The Big Museums
We know them from tv, movies, even cartoons: they’re the big museums of New York City and often the only formal art institution most visitors see. As a result of this fame and audience, their special exhibitions tend to be large, spectacular, and Instagrammable with short snippets of information placed strategically throughout the rooms – less about study and contemplation of a topic and more about keeping people moving through the rooms. It’s a system that’s worked for years, although it can be frustrating for experienced museum goers who get bored with the same display backgrounds, layouts, and writing styles. However, there’s no doubt that many people enjoy seeing and learning this way, if attendance numbers are anything to go by, so it’s not going to change any time soon. And of course, we’ll still go to these exhibitions, because, well, we don’t want to miss out.
Brooklyn Museum (200 Eastern Parkway, Brooklyn), Virgil Abloh: “Figures of Speech” (July 1, 2022 – January 29, 2023), Jimmy DeSana: Submission (November 11, 2022 – April 16, 2023), Thierry Mugler: Couturissime (November 18, 2022 – May 7, 2023)
Alex Katz, Ada Ada, 1959. Oil on linen, 49 1/2 × 50 in. (125.7 × 127 cm). Grey Art Gallery, New York University Art Collection, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Golden, 1963. © 2022 Alex Katz / Licensed by VAGA at Artist Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Courtesy Alex Katz Studio 
Alex Katz, Crosslight, 2019. Oil on linen, 126 × 96 in. (320 × 243.8 cm). Dallas Museum of Art, TWO x TWO for AIDS and Art Fund. © 2022 Alex Katz / Licensed by VAGA at Artist Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: © Paul Takeuchi 2022 
Alex Katz, 4 PM, 1959. Oil on linen, 57 1/2 × 50 in. (146.1 × 127 cm). Collection of Vincent Katz. © 2022 Alex Katz / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Courtesy the artist and Gladstone Gallery
Guggenheim Museum (88th Street and Fifth Avenue): Alex Katz: Gathering (October 21, 2022 – February 20, 2023), Nick Cave: Forothermore (November 18, 2022 – April 10, 2023)
The Metropolitan Museum of Art (81st Street and Fifth Avenue): Hear Me Now: The Black Potters of Old Edgefield, South Carolina (September 9, 2022 – February 5, 2023), Cubism and the Trompe l’Oeil Tradition (October 20, 2022 – January 22, 2023), Lives of the Gods: Divinity in Maya Art (November 21, 2022 – April 2, 2023), Beyond the Light: Identity and Place in Nineteenth-Century Danish Art (January 26 – April 16, 2023), Kimono Style: The John C. Weber Collection (until February 20, 2023), and Fictions of Emancipation: Carpeaux Recast (until March 5, 2023), Before Yesterday We Could Fly: An Afrofuturist Room (ongoing).
MoMA (53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues), Never Alone: Video Games and Other Interactive Design (September 10, 2022 – June 30, 2023), Just Above Midtown: Changing Spaces (October 9, 2022 – February 18, 2023), Meret Oppenheim: My Exhibition (October 30, 2022 – March 4, 2023), Guillermo del Toro: Crafting Pinocchio (December 11, 2022 – April 16, 2023), Georgia O’Keefe: To See Takes Time (April 9 – August 12, 2023)
MoMA PS 1 (22-25 Jackson Avenue, Queens): Life between Buildings (until January 16, 2023)
“Theaster Gates: A Clay Sermon,” 2021. Exhibition view: Whitechapel Gallery, London. Courtesy the artist and Whitechapel Gallery, London. Photo: Theo Christelis © Theaster Gates, courtesy the artist 
Theaster Gates and The Black Monks performing at Kunstmuseum Basel, Switzerland, 2018. Photo: Chris Strong © Theaster Gates, courtesy the artist 
Theaster Gates, Billy Sings Amazing Grace, 2013 (still). HD video, color, sound; 12:24 min © Theaster Gates, courtesy the artist
New Museum (235 Bowery), Theaster Gates: Young Lords and Their Traces (November 10, 2022 – February 5, 2023)
Edward Hopper, Automat, 1927. Oil on canvas, 28 1/8 × 35 in. (71.4 × 88.9 cm). Des Moines Art Center, Des Moines, Iowa; purchased with funds from the Edmundson Art Foundation, Inc. © 2022 Heirs of Josephine N. Hopper/Licensed by Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photograph by Rich Sanders, Des Moines, Iowa 
Edward Hopper, Early Sunday Morning, 1930. Oil on canvas, 35 3/16 × 60 1/4 in. (89.4 × 153 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase with funds from Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney 31.426. © 2019 Heirs of Josephine N. Hopper / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York 
