This sampling of art magazines published in the 80’s gives perspective on the unique social landscape of the decade, exploring new ways to consider artists’ creative heritage, their relationship to critics as well as to each other, and their influence inside and outside of the art world. Covering a variety of writing styles and topics, these publications include interviews with artists, artists’ writings, world news, and philosophical discussion of larger themes across high and low art. Launched in 1981, BOMB Magazine was founded by artists and writers based in New York City. It sought to provide an alternative to traditional art criticism and journalism, instead publishing artist-generated content such as artist-to-artist conversations & interviews and artists’s essays. Like BOMB, ZG was founded as a response to an increasingly exclusive art world — edited and published by Rosetta Brooks from 1980 to 1985, it celebrated a wide variety of creative domains including fashion, art, film and music, and served as a forum for the critical examination of their cross-pollination. Journal was founded in the 1970’s as a project of the Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art. LAICA was conceived as a space where artists could explore experimental practices free of the pressures of the commercialized art world, and Journal was pivotal to this mission — in publishing the works and writings of artists, it served both as an artistic medium and as a mode of communication between artists.