New York Museum Exhibitions, Summer 2011: A Selected List, With Openings in June, July, and August

For current listings, please consult The Fall 2011 preview and list, now posted.


Preview Summer 2011 Museum Exhibitions

Summer visitors in the Metropolitan Museum of Art's
American Wing

Climate-controlled museum galleries feel particularly great during New York's hot summers. The cool dry air, necessary for art conservation, does wonders as a respite from hot and humid weather. The summer invites excuses to spend the whole day within the big museums such as the Met or MoMA, enjoying the range of art on display, the museum cafes, shops, and outdoor spaces. The Met has its roof, where a handful of sculptures by Anthony Caro are on display, and MoMA features the popular sculpture garden. While new shows are fewer in number in the summer than in the high seasons of fall and spring, there's still plenty new to see. While I don't know which exhibitions will be hot, as they haven't opened yet, I can briefing describe the ones that sound cool.

Let's start with the to-do list. The Morgan Library and Museum, known for its own unequaled collection of manuscripts, opens Lists: To-dos, Illustrated Inventories, Collected Thoughts, and Other Artists' Enumerations from the Smithsonian's Archives of American Art. We all make these sorts of lists, so it will be fun to check out those of people like Pablo Picasso, Alexander Calder, Eero Saarinen, and Lee Krasner. Up at The Museum of the City of New York, look for citified furniture, decorative objects and photography documenting the Colonial Revival movement in an exhibit titled The American Style: Colonial Revival and the Modern Metropolis. While in the neighborhood, check out El Museo's Bienal: The (S) Files 2011, the museum's sixth biennial showcasing innovative work by Latino, Caribbean, and Latin American artists.

The Whitney Museum presents a major exhibition this summer of the work of Lyonel Feininger (1871–1956). Born in New York, the artist moved to Germany at the age of 16 and became one of the significant artists associated with German Expressionism and the Bauhaus. With the rise of the Nazi Party in the 1930s, Feininger and his wife moved back to the United States, and he continued to flourish as an artist with his blend of realism and abstraction.

Elsewhere, the Metropolitan Museum of Art will be featuring its collection of thirteen paintings by Frans Hals, the great Dutch Master known for his spirited portraits of individuals and groups. The Guggenheim Museum showcases the first U.S. retrospective of painter, sculptor, and philosopher Lee Ufan, an artist whose large tactile brushstrokes demand engagement with the viewer. In late August, MoMA presents an environmental and participatory sound installation by Brazilian artist Carlito Carvalhosa.

The New Museum will present Ostalgia, an exhibition of more than thirty artists from twenty countries across Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Republics as well as works produced by Western European artists who have commented on representations of the East. At the Studio Museum in Harlem, look for Spiral: Perspectives on an African-American Art Collective, focusing on work by the members of the 1960s group founded by Romare Bearden, including works by Bearden, Charles Alston, Norman Lewis and Hale Woodruff.

Stay cool. The complete listings, with details of openings and ongoing exhibits, continue below.


PUBLIC ART

The listings for temporary public art in New York are now listed under the post, A Fine Season for Public Art: Temporary Works in New York City. The list includes a map.

MUSEUM EXHIBITIONS IN NEW YORK, SUMMER 2011

Upcoming exhibitions below are noted in bold type.

MUSEUMS AND ART CENTERS

American Academy of Arts and Letters, 633 West 155th Street (Audubon Terrace):

Annual exhibitions are held in the spring. See the nearby Hispanic Society, noted below.

• no exhibits currently on display

American Folk Art Museum, 2 Lincoln Square, Columbus Ave.  at 66th Street:
• Super Stars, a quilt exhibition
Through September 2011

American Museum of Natural History (Central Park West and 79th St.):

• exhibits include The World's Largest Dinosaurs; Brain: The Inside Story; Highway of an Empire: The Great Inca Road; Frogs: A Chorus of Colors; and more.

Asia Society (725 Park Avenue at 70th Street):

Brooklyn Museum

• The Buddhist Heritage of Pakistan: Art of Gandhara

Through October 30, 2011

Brooklyn Museum, 200 Eastern Parkway, Brooklyn, New York:

• reOrder: An Architectural Environment by Situ Studio

Through January 15, 2012

Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum

Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, 2 East 91st St.:

• galleries CLOSED for renovation. Reopening is planned for Fall 2013.

The Drawing Center, 35 Wooster St.:

• closed for expansion. Projected re-opening date is April 2012.

El Museo del Barrio, 1230 Fifth Avenue at 104th Street:

• El Museo's Bienal: The (S) Files 2011

Through January 8, 2012

Frick Collection, 1 East 70th Street:

• Turkish Taste at the Court of Marie-Antoinette

Through September 11, 2011

Read more about The Frick Collection at the post, The Frick Collection at 75: Plain Citizens in a Rich Man's Home.

Grey Art Gallery (NYU), 100 Washington Square East:

• NYU's gallery will re-open in September.

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, 1071 Fifth Avenue (at 89th St.):

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum

• The Hugo Boss Prize: Hans-Peter Feldmann

Through November 2, 2011

• Lew Ufan: Marking Infinity

Through September 28, 2011

The Hispanic Society of America Audubon Terrace, Broadway between

155th and 156th streets, New York City

• Permanent collection on view.

The Museum of Art and Design

International Center of Photography, 1133 Avenue of the Americas at 43rd Street:

• The galleries are closed through September 8 in preparation for the Fall season.

