The Mercer Street Store

Before Stefan Eins opened Fashion Moda — the legendary South Bronx gallery that bridged street culture and the art world — he ran The Mercer Street Store in the late 1970s, occupying a street-level storefront in what was then an emerging SoHo. Rents in the neighborhood were a fraction of what galleries charged on 57th Street and the Upper East Side, making it possible for spaces like this to exist.

The Mercer Street Store operated on a strict aesthetic manifesto: “low-cost art, no painting, no sculpture, only found objects, performance and collage.” That credo embodied the bohemian ideals of the downtown scene perfectly. Eins went on to become a key figure in introducing graffiti to the mainstream art world — the Mercer Street Store was the beginning of that trajectory.

Ephemera from The Mercer Street Store surfaces occasionally on Gallery 98.

Location: 3 Mercer Street