Nicolas Moufarrege

Nicolas Abdallah Moufarrege was born in Alexandria, Egypt to Lebanese parents. He earned BA and MA degrees in chemistry in 1965 and 1968 from the American University of Beirut. In 1968, he moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts on a Fulbright grant and a Harvard University assistantship. He then decided to pursue a career in the arts and returned to Beirut where he held his first solo exhibition at Triad Condas Gallery in 1973. He then relocated to Paris amid civil war and participated in several exhibitions, including Mathaf Gallery, London (1976); Gallery Kamp, Amsterdam (1977); George Zeeny Gallery, Beirut (1979) and Galeries de Varennes/Jacques Damase, Paris (1980). In 1981, Moufarrege moved to New York City and became a central figure in the East Village arts scene. He wrote art criticism for the New York Native, Arts Magazine, Flash Art and Artforum. From 1982 to 1984 he received a studio through the International Studio Program at PS1, the Institute for Art and Urban Resources (now MoMA PS1). He held two studio exhibitions in 1982 and 1983 and had solo shows at Gabrielle Bryers Gallery (1983) and FUN Gallery (1985). He curated the exhibitions Intoxication (1983) and Ecstasy (1984) at Monique Knowlton Gallery in New York. Moufarrege passed away in 1985 from AIDS-related complications. A major exhibition of his work was curated by Dean Daderko at the Queens Museum, New York in 2019.