Bad Painting emerged in the United States at the end of the 1970s and flourished in the 1980s. The “Bad boys” of painting are Jean-Michel Basquiat, Neil Jenney, Kenny Scharf, Julian Schnabel, Malcolm Morley, David Salle, Jonathan Borofsky and Donald Sultan. They glory in the bad taste of their work, draw inspiration from fringe and popular culture, introduce various materials into their paintings, and play on excessively thick layers and clashing colours. This reversion to expressionism in painting staked out its territory in opposition to the period’s established codes of austere minimalism and conceptual art.