New York Museum Exhibitions, Winter 2011-12: A Selected List, With Openings in December, January, and February

The warm weather of late doesn't feel like a New York winter is around the corner, but at some point soon we're likely to be bundled up against the elements and heading out of doors. The art aficionados among us will be making our way to a favorite museum, handing over our big coats to the coat check department, and then strolling the comfortable galleries as the gently falling snow gathers in arcs on the windowsills and the chimney rooftops of the city. Or not. Sounds nice anyway.

Model of the Portico Gallery for Decorative Arts and Sculpture,
south façade, by Davis Brody Bond, architects and planners for the project.
The Frick Collection.

December museum events include the opening of the new Portico Gallery for Decorative Arts and Sculpture at The Frick Collection (December 13), an exhibition at Asia Society spotlighting Sarah Sze's process (December 13), and an exhibition for the art-surviving winner of Bravo's Work of Art TV series at the Brooklyn Museum (December 15).

Two exhibitions pack heat with crime-centered photography. Police Work: Photographs by Leonard Freed, 1972-1979 opens at the Museum of the City of New York on December 20, drawing our visual memories back to the gritty 1970s. The master image-maker of criminal New York from 1935 to 1946 is the subject of an ICP exhibition, Weegee: Murder Is My Business, opening January 20, 2012. We love those big popping flashbulbs that capture the perp in blinding harsh light.

Other choice winter exhibitions include John Chamberlain: Choices, opening February 14, 2012 at the Guggenheim Museum, a blockbuster-y Cindy Sherman show at MoMA (February 26), and The Steins Collect: Matisse, Picasso, and the Parisian Avant-Garde at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (February 28). Good thing the February art calendar is loaded with extra special exhibitions. If April is the cruelest month, February might be the most boring. By then, we're sick of the snow.

Cindy Sherman. Untitled #466. 2008. Chromogenic color print, 97 1/8 x 63 15/16" (246.7 x 162.4 cm). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Acquired through the generosity of Robert B. Menschel in honor of Jerry I. Speyer.
© 2011 Cindy Sherman

On the Bowery, the New Museum's The Generational, a survey exhibition of the work of the less-than-35, opens February 15. Uptown, the notorious Whitney Biennial is not far behind (March 1, 2012). For our cultural visitors to New York City, book your flights and hotels accordingly. Cheers.

Winter 2011-2012 Museum Exhibitions

Upcoming exhibitions below are noted in bold type.

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

Annual exhibitions are held in the spring. 

• no exhibits currently on display

American Folk Art Museum, 2 Lincoln Square, Columbus Ave. at 66th Street:

• 9/11 National Tribute Quilt

on continuous view
• Jubilation/Rumination: Life, Real and Imagined
Through September 2, 2012

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

• exhibits include The World's Largest Dinosaurs; 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

• Sarah Sze: Infinite Line

Through March 25, 2012   

Bronx Museum, 1040 Grand Concourse at 165th Street:

• Juan Downey: The Invisible Architect

Through May 20, 2012

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

• 19th-Century Modern

Through April 1, 2012

• Question Bridge: Black Males
Through June 3, 2012
• Newspaper Fiction: The New York Journalism of Djuna Barnes, 1913–1919
Through August 19, 2012
• Rachel Kneebone: Regarding Rodin
Through August 12, 2012
• Raw/Cooked: Shura Chernozatonskaya
Through April 8, 2012

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:

The Frick Collection

Frick Collection, 1 East 70th Street:

• White Gold: Highlights from the Arnhold Collection of Meissen Porcelain (new portico gallery opens)

Through April 29, 2012
• Renoir, Impressionism, and Full-Length Painting
Through May 13, 2012
• A Passion for Drawings: Charles Ryskamp's Bequest to The Frick Collection 
Through April 8, 2012

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:

• SOTO: Paris and Beyond

Through March 31, 2012

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

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum

• John Chamberlain: Choices

February 24 - May 13, 2012

The Hispanic Society of America Audubon Terrace, Broadway between

155th and 156th streets, New York City

• Permanent collection on view.

