ABSTRACT
The recovery from the economic recession and fi scal crisis predicated a change in the behavior, values, and goals of the underground bohemians. In the service of capital, their aesthetic became fashion, their way of life a marketable lifestyle, their neighborhood a gentrifi ed bohemian carnival. In the process, some achieved acclaim and fi nancial success, while others struggled with drugs, AIDS, and the imperatives of the New Economy. By the 1990s, only a vestige of the underground scene remained on the Lower East Side (see Figure 6.1 ).
