Tired of sheltering and dealing with the cold weather?  We are all yearning when we can begin to do day trips, weekend gateways and make plans to new travel destinations.  A chance to breathe and enjoy the air of a new destination, a welcoming change to our immediate surroundings.    Spring can not arrive soon enough, as many of us are dealing with another dose of snowy, freezing weather. Once the temperature climbs to 40 degrees and hopefully vaccinated, I plan to get away for day trips to  New York City.   I miss going to museums and art fairs and decided to do a bit of research to see what exhibitions are on display throughout the fall.

Due to the pandemic, museums have slowly reopened with restrictions requiring advance reservations and mask mandates.   Many museums are experiencing significant losses requiring them to reduce their staff capacity and limit the number of exhibitions they can sponsor while dipping into their endowments.   Admission fees remain high; generally, the cost can range from $15- 40 although some may still have a free day or evening.   In a recent study by the American Alliance of Museums about 30% of museums remain closed and those that are open have less than 35% of their normal attendance which may not be enough t to keep many of them afloat.  The lack of tourists will continue to have a severe impact on museums in  New York and elsewhere.  The will force museums to rely more on their collections while cutting costs until the pandemic is under control.   Museums can certainly gain from more traffic and we all can use a break of inspiration.  Below are some of my favorite NYC museums and what they are offering through fall 2021.

 

  1. The  Metropolitan Museum…The Met has two exhibitions that I found interesting among several others that are part of their collection. This is such a humongous museum that you need the entire day to get thru it.  To my surprise, The Met has an exhibition thru June 27th on Tainos Indians entitled  Arte del mar: Artistic Exchange in the Caribbean ( Arte del mar “art of/from the sea”).   This particular exhibition “explores the artistic exchange around the rim of the Caribbean Sea before the sixteenth century between the Taíno civilizations of the Antilles archipelago and their powerful peers on the continental mainland.”  Puerto Ricans are descendants of Taino Indians, a good reason for me to check it out.   Another exhibition that caught my interest is the reopening of The Met’s British Galleries “devoted to British decorative arts, design, and sculpture created between 1500 and 1900”.  Who wouldn’t love seeing over 100 different teapots and all of the extravagances that dominated that era?   I often wondered what their bathroom plumbing looks like.

 

  1. Whitney Museum of American Art… The Whitney –There are a couple of reasons why this is one of my favorite museums. It is devoted to American Art that is contemporary and more inclusive and is situated in the trendy Chelsea neighborhood next to The Highline (the elevated park formerly railroad tracks), a perfect place to end the day with a stroll. One thing I enjoyed about this museum is the free tours they offer on their exhibitions. I recently missed the exhibition of  Vida Americana: Mexican Muralists Remake American Art (I linked the video).   Presently, the museum has several exhibitions of which the following  Making Knowing: Craft in Art, 1950–2019 showcases “how visual artists have explored the materials, methods, and strategies of craft over the past seven decades….artist techniques with long histories, such as weaving, sewing, or pottery, while others experiment with textiles, thread, clay, beads, and glass, among other mediums.”

 

  1. Museum of Modern Art …MOMA also has a couple of interesting exhibitions. The one that caught my attention is Marking Time: Art in the Age of Mass Incarceration. The exhibition “highlights the work of artists within US prisons and the centrality of incarceration to contemporary art and culture. Featuring art made by people in prisons and work by non-incarcerated artists concerned with state repression, erasure, and imprisonment. The exhibition has been updated to reflect the growing COVID-19 crisis in US prisons, featuring new works by exhibition artists made in response to this ongoing emergency”.  The exhibition will only be there until April 4. While it could be a bit depressing, the power of art as therapeutic is undeniable (the photo displayed is part of this exhibition).

 

  1. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum…The Guggenheim has one of the most impressive contemporary buildings designed by Frank  Lloyd Wright.    Much like MOMA and Whitney, this museum is also known for its avant-garde art bringing forth the best of contemporary art.  Presently it is featuring a focused exhibition dedicated to Jack Pollock’s Mural. This “mural represents a pivotal moment in  the evolution of  Pollock’s artistic style informed partly by the Surrealists’ exploration of the unconscious mind, and by  the work of Mexican muralists.”

 

  1. The Brooklyn Museum… Although not exactly located in the center of NY,  it is a museum that holds its own place in the art world with decent local and traveling exhibitions easily accessible by the subway within walking distance. It currently has several exhibitions that address societal issues.  For instance, the works in Climate in Crisis: Environmental Change in the Indigenous Americas tells the story of how “objects reveal  Indigenous understandings of the natural world, while others more directly address the threat climate change poses to Indigenous livelihoods and survival from the northern  Arctic to the southern  Amazon”.   Another popular exhibition is KAWS: WHAT PARTY “ a sweeping survey featuring more than twenty-five years of Brooklyn-based artist KAWS consisting of one hundred broad-ranging works, such as rarely seen graffiti drawings and notebooks, paintings and sculptures, smaller collectibles, furniture, and monumental installations of his popular COMPANION figures” available til September 5th..   The museum recently reopen it Decorative Arts Galleries with Design: 1880  to Now that “examines issues of cultural appropriation across  decorative arts  mediums.”  In August for two months,  it will sponsor The Obama Portraits Tour for those who would are unable to go to Washington DC to see these elaborate portraits.

           Do support the arts, and do plan your visit!