Violence is the ultimate weakness or, as the writer Isaac Asimov once put it, “the last refuge of the incompetent.” That hasn’t stopped masculinism – a #brand as much as an ideology, promoting male supremacy and confusing strength with brute force – from infecting public discourse.
True forza is courage, a word that contains the Latin term for heart. Thankfully, the arts abound with such power. This Fall/Winter season, the arts offer self-preservation with a side of ’90s nostalgia.
And what the Bronx wants
Is not a combative retaliatory response
It’s a renaissance…
The Warriors, a 1979 thriller set and filmed in New York City, presented a Coney Island street gang’s nighttime escape from the Bronx after its members are falsely accused of murdering a gang leader and face threats of retribution from rival thugs. Initially panned by critics, the movie featured numerous gritty subway and street scenes and later became a cult favorite, spawning video game and comic book spinoffs as well as an all-female concept album by Lin-Manuel Miranda and Eisa Davis. Now, in March 2027, The Warriors is finally taking center stage on Broadway – and if Hamilton is anything to go by, theater-goers will need to be strategic in their quest for tickets.
In an interview with Artist on the Rise following the album launch in 2024, Miranda noted that “flipping the gender of the Warriors as a female gang” made the project compelling. In particular, he said that certain “toxically online men doxxing women’s home addresses” reminded him of behaviors shown in the movie. “It seemed to be the same malignant chaos. … I got excited by the notion of writing women’s voices surviving the night,” he said.
Sometimes, of course, women don’t just survive a night – they shoot and kill their low-life attackers, hightail it out west in a Thunderbird convertible and accelerate off a cliff into the Grand Canyon to escape the FBI.
Thelma & Louise, the 1991 film starring Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon (with a memorably shirtless performance by a 26-year-old Brad Pitt), is now also a theatrical production, premiering this fall at the Young Vic in London, where it runs through October 24, 2026. The show’s music is by Neko Case, with choreography by Bobbi Jene Smith and Or Schraiber. Rachel Tucker is Louise and Amy Lennon is Thelma, while Trip Cullman is the director.
At the time of the film’s release, its depiction of resilience, female friendship on the road, and violence perpetrated both by and against men led some critics to dismiss it as degrading. Yet Callie Khouri, who adapted her original screenplay for the new stage production, posited in a recent interview with The Times of London that the story didn’t need much updating because “it’s still a very plausible scenario,” with women’s rights on a backwards trajectory in the United States, where she was born and raised.
Let’s be clear: The 1990s are (still) having a moment. Pop culture is awash in references to Friends, Tamagotchis, MTV, Gameboy consoles, video rentals, landline phones, choker necklaces, slip dresses, flannel shirts, Calvin Klein, alt-rock, and more. In June, comedian Rob Anderson extended his viral foray into Millennial childhoods with the release of a full-length YouTube special, “Are You Afraid of the ‘90s?”
What prompted this wistfulness? Possibly, a yearning for a pre-surveillance era of the internet, one that felt exciting – with the screeching, beeping promise of the dial-up connection – rather than ominous. Whatever the reason, fans of the decade’s style and sound have more to look forward to in 2027, with the promise of a new album currently titled 1994, by 4 Non Blondes early in the year.
The band’s debut album Bigger, Better, Faster, More! came out in 1992, with the generational anthem “What’s Up?” quickly rising in the charts.
The ’90s iteration of the group was short-lived, but band members Linda Perry, Christa Hillhouse, Dawn Richardson, and Roger Rocha astutely sensed the time was ripe for a reunion. In a statement put out by Red Light Management, Perry noted that “Playing some songs with 4 Non Blondes just seemed like a fun thing to do, in a way it hadn’t before now.” Duly noted: We’re standing by for the encore.
