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February 16, 2023February 16, 2023

New Year, New York, New Museums

I’ve not been keeping nearly as up-to-date on the New York museum landscape as I would like to — life and job have had a funny way of getting in the way of this project.

However, as we dive headlong into whatever new madness 2023 will bring, I’m happy to say that the museum outlook in New York City is very bright. By my count there are currently 180 museums open in New York as of February. By comparison, I had 197 museums in my database pre-pandemic. Early 2021 saw just 105 museums open; in April of 2022 the number was up to 160.

At this point only ten museums remain closed for pandemic-related reasons. It’s doubtful that those, including China Institute, the Children’s Museum of the Arts, and the Onassis Cultural Center, will come back.

Another five: The Frick Collection, the Studio Museum in Harlem, Wyckoff House, Lefferts Historic House, and the Center for Brooklyn History (formerly known as the Brooklyn Historical Society), are closed for renovations and should reopen.

Jackie Robinson Museum

Most hopeful of all are the brand-new museums opening up around New York. My current tally of 180 museums includes three that are new in the past few months: the Jackie Robinson Museum in Tribeca (above, review coming soon), the Bronx Children’s Museum (leaving Queens the only borough without a children’s museum), and the Museum of Broadway near Times Square (below).

Shapes of Museums to Come

Museum of Broadway

Based on a City Realty article and some research of my own, a number of other interesting institutions plan to open in the next couple of years, among them the Italian American Museum, the Universal Hip Hop Museum, and the Urban Civil Rights Museum. And there are a number of significant expansions and remodels going on, including most notably the biomorphic new wing at the American Museum of Natural History and a renovation at the New-York Historical Society.

The new AMNH wing, called the Gilder Center, will open this week, and I look forward to visiting it in person. In my review I called Natural History a museum of museums, since its halls contain some exhibits that seem untouched since the place opened, and others at the cutting edge of museum design (whatever that meant the year they opened). I expect the new building, which looks much more Flintstones than Jetsons (see this Untapped Cities article for more), is going to feel very 2020s to people who view it 50 years from now.

Gilder Center, American Museum of Natural History

It’s taken a while, but I’m excited by the renaissance of the New York museum scene. It’s hard to believe I’ve been keeping an eye on it since 2017. Hopefully this will finally be the year when I’ll be able to say that I’ve been to all the museums in New York City. At least until the next new one opens its doors.

April 24, 2022April 3, 2023

New York Museum Update – April 2022

One year ago I took a look at the state of museums in mid-pandemic New York. At that point, 106 of the museums I track in my database were open in some capacity. Now I’m back (it’s been a while) with a look at New York museums post-pandemic (hopefully).

One year later, the situation pandemic-wise and museum-wise has improved significantly: As of April 2022, 160 museums are open in New York City. That’s 80% of the museums I’m currently tracking.

Museums open pie chart

The Bad News

Twenty-four New York museums post-pandemic remain closed due to COVID. They’ve still got websites and sound like they’ll reopen, eventually. This list includes major national historic sites like Hamilton Grange and The General Grant National Memorial (aka Grant’s Tomb), which presumably will come back. But it’s starting to seem unlikely that smaller institutions that closed due to COVID and haven’t reopened will return.

Another ten museums are currently closed for non-pandemic reasons — construction, between exhibitions, etc.

Three museums have permanently shut down: New York School of Interior Design Gallery; Newhouse Center of Contemporary Art; and New York City Police Museum all seem defunct. Based on my reviews, losing them is not exactly a huge blow to the cultural fabric of the City. However, I did like the Snug Harbor building that housed the Newhouse Center. Hopefully they’ll find a new use for the space.

The Good News

On the other hand, three museums closed since before the pandemic have re-opened. The Hispanic Society (review pending) is back, albeit in a tiny part of its still-under-renovation space. I finally made it to a show at the American Academy of Arts and Letters (review also pending). And the Museum of Food and Drink has moved to the Africa Center in Manhattan. I’m excited to see its new space.

I’ve updated my museum database, showing which museums are open as of April 2022.

As always in these complicated times, do not take my word for whether a museum is open or not. Please check before you go. While many places have relaxed requirements around buying tickets in advance, museum opening hours and the requirements for masks or proof of vaccination remain highly variable.

April 11, 2021April 24, 2022

NY Museum Update – April 2021

It has been a while. But as things start to look (cautiously) up again, it feels like a good moment to end my Museum Project’s long hiatus, assess where things are, and hopefully point toward an optimistic future for museums.

To start, I took a quantitative look at where the New York museum world stands as of thirteen months after everything hastily shut down.

The news isn’t great, but it could definitely be worse.

