In the 1980s and ’90s, as Asian American identity transformed from a radical vision born of political agitation into a broadly recognized demographic, how did ethnic magazines reflect this new consciousness? Drawn from MOCA’s Museum of Chinese in America (MOCA) Private Danny Chen Collection and Archives, Magazine Fever surveys a surge of Asian American magazine publishing during the multicultural era including A. Magazine, AsiAm, AsianWeek, Audrey, Giant Robot, Hyphen, Jade, KoreAm, Rice, Transpacific, YOLK, and others.

Through magazine publishing, a vital form of mass media in the 1990s, Asian Americans editorialized issues central to their lives and depicted themselves in ways that were unimaginable before. Magazine Fever presents stories of Generation X magazines–how they were founded and sustained; how they captured the essence of multiculturalism and Generation X paradigms, and how they impacted the ways Asian American identity is understood today.

A companion exhibition focuses on three magazines that have emerged recently–4N, Hotam, and te magazine–offering three new directions for magazine making today.