For travelers craving a curtain call for ’90s fashion, the Fashion Museum of Antwerp (MoMu) is treating visitors to “The Antwerp Six,” an exhibition that runs through January 17, 2027, and tracks the rise of the radical Dirk Bikkembergs, Ann Demeulemeester, Walter Van Beirendonck, Dries Van Noten, Dirk Van Saene, and Marina Yee on the global design scene after their debut in London in 1986.
Antwerp, Belgium, is a long-standing business hub, home to the world’s first dedicated commodities exchange – the Handelsbeurs, which opened in 1531 – and known for its vast diamond district, through which a substantial majority of rough diamonds pass before reaching jewelers. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the cobblestoned Flemish city has also churned out an impressive number of fashion designers. The Antwerp Six all studied at Antwerp’s Royal Academy of Fine Arts and have since continued to explore creativity in various forms, with Demeulemeester producing homeware for Serax and Van Noten launching an arts foundation in Venice.
Known for his irreverence and nonconformity, designer Franco Moschino – another big name from the era – once confessed to The New York Times that his original passion was painting. “Making money in art was difficult,” he noted in a 1986 interview. “The easiest way to make money was to use art for some other reason. One of the easiest and most interesting from an economic point of view was fashion. Fashion pays.”
From October 31, 2026, through February 14, 2027, visitors to the alpine Forte di Bard in Italy’s Valle d’Aosta region will be treated to “Ceci n’est pas une exposition,” a collection of more than 200 photographs, garments, and archival materials from Moschino’s career. Part of a Lombard dialectical theater group in the 1970s, he served as illustrator to Gianni Versace before emerging as a leading Italian designer in the 1980s.
His provocative aesthetics can be traced to Pop Art, which gained traction as Moschino was growing up in Abbiategrasso, a town outside Milan, and plainly influenced his work. Witness a silk suit from Moschino Spring 1991, covered in a pattern print by Roy Lichtenstein: the collaboration between designer and artist was a manifestation of their kindred sensibilities. “I’m interested in what would normally be considered the worst aspects of commercial art. I think it’s the tension between what seems to be so rigid and cliched and the fact that art really can’t be this way,” Lichtenstein told the BBC in a 1966 interview.
Through January 10, 2027, stop by the Guggenheim in New York for “Guggenheim Pop: 1960 to Now,” a celebration of the movement critics once dismissed as vulgar for its embrace of advertising, comic strips, pulp magazines, and other mass-market influences. The pieces on display were assembled over decades following the departure of curator Lawrence Alloway, who spearheaded the museum’s original Pop Art exhibition.
In addition to works by Lichtenstein, visitors can see Chryssa’s take on the blazing neon signs of Times Square, a distillation of commercial Americana if there ever was one, and art by Claes Oldenburg, Coosje van Bruggen, John Chamberlain, Andy Warhol, and Richard Hamilton, as well as more recent contributions from the likes of Maurizio Cattelan, Mohammed Ahmed Ibrahim, Lucia Hierro, Alex Da Corte, Liu Shiyuan, Martine Gutierrez, Lauren Halsey, and the iconic Yayoi Kusama, who died this past summer at 97. Her immersive installation “Infinity Mirrored Room – Dancing Lights That Flew Up to the Universe,” dated 2019, welcomes viewers into a constellation of flickering lights.
As a child during the Second World War, Kusama spent many hours a day stitching parachutes for Japan’s Imperial Army, and as an adult, she openly spoke of her mental health struggles. Ultimately, Kusama waged her battle through creativity, stating: “Every time I have had a problem, I have confronted it with the ax of art.”
The Warriors
The Warriors will be playing at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre,
NYC, opening March 2027.
4 Non Blondes
New album, 1994, to be released in early 2027.
Thelma & Louise
The 1991 movie hit is now a live show at the Young Vic Theatre,
London, through October 24, 2026.
Antwerp Six
At the Fashion Museum of Antwerp (MoMu), through January 17,
2027.
Moschino
At the Forte di Bard, Italy, from October 31, 2026, through
February 14, 2027.
Guggenheim Pop
At the Guggenheim, NYC, through January 10, 2027.