The Numbers, April 2021

106 museums, or 53.5% of all the museums in New York, are currently open.
7 museums are temporarily closed, generally not COVID-related.
- Several are closed due to building renovations or new construction (for example, the Frick Collection and the Studio Museum in Harlem).
- Others are pending new installations or seasonal openings (for example the Aperture Foundation and Bronx River Art Center).
2 museums are closed and seeking new spaces. I’m treating these as “permanently closed” though hopefully they’ll be back.
- The Museum of American Finance and the Museum of Food and Drink are both currently without a home.
1 museum has permanently closed for non-COVID reasons: The Metropolitan Museum of Art has ended its Met:Breuer experiment.
However the Met’s loss is the Frick’s gain, as the Frick Madison counts as a new (albeit temporary) museum.
1 museum, Art in General, has permanently closed due to COVID.
That leaves 81 museums, or 40.9%, closed due to the pandemic but, at least theoretically, planning to open again as things improve.
One museum, the Brooklyn Historical Society, has reorganized, merging with the Brooklyn Public Library to become the Center for Brooklyn History. I’ll be curious to see what it’s like when it reopens.

For those who like pie charts, here’s what the numbers look like:

Pie chart depicting New York museums

Even museums that are open are very different experiences than they were a year ago. The vast majority of New York institutions today require advance reservations or ticket purchases, usually for specific entry times. It’s a challenging moment to just drop into a museum on a whim. Very definitely visit a museum’s website or social media before you attempt to visit the place itself. Still, it’s nice that even some smaller, quirkier gems (welcome back, City Reliquary and Nicholas Roerich Museum) have survived. And we will hopefully see more spaces reopen their doors in the coming weeks and months.

To view a list of all the open museums, visit my database page.

May 7, 2018May 8, 2018

The Museum Emoji Guessing Game

An offhand remark I made in my review of the The Statue of Liberty Museum got me thinking about emoji and museums and museum emoji. I have mixed feelings about emoji, especially as the character set nears hanzi/kanji numbers. They’re complex, and just as open to misinterpretation as any form of communication. Sometimes an eggplant is just an eggplant. On the other hand, adding a visual component to dry text communication can enrich it. And they’re fun.

Anyway, I started pondering what some of my favorite New York City museums would be called in emoji. And I decided, why not make a game of it? Here’s some museums rendered emojically. Most are pretty famous, though a couple are obscure.

See how many you can decode! 🤔🏆 Continue reading “The Museum Emoji Guessing Game”

March 8, 2018May 1, 2018

Nine Future New York Museums

Thinking about “future New York Museums” could inspire a ruminative, speculative essay on how the museum business will evolve over the next decade. I certainly have some thoughts about that, given my intense museum-going over the past year.

However, I’ll save those thoughts for later. (My essay on museums and Instagram offers a taste.)

More prosaically, as I near the end of my museum checklist, I have started to wonder about specific, new museums with plans to open somewhere in the city.

It’s difficult to track “coming attractions.” However, the American Alliance of Museums, the body that accredits institutions for excellence, offers a good place to start. Several future New York museums are already members there. And that, combined with recent news coverage (and a few links from friends), leads to the following list. It probably isn’t comprehensive, but here are 9 — make that ten– future New York museums. Continue reading “Nine Future New York Museums”

February 26, 2018February 26, 2018

New York Museums of Excellence

Museum Buttons When I first compiled my list of New York museums, one of my sources was the American Alliance of Museums (AAM). Trade associations, I love ‘em. The Alliance accredits worthy institutions. However, its website describes an AAM Continuum of Excellence rather than a black-and-white, accredited-or-not dialectic.

Indeed, the AAM offers a variety of options for museums short of full accreditation. The simplest simply being signing a Pledge of, well, Excellence. AAM maintains a list of museums that have signed the Pledge and/or proceeded further along its Continuum, up to and including full accreditation. Continue reading “New York Museums of Excellence”

February 16, 2018March 9, 2019

New York Museums of African-American History and Culture

Lawdy Mama, 1969, Studio Museum in Harlem — Barkley L. Hendricks, “Lawdy Mama,” 1969, Studio Museum in Harlem

For anyone seeking ways to celebrate Black History Month besides seeing “Black Panther,” I’ve compiled a list of New York City’s African-American museums. As an aside, I’m not sure seeing “Black Panther” actually counts, but I went today and it was awesome.

Of course, many of the city’s general arts and cultural institutions feature African-Americans as part of their permanent collections and in temporary exhibitions. For example you could pay homage to the Obamas, Beyoncé, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr., and others at Madame Tussaud’s. Or visit Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx for its tour visiting Duke Ellington and other great African-American “residents.”

