Exhibitions
Events: Fashion Moda
December 13 1980 – January 8 1981
From December 13, 1980 to January 8, 1981, as part of the tripartite exhibition “Events: Fashion Moda, Taller Boricua, Artists Invite Artists,” the New Museum presented an installation of works curated by artists’ organization Fashion Moda. In keeping with the exhibition format of the Events series, the New Museum reversed standard museum procedure by asking artists’ groups to organize and present their own exhibitions, thereby relinquishing curatorial control over its gallery space and the publication of the accompanying catalogue.
Fashion Moda (1978 - 1993) was a not-for-profit art gallery. Located in a South Bronx storefront, the gallery presented exhibitions involving artists and other professional people, community residents, and children. Its intention was to include art and ideas from cross-cultural sources and make them available to an audience from the widest possible spectrum of educational, economic, and cultural backgrounds.
At the New Museum, Fashion Moda presented a wide range of ideas, and such works as the subway graffiti of Futura, Christy Rupp’s ‘Urban Wildlife,’ and John Fekner’s stenciled slogans. Work by New York City artists Jane Dickson, Keith Haring, Judy Rifka, William Scott, Joe Lewis and John Ahearn were also shown, along with work by Robert Colescott and Louise Stanley of Oakland, CA and pieces by several New Orleans artists which were presented for the first time to a New York audience.