Katherine Hubbard, Bend the rays more sharply (Photographic print made from a negative embedded in ice at increments of ten degrees between zero and ninety.) from the series Bend the rays more sharply…., No. 3 of 10, 2016. Gelatin silver print: sheet, 16 × 19 7/8 in. (40.6 × 50.5 cm); image, 8 × 10 1/4 in. (20.3 × 26 cm). Edition 4/5. Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase with funds from the Photography Committee 2020.135.3. © Katherine Hubbard 
Edna Andrade, Cool Wave, 1974. Acrylic on canvas, 72 1/8 × 72 1/4 in. (183.2 × 183.5 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; gift of Luther W. Brady 2022.9. © The Estate of Edna Andrade 
Alvin Loving, Rational Irrationalism, 1969. Acrylic on shaped canvas, 82 1/8 × 97 in. (208.6 × 246.4 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase with funds from the Robert C. Scull Fund for Young Artists not in the Collection 69.74a-b. Courtesy the Estate of Al Loving and Garth Greenan Gallery, New York 
Javier Orfón, Bientéveo, 2018-2022. Inkjet print, 97 × 176 in. (246.4 × 447 cm). Collection of the artist; courtesy Hidrante, San Juan
Whitney Museum of American Art (99 Gansevoort Street): Time Management Techniques (September 24, 2022 – January 31, 2023), Edward Hopper’s New York (October 19, 2022 – March 5, 2023), In the Balance: Between Painting and Sculpture, 1965-1985 (October 19, 2022 – March 5, 2023), No Existe Un Mundo Poshuracan: Puerto Rican Art in the Wake of Hurricane Maria (November 23, 2022 – April 23, 2023), Every Ocean Hughes: Alive Side (January 14 – April 2, 2023), Jaune Quick-To-See Smith: Memory Map (April 19 – August 31, 2023), Josh Kline (April 19 – August 31, 2023)
The Smaller Museums
When it comes to the specialty museum, NYC has a diverse selection that satisfies the needs of their niche audience while also welcoming new visitors. These institutions make audience outreach a priority: creating exhibitions that are appealing to a wide group of people, holding fun events for every age group, and friendly museum staff ready to chat about the work on view or even recommend a local restaurant for lunch.
American Folk Art Museum (2 Lincoln Square or 66th Street and Columbus Avenue), Morris Hirshfield Rediscovered (September 23, 2022 – January 29, 2023)
Cooper Hewitt Design Center (91st Street and Fifth Avenue), Mr. Pergolisi’s Curious Things: Ornament in 19th Century Britain (until January 29, 2023), Design and Healing: Creative Responses to Epidemics (until February 20, 2023), Designing Peace (until September 4, 2023), Hector Guimard: How Paris Got Its Curves (until May 21, 2023), Deconstructing Power: W.E.B. Du Bois at the 1900 World’s Fair (until May 29, 2023)
The Frick Collection (75th Street and Madison Avenue): Highlights from the permanent collection on view at the museum’s temporary home on Madison Avenue and 75th Street, while the old location undergoes renovation. If you haven’t seen their holdings before, this current display is a wonderful introduction to one of the best single collector museums in the US. If you have visited the museum in the past, this new display is beautifully done, with pictures grouped by period or artist, allowing visitors to appreciate their favorites in fresh ways. In addition, there will be the temporary shows The Eveillard Gift (October 13, 2022 – February 26, 2023), Olafur Eliasson and Claude Monet (October 20, 2022 – January 22, 2023), The Gregory Gift (February 16 – May 14, 2023) on view throughout the fall and winter season.
International Center of Photography (79 Essex Street), Face to Face: Portraits of Artists by Tacita Dean, Brigitte Lacombe and Catherine Opie and Between Friends: From the ICP Collection (both January 27 – May 1, 2023)
The Jewish Museum (92nd Street and Fifth Avenue): Scenes from the Collection (ongoing), The Sassoons (March 3 – August 13, 2023), After “The Wild”: Contemporary Art from The Barnett and Annalee Newman Foundation Collection (March 24 – October 1, 2023)
Ashley Bryan, F (for Freedom), 199. Ashley Bryan papers, 1823-2019, Ms. Coll. 1439, Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts, University of Pennsylvania. © 2022 The Ashley Bryan Center. Used with Permission. 
Ashley Bryan, Seascape (from Sail Away) 2015, recto, 2021.25:6. The Morgan Library & Museum, Gift of the Ashley Bryan Center, 2021.25:6r. Photography by Janny Chiu, 2021. © 2015 The Ashley Bryan Center. Used with Permission. All Rights Reserved. 
