Museum Photo Exhibit To Highlight NYC's Muslim Community

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — A photography exhibit opening this weekend at the Museum of the City of New York will highlight the city's Muslim community and its contributions to New York City since the 17th century. The exhibit will dive into themes such as diversity, money, density and creativity, all explored by the museum's permanent flagship exhibit "New York at Its Core."

"Muslim in New York: Highlights From the Photography Collection" will open Saturday, Feb. 18 at the museum located on East 103rd Street and 5th Avenue on the borders of the Upper East Side and East Harlem. The exhibit will feature 34 historic images of Muslim New Yorkers in the 20th and 21st centuries by photographers such as Alexander Alland, Ed Grazda, Mel Rosenthal, and Robert Gerhardt, according to a press release.

The museum has decided to highlight New York's Muslim community due to the increased scrutiny the United States' Muslim community is facing following the election of President Donald Trump, who campaigned on anti-Muslim rhetoric and has implemented that rhetoric into his early policies.

The recent Trump executive order banning travel from seven majority-Muslim countries was noted as an inspiration for the exhibit.

"This special installation comes at a time when the place of immigrants from Muslim-majority countries is being scrutinized, and even challenged, on a national level," Whitney Donhauser, the Museum’s Ronay Menschel Director, said in a statement. "The Museum’s rich photography collection, begun in the 1930s and growing each year, speaks eloquently to the enormous diversity of our city and the many ways in which immigration and religious diversity has enriched and benefited New York, the quintessential city of immigrants. We are proud to display these beautiful images of Muslims in New York as part of that story."

New York City's Muslim community first arrived in the city during the 17th and 18th centuries during the slave trade and by the late 19th century Muslim communities began to grow in Harlem, Brooklyn and Lower Manhattan, according to the museum. By 2015 an estimated 3 percent of New York City's population identified as Muslim, according to a press release.

Photo courtesy of Ed Grazda/Museum of the City of New York