? Who is asking the questions no one will? The exercise surfaces a constellation of voices who are reckoning with a messy world through the work they make. Their relative youth is really the least interesting thing about them.
And the Young Artists list alums have continued to surprise us at every turn. Since being featured, they have ventured into new mediums, started bands, designed handbags, shown at every conceivable scale and in every conceivable climate. They’ve lost everything, called out the art world’s hypocrisies, and formed mutual aid networks while they were at it. To celebrate a decade of their accomplishments, we welcomed 27 Young Artists—representing every edition of the list thus far—for a reunion photoshoot at MoMA PS1, which became a colorful backdrop for Dana Scruggs’s unconventional riff on a yearbook picture. Some of these artists have been close for years; others have never met in person. But if the mood on set revealed anything, it’s that they are stronger together.
What’s the single greatest challenge of being an artist today?
Hannah Beerman: Survival.
Borna Sammak: Money. It’s boring and upsetting to say, but that’s what’s ruining everyone’s lives. It all goes to landlords. Art-wise, that’s easy; it’s just like, does it rock or not? And you have control over that.
Sasha Gordon: Wanting the work to evolve and to not be as impacted by others’ opinions or other work I’ve been seeing.
Louis Osmosis: Having to fight a new battle every fucking day. Speaking the language of the trenches. Keeping a Duolingo two-week streak in Trenchanese.
Oscar Yi Hou: The storm of images we have to contend with.
Theresa Chromati: Acceptance.
What’s the silliest thing a collector, curator, or journalist has asked about your work?
Ajay Kurian: There was a British collector who told me about his visit to India: “Even though they were so poverty-stricken, they still had so much joy in their eyes.” That was a tough one.
Martine Gutierrez: Honestly, I think things could get stupider. Everyone’s a little too informed. I feel like most people’s questions are almost too heady. I challenge someone to ask me stupider questions.
What’s been the proudest moment in your career so far?
Kurian: Two things from the 2017 Whitney Biennial stand out. One was working with Tiffany & Co. and going through that whole process with five other artists. It felt like this weird camp where we got to work with this multibillion-dollar company and do whatever we wanted. Then I had this installation in the stairwell, and this little girl—she couldn’t have been more than 3 or 4—was reaching for one of my sculptures. Her mother said, “I know that’s your favorite, but we have to go.” That really did it for me.
Dominic Chambers: A homecoming exhibition I had at the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis in 2023, 10 years after leaving St. Louis to pursue my education in the arts.
Chromati: To be able to look at a piece and just let it be. Getting to that moment where I don’t have to pack everything in, and instead be like, It’s done, move on.
Where do you see yourself in 10 years?
Bony Ramirez: Back in my home country, the Dominican Republic. Somewhere close to the beach, where I would have my studio close to the water. I could see myself being, like, 100 years old and still working.
Sammak: In New Orleans, in a half-bathhouse, half-metal venue.
Gutierrez: Retired, ideally. The survey is happening this year, and then it’s just gardening.
What’s a rumor about you that you kinda wished were true?
Andrew Ross: That my work is really cerebral.
Chloe Wise: That I’m dating Timothée Chalamet. Everyone confuses me with Kylie [Jenner] all the time, it’s crazy.
Miles Greenberg: They’re all true, babe.
in your life?