New York has nine museums devoted to African-American culture, art, and history. I reckon that seven are well worth a visit, whatever month you happen to read this.

I’ve also included an addendum of two non-African-American places and a “maybe.” These are less appropriate but may still merit visits to ponder black history.

Louis Armstrong House Museum, Corona, Queens — Louis and Lucille Armstrong’s Home in Queens

I Recommend

African Burial Ground National Monument, Lower Manhattan. A solemn and dignified memorial to the pre-Revolutionary War black experience in New York City.

Lewis Latimer House, Flushing, Queens — A tribute to a largely forgotten African-American inventor, musician, poet, and general Renaissance guy, who worked with Edison perfecting the light bulb and became an important executive at GE.

Louis Armstrong House Museum, Corona, Queens. One of the city’s best house museums and a tribute to a truly singular, titanic genius of music history, and the modest life he and his wife led in Queens.

Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Harlem. An essential resource for black history, literature, and the arts. Leverages the New York Public Library’s supreme skill at curating shows that use primary documents to bring history to life.

Studio Museum in Harlem, Harlem. A fantastic collection and great space make this a must-visit institution for African-American art in New York City.

Weeksville Heritage Center, Bed-Stuy/Crown Heights, Brooklyn. Historic houses and a sleek, modern visitor’s center commemorate Weeksville, an African American community started in the 1830s.

Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture — From Black Power!, Exhibition at the Schomburg Center, March, 2017

I Don’t Recommend

National Jazz Museum, Harlem. An institution with grand ambitions hampered by limitations of space and capability. Jazz may just not work well in the confines of a museum.

The Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts (MoCADA), in Downtown Brooklyn, has a great name, but a small space that doesn’t suit its mission statement or its ambitions. So I can’t recommend it.

Sandy Ground Historical Society, Staten Island. Sandy Ground was an early African-American community. I tried, unsuccessfully, to visit this place this week. It’s a huge trek to get somewhere not reliably open during its ostensible open hours. Check out Weeksville in Brooklyn instead. Sandy Ground’s website is here.

Addendum: One “Maybe,” Two “Others”

Fraunces Tavern Museum, Lower Manhattan. This is my “maybe.” Some reckon that Samuel Fraunces, saloonkeeper, spy, and aide to Washington, was black. Mainly because his nickname was “Black Sam.” However, there’s little solid evidence for this claimed racial background, and most historians seriously doubt it. Still, ‘maybe.’

General Grant National Memorial, Morningside Heights, Manhattan. Obviously Ulysses S. Grant wasn’t an African-American, but in an era when some parts of this country still can’t seem to get rid of Confederate monuments, why not visit one of New York’s greatest monuments to the victors in the Civil War?

King Manor Museum, Jamaica, Queens. Rufus King was not an African-American either, but he was an early, persistent voice against the compromises that the framers of the Constitution made allowing slavery in the infant United States. His historic home today serves as a monument to an early abolitionist.

Bonus Museum

Okay, I’ve got one more, but it’s not a physical place. I feel compelled to add the Museum of UnCut Funk, a virtual institution that co-presented the Finance Museum’s great exhibit on blacks on U.S. currency. As surely the funkiest museum in the world, I highly recommend visiting it online, even if it’s not technically in New York.

January 7, 2018

A Museum Year in Review

Happy New Year

I’m getting a bit of a late start in 2018. I blame the insanely cold East Coast weather. Still, here’s an obligatory year-in-review post to wrap my adventures in 2017.

Since starting this expedition last March, I’ve reviewed 144 museums. Overall averages continue to be right around, well the average. Across all the museums I’ve visited, the average education score was 3.06, entertainment 3.09, and “should you go?” rating 3.22 (on a scale from 1 to 5).

My average time spent per museum works out to about 1 hour and 3 minutes, for a cumulative total of 6 days and 6 hours and 58 minutes spent at museums I’ve reviewed this past year.

Cumulatively I’ve spent $364 on museum admissions for my 2016 reviews, or an average admission price of $2.53. I’m sure that will increase as I’ve saved some high-cost museums for the latter part of the project.

By Borough

Borough	Museums Visited	Percent of Total	Average Edification	Average Entertain-ment	Go?
Brooklyn	14	61%	2.71	3.21	3.21
Bronx	15	100%	3.33	3.20	3.33
Manhattan	89	77%	3.14	3.02	3.26
Queens	19	82%	2.84	3.32	3.00
Staten Island	8	67%	2.88	2.88	3.13

At this point, Bronx museums slightly outscore those of the other boroughs. I’m surprised by that, but then again, the Bronx today quietly punches above its weight in many ways.

