MOCA DC, the talked-about Georgetown gallery that you've never been to
Most of the foot traffic to Canal Square, a quiet, small courtyard off of M Street, is accidental. The businesses there, mainly art galleries, remain out of sight from most shoppers, except for those who patronize the nearby Sea Catch restaurant—and a gallery without a reliable clientele probably will not survive the high-end rents that these tiny storefront can fetch. That is, unless you can draw a crowd some other way. That's exactly the strategy of David Quammen, the 70-year-old owner of MOCA DC. Quammen says he wants to turn his gallery into a destination. But if he succeeds, it won't be the kind of destination that typical Georgetown shoppers will add to their maps.
Over the past five and a half years, Quammen has transformed his gallery into what he calls a celebration of the figure. Figures, meaning those which are unclothed and unrestrained. Bare chests, painted renditions of intimacy, and until recently, a painting depicting a vagina are all visible through the expansive front windows of his gallery, and there is even racier art in back. But for extra exposure and profit, Quammen hosts regular erotic-themed parties. Each November, for example, he throws a reception for "Heads or Tails," an annual exhibit in which he invites portraits and "tasteful backsides." ("I couldn't really stomach having just heads all over the gallery," he explained). This upcoming Friday, MOCA DC will host the "Artists and Models Ball" in the style of parties held by 20th century Parisian artists. For $25, photographers can shoot the nude models who will be sitting throughout the gallery. Artists can paint for $20.
It's a gallery "open to all artists, all the time," with a particular draw for artists without other galleries in which to show figure art. It's not all focused on the figure—and Quammen has donated gallery space to everyone from high schoolers to AU students to Indian students' photography. But without question, it's a gallery that makes itself into a rowdy party scene at least once a month.
Recently, it looked as though it was also a gallery that was no longer welcome in Georgetown. In early July, Amanda Hess reported that Quammen's landlord was forcing him out after a burlesque competition heralding the opening of his latest exhibit, Erotica 2010, caused a stir among the gallery's neighbors. During the course of the evening, a competitor left the back of the gallery, where over one hundred people were already making "a deafening roar," wearing only pasties from the waist up. Despite a letter of apology to R B Properties, by the end of June, it looked as though MOCA DC—and Quammen, who lives in the gallery—would be vacating its Georgetown location. This month, though, through some concessions, it was decided that Quammen and MOCA DC could stay.
Quammen has cleaned up the front of the gallery, literally—he moved some of the clutter that distinguished it from the pristine surrounding galleries to the back room—and metaphorically—he brought some of his more risqué art to the back room.
But despite this, his gallery isn't going to resemble its neighbors anytime soon. And Quammen doesn't mind that he doesn't fit in with the rest of Georgetown. He wound up in Canal Square only by chance through his a word-of-mouth search for a home for The Figure Models Guild, a group that he started for the training and recommendation of figure models to legitimate artists. He isn't looking to be a Georgetown destination but a destination for artists and his audience, period. His name is known in certain corners of the art community and The Figure Models Guild is known nationally. As early as 2004, he was called upon through the guild to recommend a Rubenesque model for National Geographic. (A photograph of her side and legs ended up on the cover of the magazine with the headline, "The Heavy Cost of Fat"; she was incensed).
"We're the pig of the bunch," he said, in a phrase he has used to describe MOCA DC to others before. He's not apologizing.
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