Koda, Harold 1950–

(Harold Jyun Koda)

PERSONAL: Born January 3, 1950, in Honolulu, HI; son of Roy Masaichi and Lillian (Yasue) Koda. Education: University of Hawaii, B.A and B.F.A., 1972; Harvard University, M.L.A., 2000.

ADDRESSES: Office—Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1000 5th Ave., New York, NY 10028-0198.

CAREER: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY, intern, then exhibit assistant, c. 1973–79; Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, NY, associate curator, 1979–82, curator of costume collection, 1982–90, director, 1990–92; Metropolitan Museum of Art, associate curator, 1992–97, curator-in-charge of Costume Institute, 2000–.

MEMBER: Costume Society of America (member of board of directors, 1990).

AWARDS, HONORS: Distinguished Achievement Award, Council of Fashion Designers of America, 1987, 1996.

WRITINGS:

FASHION EXHIBIT CATALOGS

(With Richard Martin) Jocks and Nerds: Men's Style in the Twentieth Century, Rizzoli (New York, NY), 1989.

(With Richard Martin) The Historical Mode: Fashion and Art in the 1980s, Rizzoli (New York, NY), 1989.

(With Richard Martin) Splash!: A History of Swimwear, Rizzoli (New York, NY), 1990.

(With Richard Martin) Giorgio Armani: Images of Man, Rizzoli (New York, NY), 1990.

(With Richard Martin) Flair: Fashion Collected by Tina Chow, Rizzoli (New York, NY), 1992.

(With Richard Martin) Diana Vreeland: Immoderate Style, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY), 1993.

(With Richard Martin) Infra-Apparel, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY), 1993.

(With Richard Martin) Orientalism: Visions of the East in Western Dress, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY), 1994.

(With Richard Martin) Madame Grès, photographs by Marcia Lippman, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY), 1994.

(With Richard Martin) Waist Not: The Migration of the Waist, 1800–1960, illustrated by Ruben Toledo, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY), 1994.

(With Richard Martin) Swords into Ploughshares, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY), 1995.

(With Richard Martin) Haute Couture, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY), 1995.

(With Richard Martin) Bloom, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY), 1995.

(With Richard Martin) Christian Dior, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY), 1996.

(With Richard Martin) Bare Witness, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY), 1996.

Extreme Beauty: The Body Transformed, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY), 2001.

Goddess: The Classical Mode, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY)/Yale University Press (New Haven, CT), 2003.

(Editor, with Andrew Bolton) Chanel, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY), 2005.

SIDELIGHTS: Museum curator Harold Koda specializes in the history of clothing fashions and their current trends. While working at New York City's Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) and, more recently, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute, Koda has organized numerous exhibits, often in collaboration with Richard Martin, to highlight the artistry of haute couture. Born in Hawaii, Koda was inspired by entertainer Bette Midler, who came from Aiea, Hawaii, where Koda had lived, and whose appearance on a television talk show dressed in an outrageous vintage costume suggested to Koda that he was right to aim for a career in New York. After graduating from the University of Hawaii, he gained an internship at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Met), working under Diana Vreeland. He went on to serve as curator at FIT and then went back to the Met to work with Martin. In 1997, however, Koda grew weary of the field and tried to take a different course in his career. He earned a degree in landscape architecture at Harvard University before realizing that he missed the fashion world and all its colorful personalities. He returned to head the Met's Costume Institute in 2000 after Martin died, continuing his colleague's work to consider the artistic value of fashion.

Koda's numerous books on fashion, most done with Martin, have been released to coincide with fashion exhibitions. For example, Extreme Beauty: The Body Transformed was published to accompany an exhibit about "the role of fashion in manipulating the body to fit physical ideals," as one Publishers Weekly contributor related. Other exhibits and books focus on the work of a particular designer, such as Coco Chanel in Koda's Chanel, written with Andrew Bolton. Although Booklist contributor Barbara Jacobs felt the catalog fails to capture "the spirit of Chanel," Sandra Rothenberg, in a review for Library Journal, called it a "stunning book." According to Atlantic Monthly critic Benjamin Schwarz, Chanel includes discussion of both the designer and her work, whereas other books about her have only focused on biographical information. Thus Schwarz concluded that Koda and Bolton "nicely explain Chanel's innovations, clearly define the essential quality of her designs, and concretely convey the workings of cut and construction."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Atlantic Monthly, July-August, 2005, Benjamin Schwarz, review of Chanel, p. 126.

Booklist, July, 2005, Barbara Jacobs, review of Chanel, p. 1888.

Library Journal, February 15, 2001, Therese Duzinkiewcz Baker, review of Giorgio Armani: Images of Man, p. 162; March 1, 2002, Margarete Gross, review of Extreme Beauty: The Body Transformed, p. 96; October 1, 2003, Sandra Rothenberg, review of Goddess: The Classical Mode, p. 71; July 1, 2005, Sandra Rothenberg, review of Chanel, p. 76.

Publishers Weekly, August 17, 1990, Penny Kaganoff, review of Splash!: A History of Swimwear, p. 63; December 24, 2001, review of Extreme Beauty, p. 58.

Women's Wear Daily, June 14, 2000, "Met to Name Koda Curator of Costumes," p. 2; August 18, 2000, Bridget Foley, "Clothes Minded," summary of Koda's career at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, p. 4; December 3, 2001, "Koda Moment," review of exhibit at the Costume Institute, p. 16.