Ashley Bryan, Paula the Cat, 2018. Ashley Bryan papers, 1823-2019, Ms. Coll. 1439, Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts, University of Pennsylvania. © 2022 The Ashley Bryan Center. Used with Permission. All Rights Reserved 
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900 – 1944) The little prince lying on his stomach, New York, 1942. The Morgan Library & Museum, MA 2592.1. Photography by Graham S. Haber. 
Unknown photographer, Portrait of Saint-Exupéry in pilot outfit, Buenos Aires, 1930. Purchased on the Drue Heinz Twentieth-Century Literature Fund, 2021. The Morgan Library & Museum, MA 23778.7. 
Cylinder seal (and modern impression) with mother and child attended by women Mesopotamia, Akkadian, Ur (modern Tell el-Muqayyar), PG 871 Akkadian period (ca. 2334–2154 BC), Carnelian and gold. Courtesy of the Penn Museum. 
Disk of Enheduanna, daughter of Sargon Mesopotamia, Akkadian, Ur (modern Tell el-Muqayyar), gipar Akkadian period, ca. 2300 BC. Courtesy of the Penn Museum. 
Installation views: Georg Baselitz: Six Decades of Drawings, Morgan Stanley East Gallery, Photography by Janny Chiu 2022
Morgan Library and Museum (36th Street and Madison Avenue): Ashley Bryan and Langston Hughes: Sail Away (September 30, 2022 – January 22, 2023), The Little Prince: Taking Flight (October 14, 2022 – February 5, 2023), She Who Wrote: Enheduanna and the Women of Mesopotamia, ca. 3400 – 2000 B.C. (October 14, 2022 – February 19, 2023), George Baselitz: Six Decades of Drawing (October 21, 2022 – February 5, 2023)
National Museum of the American Indian (One Bowling Green, Manhattan), Developing Stories: Native Photographers in the Field (November 3, 2022 – March 12, 2023), Jeffrey Veregge: Of Gods and Heroes (until December 31, 2022)
Museum of Arts and Design (2 Columbus Circle), Queer Maximalism x Machine Dazzle (September 10, 2022 – February 19, 2023), Jewelry Stories (until April 16, 2023)
Museum of Chinese in America (215 Centre Street): With a Single Step: Stories in the Making of America (now through December 31, 2023)
Speaking Up For America: featuring Judy Garland poster, 1946. American Jewish Committee 
Bernard Seaman for AJC and National Labor Service, “Spring Cleaning’ cartoon, 1947. American Jewish Committee 
Kwame Brathwaite, Self-Portrait, African Jazz-Art Society & Studios (AJASS), Harlem, ca. 1964. Courtesy the artist and Philip Martin Gallery, Los Angeles. 
Kwame Brathwaite, Marcus Garvey Day Parade, Harlem, ca. 1967. Courtesy the artist and Philip Martin Gallery, Los Angeles. 
Kwame Brathwaite, Photo shoot at a public school for one of the AJASS associated modelling groups that emulated the Grandassa Models and embraced natural hairstyles. Harlem ca. 1966. Courtesy the artist and Philip Martin Gallery, Los Angeles. 
Carnegie Deli, New York, NY, 2008. Photo by Ei Katsumata/Alamy Stock Photo 
Snack at Manny’s Delicatessen, Chicago, IL, 2010. Image Professionals GmbH/Alamy Stock Photo
New-York Historical Society (77th Street and Central Park West), Black Is Beautiful: The Photography of Kwame Brathwaite (August 19, 2022 – January 15, 2023), The Salem Witch Trials: Reckoning and Reclaiming (October 7, 2022 – January 22, 2023), ‘I’ll Have What She’s Having’: The Jewish Deli (November 11, 2022 – April 2, 2023), Holiday Express: Toys and Trains from the Jerni Collection (November 18, 2022 – February 26, 2023)
Poster House (23rd Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues), Masked Vigilantes on Silent Motorbikes (September 9, 2022 – February 12, 2023), Air India’s Maharaja: Advertising Gone Rogue (September 9, 2022 – February 12, 2023), With My Little Eye: Warnings For The Homefront (October 20, 2022 – April 16, 2023), Schoolgirls at War: French Propaganda Posters from World War I (October 20, 2022 – April 16, 2023), Made in Japan: 20th Century Poster Art & Design (March 2 – September 10, 2023), Black Power to Black People: Branding the Black Panther Party (March 2 – September 10, 2023)
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