Red Grooms, Mimi Gross, and The Ruckus Construction Co.: Excerpts from “Ruckus Manhattan”

For the first time in more than 30 years—and on the city’s 400th birthday—experience a fantastical and hilarious tribute to New York. Ruckus Manhattan opened at Marlborough Gallery in 1976 as a sprawling, 6,400-square-foot “sculptural comic book” of urban life. Created by artists Red Grooms and Mimi Gross with their collaborators in The Ruckus Construction Co., the vibrant installation satirized the city with a dynamic mix of painting, sculpture, performance, and puppetry. From a high-heeled Statue of Liberty to a Financial District in flames, Ruckus Manhattan’s visual metaphors captured the chaos, corruption, sexuality, and creativity of 1970s NYC.

A standout sculptural element of the original work, Dame of the Narrows now returns to public view for the first time since 1994. Featuring a playfully exaggerated version of the Staten Island Ferry set against a whimsical backdrop of Lower Manhattan, the piece was given to the Brooklyn Museum in 1977. Joining it in this exhibition is an audacious component of Ruckus Manhattan called 42nd Street Porno Bookstore. Witness this fresh, funny, and deeply New York celebration of a city that so many love to hate—and to claim as their own.

Red Grooms, Mimi Gross, and The Ruckus Construction Co.: Excerpts from “Ruckus Manhattan” is organized by Kimberli Gant, Curator, Modern and Contemporary Art, with Indira A. Abiskaroon, Curatorial Assistant, Modern and Contemporary, Brooklyn Museum.