An exhibition dedicated to early 00s pop culture is coming

I don’t know about you, but I haven’t had any human emotions since circa 2007. They were better times – The O.C. and The Simple Life were (for a bit) still on TV, socialites were relentlessly getting arrested for DUIs, and emo was still good. Paparazzis still had work. The internet was there, untarnished; Myspace was king, and celebrities weren’t yet too aware of its impact to post highly personal blogs. Despite the 00s only being eight years ago, we miss them enough to be wearing Juicy Couture tracksuits and Von Dutch hats in the year of our lord 2017. The 00s are back, not only because everyone who came of age then is a baby desperate for the past, but because they were the last time we had any new culture that wasn’t entirely recycled from decades past.

If you too are desperately nostalgic and feel like you could probably do with growing up, actually, now you’re an adult – don’t bother. @popculturediedin2009 has teamed up with The Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan 1994 Museum to bring us Nicole Richie’s Memorial Day BBQ, an exhibition dedicated entirely to the decade that made ankle bracelets fashionable. The exhibit will be told through the lens of the infamous Memorial Day BBQ that started with an invite claiming “there will be a scale at the front door. No girls over 100 pounds will be let in” and ended in Mischa Barton’s hospitalisation. The exhibit will feature art on the era by Laura Collins, Tiny Stitchers (Ashley Chávez and Caroline Cristal), Lila Freeman, and many more. PCD2009 runs a blog, Twitter and Instagram dedicated to the era and has an encyclopaedic knowledge of all things noughties, so it’s bound to be a blowout – if not one which ends in a rehab visit.

The Facebook event, while less scandalous than the leaked email that inspired it, states: “right now, someone somewhere is looking at an exhibit featuring photos of rock stars in their heyday. Good for them! We feel it’s time to celebrate the icons of the aughts we all know and love as the rockstars they are. Sure not all of them ‘played music’, but their music was the sound of a faceplant while exiting a Range Rover, a catchphrase created organically on a reality show, the beeping of a court enforced alcohol monitoring bracelet, the mixing of antibiotics with things you shouldn’t mix antibiotics with. The list goes on, do you hear the music now?”

The event will run from July 29 to September 10 at THNK1994.