Activist History: Community, Surveillance, Biking
MoRUS is close partners with Times Up! environmental organization. Founded in 1987, the group pushed cars out of public parks and pressured the city to make biking safer, among other major campaigns. The museum showcases their history through photos and videos, along with exhibits on government surveillance and the ongoing struggle for Charas Community Center.
According to the NYC Landmarks Commission report, the LES is a historic district synonymous with the American immigrant experience and has served as a nationally-recognized cultural center for more than a century and a half. The blocks within the East Village contain a dense layering of historic and cultural significance — from its early history as a fashionable residential neighborhood, to its subsequent identities as the tenement districts and, during its more recent evolution, into the East Village of Bohemians and punks, Off-Broadway theaters and community activist groups. MoRUS is the only museum in the city focused on the radical social movements that created activist community culture, which remains alive today and attracts many to the neighborhood — but is slowly being eroded by gentrification.