Japan Society, 333 East 47th Street:

• Fiber Futures: Japan's Textile Pioneers

September 16 - December 18, 2011

Jewish Museum

Jewish Museum, 1109 Fifth Avenue at 92nd Street:

• Collecting Matisse and Modern Masters: The Cone Sisters of Baltimore

Through September 25, 2011

MAD (The Museum of Art and Design), 2 Columbus Circle:

• Stephen Burks | Are You a Hybrid?

Through October 2, 2011

• Flora and Fauna: MAD about Nature

Through November 6, 2011

Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1000 Fifth Avenue:

(a partial selection of many exhibitions at the Met)

American Wing, the Metropolitan Museum of Art

• Anthony Caro on the Roof,

The Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Roof Garden

Through October 30, 2011 (weather permitting)

Read On the Met's Roof Garden with Sir Anthony Caro (review)

• Night Visions: Photography After Dark

Through September 18, 2011

• Mother India: The Goddess in Indian Painting 

Through November 27, 2011

• Frans Hals in the Metropolitan Museum

Through October 10, 2011

• 9/11 Peace Story Quilt

Through January 22, 2012

MoMA (The Museum of Modern Art), 11 West 53 Street:

(a selection below)

MoMA sculpture garden

• Standard Deviations: Types and Families in Contemporary Design

Through January 30, 2012

• I Am Still Alive: Politics and Everyday Life in Contemporary Drawing

Through September 19, 2011

• Boris Mikhailov: Case History

Through September 5, 2011
• Young Architects Program 2011
Through September 19, 2011
• 194X–9/11: American Architects and the City
Through January 2, 2012
• Talk to Me: Design and the Communication between People and Objects
Through November 7, 2011
• Carlito Carvalhosa: Sum of Days
Through November 14, 2011

Morgan Library & Museum, 225 Madison Avenue at 36th Street:


The Morgan Library

• The Age of Elegance: The Joan Taub Ades Collection

Through August 28, 2011

• Jim Dine: The Glyptotek Drawings

Through September 4, 2011
• Lists: To-dos, Illustrated Inventories, Collected Thoughts, and Other Artists' Enumerations from the Smithsonian's Archives of American Art
Through October 2, 2011
• The Living Word 3 (Xu Bing installation)
Through late September, 2011

Read more about the renovated McKim Building at the post Mr. Morgan's Library.

Museum of the City of New York, 1220 Fifth Avenue:

• The American Style: Colonial Revival and the Modern Metropolis

Through October 30, 2011

Museum of the City of New York

Museum of the Moving Image, 35 Avenue at 37th Street, Astoria:

• Chiho Aoshima: City Glow

• Behind the Screen

ongoing

National Academy Museum, 1083 Fifth Avenue:

• Closed for renovations from July 2010 to September 2011

Neue Galerie, 1048 Fifth Avenue:

• Selections from the Permanent Collection

Read more about the museum at the post, A Visit to the Neue Galerie.

The New Museum of Contemporary Art, 235 Bowery:

• Ostalgia

Through September 25, 2011

New York Historical Society, 170 Central Park West:

The New Museum of Contemporary Art

(Note: undergoing major renovations, scheduled to be completed November 2011)

New York Public Library (Stephen A. Schwartzman Building), 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue:

The NYPL maintains an extensive exhibition program, so check the library's website page for what's on display at the various branches.

• Celebrating 100 Years

Through December 31, 2011. 

Noguchi Museum, 3237 Vernon Blvd., Long Island City:

• Tracks: Animal Drawings from Noguchi's Travels

Through September 18, 2011

Read more about the museum at the post, A Sunday Ride to the Noguchi Museum.

Queens Museum of Art, New York City Building, Flushing Meadows, Corona Park:

• Niyeti Chadha: A Script for a Landscape
Through January 15, 2012
• Ghana Think Tank in Corona
Through August 21, 2011

Rubin Museum of Art

Rubin Museum of Art, 150 West 17th Street:

• Quentin Roosevelt's China

Through September 19, 2011

• Patterns of Life

Through August 22, 2011
• Human Currents
Through November 13, 2011
• Pilgrimage and Faith
Through October 24, 2011

The Skyscraper Museum, 35 Battery Place:

• Supertall!

Through January 2012

South Street Seaport Museum, 12 Fulton Street:

• DecoDence:Legendary Interiors and Illustrious Travelers Aboard the SS Normandie and Van Riper: A World of Ships in Miniature

ongoing

The Studio Museum in Harlem

The Studio Museum in Harlem, 144 West 125th Street:

• Spiral: Perspectives on an African-American Art Collective
Through Oct 23, 2011

Whitney Museum of American Art, 945 Madison Avenue At 75th Street:

• Cory Arcangel: Pro Tools
Through September 11, 2011

• Breaking Ground: The Whitney's Founding Collection

Through September 18, 2011
• Lyonel Feininger: At the Edge of the World
Through October 16, 2011
• Xavier Cha; Body Drama
Through October 9, 2011

Images by Walking Off the Big Apple.

* Many international cultural centers in New York showcase art work from their respective countries. Several are within walking distance of Asia Society and the Armory. Read more in the post New York as the Stage for the World: Walks Through the City's International Cultural Centers.

Visiting New York on a Monday and want to know which of these museums are open? See the list here. Clicking on museum names above will link to their respective homepages.