Wave Hill, Bronx, New York — Fall foliage at Wave Hill, a standout among the Bronx’s surprisingly great museums

Points for Randomness

While I could focus on the greatest hits, I think it’s more fun to review the things that were most unexpected — the places I never would’ve gone except my list made me, which surprised me the most.

Truth be told, the randomest museum I’ve been to this year is one I didn’t review. While in Idaho for August’s total solar eclipse, I made a detour to the Idaho Potato Museum. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that such a place exists, giant fiberglas spud and all. But I was a little surprised that I actually liked it. I’d give it a 3 for edification, a 4 for entertainment, and a 3 for “should you go?” Assuming you ever find yourself in Blackfoot.

Idaho Potato Museum, Blackfoot, Idaho — We’re not in Gotham anymore…

Of the museums I’ve reviewed, I would say my top five for peak randomness would be:

The Jacques Marchais Museum of Tibetan Art
The Nicholas Roerich Museum
The Hall of Fame for Great Americans
The Mossman Lock Collection
Walter De Maria’s New York Earth Room

I highly recommend visiting four of them.

What is a Museum, Anyway?

During 2017, I’ve had ample time to consider the concept of “museum.” I took a liberal definition of museum when I created my list. I continue to believe historic houses are indisputably museums. However, I don’t think it’s fair to judge botanical gardens by the same yardsticks as museums. And yet, I do think the historic cemeteries merit consideration as museums.

I had a conversation with my younger sister about the definition of museums, and how my thinking has evolved with the experience of visiting them all, big and small, mainstream and quirky. We kicked around various notions, starting from my initial idea that museums should both educate and entertain. I offered the idea that maybe they should “amuse” you.

From there I suggested that maybe they should be judged as places that cause you to muse on things.

And that in turn got us thinking (thanks, liberal arts education) about the Muses, the nine Greek divinities in charge of the arts. People talk about the Muses in the sense of having one, or of the Muse being upon them when they have a burst of creativity.

So perhaps museums shouldn’t just educate and entertain or amuse or make you think. Additionally, they should inspire. Something about that feels very right to me. I think of the people I’ve seen sketching at the Met, or those taking the Grolier Club’s life drawing and drinking class. Or myself, walking through say the Van Cortlandt House dutifully taking notes and seeking inspiration to frame a story about the place.

I briefly considered whether I should retroactively rate the places I’ve visited in terms of their inspiration levels. Fortunately, I have realized that even though it wasn’t an explicit criterion, inspiration correlates very strongly with how much I recommend visiting a museum.

The Shape of Museums to Come

It’s hard to believe I fewer then 50 museums to go in my Pokemon-esque effort to catch ‘em all. Barring something unforeseen, I should finish my last review just about a year from starting the project. I’ve deliberately left some of the biggest and most famous museums for late in this project — I have yet to write about MoMA or the American Museum of Natural History, and I’m looking forward to the challenge of those.

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York — The Met: Still To Come

If there’s one category of museum I’ve not done justice to thus far, it’s children’s museums. I worry that I’ll seem a little creepy if I go to a children’s museum sans kid. And additionally I want a young person’s perspective to inform my own reactions to how well the childrens’ museums fulfill their mandates. So I will have to borrow or rent some kids in the next few weeks to rectify that.

Anyway, happy new year, thanks for reading, and here’s to another two score and five museum reviews before I’m done.

December 31, 2017

Museums in the Age of Instagram

When I started this project I decided I’d rate museums based on standards of edification and entertainment. That is, how much I felt educated or improved by a place, and how fun the place was. I then added a third rating based on how much I think people should visit (or not).

But in our modern social, digital age, I’ve arguably missed a vital yardstick in the assessment of museum quality: how share-able an institution makes the experience.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Joe Laszlo (@gothamjoe)

Continue reading “Museums in the Age of Instagram”

August 15, 2017

100 New York City Museums: Milestone Post

So. 100 New York City museums in the past 160 days. Hitting the century mark is extremely satisfying. Places keep surprising me, and largely for the better. I’m not doing so well as I hoped in terms of time, but I’m doing far better than I expected in terms of money. I’ve seen a lot of art, and a lot of maritime, um, paraphernalia, and recently much Judaica. The Asia Society made me grumpy, while Louis Armstrong’s house filled me with delight.

Museums Visited Chart While it feels great to be 53 percent of my way done (tally of currently open museums: 189), there’s still a long 47 percent of the way to go. Hopefully, like a roller coaster, now that I’ve crested the top of the hill, momentum will help carry me the rest of the way.

Let’s talk stats for a moment, shall we? Continue reading “100 New York City Museums: Milestone Post”