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

• Weegee: Murder Is My Business

Through September 2, 2012
Read Walking Off the Big Apple's review, Weegee CSI, here.
• The Loving Story: Photographs by Grey Villet
Through May 6, 2012
• Perspectives 2012
Through May 6, 2012
• Magnum Contact Sheets
Through May 6, 2012

Jewish Museum

Jewish Museum, 1109 Fifth Avenue at 92nd Street:

• The Radical Camera: New York's Photo League, 1936-1951

Through March 25, 2012

• Jem Cohen: NYC Weights and Measures

Through March 25, 2012

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

• Korean Eye: Energy and Matter

Through February 19, 2012
• Swept Away: Dust, Ashes, and Dirt in Contemporary Art and Design
Through August 12, 2012

The Museum of Art and Design

Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1000 Fifth Avenue:

(a partial selection of many exhibitions at the Met)

• Infinite Jest: Caricature and Satire from Leonardo to Levine

Through March 4, 2012

• Storytelling in Japanese Art

Through May 6, 2012
• The Coe Collection of American Indian Art
Through May 28, 2012
• Duncan Phyfe: Master Cabinetmaker in New York
Through May 6, 2012
• The Renaissance Portrait from Donatello to Bellini
Through March 18, 2012
• New American Wing Galleries for Paintings, Sculpture, and Decorative Arts
now open: Permanent Installation
• Spies in the House of Art: Photography, Film, and Video
Through August 26, 2012
• Rembrandt and Degas: Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Through May 20, 2012
• The Steins Collect: Matisse, Picasso, and the Parisian Avant-Garde
February 28 – June 3, 2012

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

(a selection below)

MoMA sculpture garden

• Diego Rivera: Murals for The Museum of Modern Art

Through May 14, 2012

Read Walking Off the Big Apple's review at the post, Manual Labor: Diego Rivera Paints New York City.

At MoMA PS1, Long Island, Queens:

• Print Studio
Through March 9, 2012
• Eugène Atget: “Documents pour artistes”
Through April 9, 2012
Read Walking Off the Big Apple's review at the post, A Parisian Detour - Eugène Atget at MoMA
• Cindy Sherman
February 26 – June 11, 2012

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


The Morgan Library

• Rembrandt's World: Dutch Drawings from the Clement C. Moore Collection
Through April 29, 2012
• Dan Flavin: Drawing
Through July 1, 2012
• In the Company of Animals: Art, Literature, and Music at the Morgan
March 2 - May 20, 2012

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 Greatest Grid: The Master Plan of Manhattan, 1811-2011

Extended through July 15, 2012
• Police Work: Photographs by Leonard Freed, 1972-1979
Through March 18, 2012
• From Farm to City: Staten Island 1661-2012
currently on view

Museum of the City of New York

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

• Surviving Life: Collages by Jan Svankmajer

Through February 26, 2012

National Academy Museum, 1083 Fifth Avenue:

• Will Barnet at 100 

• An American Collection 

• The Artist Revealed: A Panorama of Great Artist Portraits

• Parabolas to Post-Modern: Architecture from the Collection 

• National Academicians: Then and Now 

• Contemporary Selections: Aligning Abstraction 

all above, through December 31, 2011
• The Annual: 2012 
Through April 29, 2012

Neue Galerie, 1048 Fifth Avenue:

• Selections from the Permanent Collection

on view

• Neue Galerie Tenth Anniversary

Through April 2, 2012

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

The New Museum of Contemporary Art, 235 Bowery:

• The Ungovernables: 2012 Triennial

Through April 22, 2012
Read the review on Walking Off the Big Apple, Present in an Age of Chaos: "The Ungovernables"at the New Museum.

New-York Historical Society, 170 Central Park West:

The New Museum of Contemporary Art

• Remembering 9/11

Through April 1, 2012

• Revolution! The Atlantic World Reborn

Through April 15, 2012

• Making American Taste: Narrative Art for a New Democracy

Through August 19, 2012

• Freedom Now: Photographs by Platon

Through April 15, 2012

• Urban Visions: Views of American Cities from the New-York Historical Society Collection

Through June 17, 2012

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

continues TBA

Noguchi Museum, 3237 Vernon Blvd., Long Island City:
• Civic Action: A Vision for Long Island City
Through April 22, 2012

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:

Rubin Museum of Art

Rubin Museum of Art, 150 West 17th Street:

• Mirror of the Buddha

Through March 5, 2012

• Modernist Art from India

Through April 9, 2012
• Hero, Villain, Yeti
Through June 11, 2012

The Skyscraper Museum, 35 Battery Place:

• Supertall!

Through January 2012

South Street Seaport Museum, 12 Fulton Street:

• historic ships open to the public Thursday through Sunday, weather permitting

ongoing

• Galleries are now reopened.

The Studio Museum in Harlem

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

• The Bearden Project

• Project Space: Kira Lynn Harris

• Collected. Ritual

Through March 11, 2012

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

• Whitney Biennial 2012

Opens March 1, 2012 (through May 27, 2012)

Images of museum buildings, except where noted, 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.