2023: the year when nostalgia eclipsed all else

Modern nostalgia has had a profound effect on all of us, even defining in some ways the annual zeitgeist, especially for Generation Z, that wave of ‘inclusive consumers’ or socially progressive dreamers who seem to control the narrative of the era we are living in.

One of the reasons for this collective feeling makes much more sense with Mark Fisher‘s theory, as reported in Dazed. The philosopher points out that there is a growing sense that culture has lost the ability to understand and articulate the present, because the idea that there is a future seems to be meaningless.

This post-apocalyptic idea attracts all the world’s dreamers to the same core of energy based on a kind of dark romanticism that seems to reject the present in order to escape into a past in which to find a valuable serotonin refuge.

The never-ending Y2K effect

From the Barbie film to Y2K fashion or the rise of K-pop bands on the global stage, which updated the concept of the girl-boys bands of the 2000s. This eternal nostalgia has been stimulating all the aesthetic trends of this year, whether through remakes of Mean Girls, the return of the digital camera, Phoebe Philo’s return to fashion, the x 0.5 frame on the networks or the Y2K effect that has led to culture shining with its bling bling effect.

This fascination is then due to the longing for the past and the refusal to face a present haunted by the climate emergency, Western neo-fascism, the tragedy of the Palestinian genocide or the loss of rights and values, among many other issues that lead us to a joint dissociation, beyond the growing infantilisation that persists in society. See one of the latest algorithmic trends: the internet’s obsession with collectible Sonny Angels figurines.

Nostalgia is now perceived from an ‘early age’ by new generations immersed in constant instability, with subconscious thoughts that the world might collapse in a few years, escaping reality through the sounds of Black Eyed Peas or Destiny’s Child in the background, reminiscing iconic scenes and/or making a superficial glimpse of the past with a pair of high school 2000s-style glasses, a sharp lip, sharp nails and a maximalist fur coat.

Not to mention the idolisation of 00’s pop icons like Paris Hilton or Britney Spears, who are once again dominating every campaign in the industry, while 90’s supernovas Linda, Christy, Naomi and Cindy star in September covers of Vogue and a documentary on Apple TV+; leading us to consume large doses of a product that feels like the past in the middle of a nostalgic cycle that hypnotises us, as we scroll and like memes about contemporary traumas or anxieties in an endless loop.