“Freak out!” the lyrics from Chic’s 1978 song Le Freak blared through the maze of Brooklyn Museum’s newest exhibition, Studio 54: Night Magic. Mouthing the words like they were disco dharma, I bopped from room to room in a contented daze, and yet, I could sense a growing unease. The press preview seemed to be thin in attendance, surely a fraction of the invitation list. The occasional faint cough echoed like an infected ghost through the corridors of the exhibition, inevitably joined by an anxious sneeze, the tightening of a surgical mask, a rolled eye and someone shuffling away. A peculiar contrast, this joyful tribute of liberation and the tense feeling of captivity.

Image Courtesy of © Brooklyn Museum. All rights reserved

Here we were silently gawking at photos and film of perhaps the most flamboyant and garish spectacle of social escapism since the Roaring Twenties. The photographs – taken by famous photographers such as, Rose Hartman, Meryl Meisler, Allan Tannenbaum – were evocative and obviously relevant, and I was being invited to be a voyeur to one of Civilization’s greatest bacchanals, and yet I could not muster the proper empathy. Someone’s sniffle brought me back to an existential crisis not found on these walls.

In an era when events move so fast and every day feels unprecedented, we nevertheless find ourselves in a most extraordinary moment. There has never been a world-wide shut down, and as I’m moving from one photo of exuberance to the next, all happening within the cloistered confines of one nightclub, I am coming to the slow realization that this exhibit is sadly ill-timed. I am not “feeling it.” I feel like I want to go home, quietly sip some tea, and go to bed early.

In the late 70s, a near-bankrupt New York City, following the end of the Vietnam War, and in the midst of the civil rights and women's rights movement, faced a similar sense of unease, restlessness – ushering in a new era of escapism.

Enter Studio 54: a haven for creative expression and a mecca for complete and uninhibited release. In April 1977, notorious NYC club promoters, Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager acquired and transformed an old theater into the discotheque spectacle, now known as Studio 54. In doing so, they altered and elevated the landscape of city nightlife, setting a standard of exclusivity for rockstar decadence. The creators had a vision for both the physical structure and metaphorical space. Using voyeuristic architecture, the space was purposefully designed to enhance the feeling of being seen. Meanwhile, the exclusivity with which the club was presented to the public magnetized the famous, the fabulous, and the beautiful.

The club's extravagant parties became internationally renowned for their impressive set design, theatrical lighting, and A-list guests, including famous artists, actors and writers such as Andy Warhol, Truman Capote, Elizabeth Taylor and Yves St. Laurent. Despite the club’s closing in 1980, it has remained an "icon" of disco since and an apotheosis for glamour, sexual expression, drugs, and celebrity.

Matthew Yokobosky, the exhibition curator who organized David Bowie is, is also responsible for Studio 54: Night Magic, which both tributes and mournes the 33-month heyday of the midtown Manhattan nightclub. "Studio 54 has come to represent the visual height of disco-era America: glamorous people in glamorous fashions, surrounded by gleaming lights and glitter, dancing 'The Hustle' in an opera house," said Matthew Yokobosky.

Studio 54 has been the subject of innumerable exhibitions, books and films; however, the Brooklyn Museum places the nightclub’s influence into a broader context of NYC history, showcasing over 650 objects ranging from fashion, photography, drawings, film, stage sets, and music.

“What we wanted to do here was emphasize the visual dimension, the art, the photography, the fashion, the scenography, that went into the creation of the storied nightclub,” said Matthew Yokobosky.

Installation view, Image Courtesy of © Brooklyn Museum. All rights reserved

As we know, life always comes barreling in, even past the velvet ropes. Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager were eventually jailed for tax evasion forcing the club to close in 1980, as the AIDs epidemic grimly swept through the city. In a parallel universe, the pandemic COVID-19 outbreak is ravaging life-as-we-know-it, closing schools and restaurants, and scoffing in the faces of all the many artists, production workers, and creatives that worked on this exhibition. Studio 54: Night Magic culminates with one press preview rather than the myriad of events planned around this opening, including a five month viewing schedule.

In spite of the undeniable beauty of this curated nightclub fantasy, the knot in my stomach remained. As I waited for some greater truth to be found in the disco – perhaps in a cryptic lyric or morose photograph of some gorgeous celebrity smited from this unjust earth by AIDs – I never quite happened upon it. The relentless beats and optimism of disco drummed on.

Studio 54: Night Magic explains, ad nauseum, that the nightclub was a reaction to a time of intense uncertainty, urging people of all races, sexualties, and backgrounds to come together and have a little fun. Two years ago, when the exhibition was first conceived, it must have seemed so timely. On March 12th, the exhibit issued a press release of its closure due to the COVD-19 crisis. We’re still not sure whether the exhibit will ever be open to the public. The Brooklyn Museum’s Studio 54: Night Magic is a beautifully written, poorly-timed eulogy, perhaps with no deeper message than pointing and cooing at the shiny glitter that settles on the floor.

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