by Miriam Silverberg

This Saturday I went back to the Museum of Modern Art to see their first-ever fashion exhibit, “Is Fashion Modern?” It closes January 28 and I wanted to see it again.  It’s well worth seeing twice or even three times.  It’s very big and really interesting.  Of course, the answer to the question, “Is Fashion Modern?” is a resounding yes.  Why else is everyone so anxious to wear the newest and the trendiest?

But what I found so interesting is so much of what we consider modern is really thousands of years old. In the 19th century bohemians began wearing the beret, prizing it because  it was “authentic” and wasn’t part of the modern urban look.  But archeologists found examples of the beret in their excavations of thousands of years ago.  Today women wear a sari and so they did thousands of years ago.  Do go and see for yourself how interesting it is.

Miriam Silverberg is a freelance journalist and owner of Miriam Silverberg Associates, a boutique publicity agency. She can be reached at silverbergm@mindspring.com.