Calling liminalism the "defining" aesthetic of our time is a bit much (though I get the article is trying to hitch its wagon to the Backrooms, aka the "current popular thing"). It's an aesthetic microniche, about as popular as vaporwave, or cyberpunk, grunge, or Y2K (think flip phones, bulky plastic cameras, etc.). There's a ton of these, and some are surprising: for example, there's even been a relatively recent revival of the "old-money" aesthetic, especially motivated by fashion brands like Rowing Blazers, etc.

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krackers 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

The same art world (or more specifically the "Consumer Aesthetics Research Institute") also named "Frutiger Aero" the defining aesthetic of 2000s, even though it was really only seen in a few places (Aqua aesthetic is very different from Aero). All of this should probably be taken with grains of salt.

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tobr 34 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

Is CARI part of the ”art world”? Where have CARI said that Frutiger Aero was ”the defining” aesthetic of 2000s? They are working to identify many different aesthetic trends that existed in parallel, not one that defines each decade.

Their description of Frutiger Aero explicitly includes Aqua, both mentioned by name and included visually:

https://www.are.na/consumer-aesthetics-research-institute/fr...

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keiferski 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

There is no “official opinion” of the art world. These are just different organizations with their own opinions.

	▲	timr 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		In fact, when you see someone in the art world claiming that X is a "defining" anything, it usually means that they have a big collection of X for sale. In this case, I imagine it's submarine marketing for the movie that's out.

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sph 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I never got why Frutiger Aero got so popular as a ‘nostalgic’ aesthetic, when it’s basically the Windows Vista, GNOME 3 (the awful rewrite of GNOME 2), KDE 4.0 (the buggy, emo black rewrite of KDE 3) look?

It was the lowest point of computer graphics. Who the hell is nostalgic for that? Probably just kids that had their formative years in those ~2-3 years. Not sure you can even call it a niche.

I’m a fan on the vaporwave/Windows 2000/XP aesthetic, the Vista era is when everything started going to shit.

	▲	satvikpendem an hour ago \| parent [-]
		Well yes, nostalgia is based on age. The people who are nostalgic for that grew up with those sorts of UI.

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appplication 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I thought similarly, but the article actually was published prior to Backrooms movie release and popularity, though there is a nod they were aware the concept was being optioned to A24. Though I agree, “defining” might be a bit strong.