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| Established | 1977[1] |
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| Location | 235Bowery Manhattan,New York City,New York 10002 United States |
| Coordinates | 40°43′20″N73°59′36″W / 40.722239°N 73.993219°W /40.722239; -73.993219 |
| Type | Contemporary art |
| Director | Lisa Phillips |
| Curator | Gary Carrion-Murayari Massimiliano Gioni Margot Norton Vivian Crockett |
| Public transit access | Bus:M103 Subway:   atSecond Avenue,  atBowery |
| Website | www |
TheNew Museum of Contemporary Art is amuseum at 235Bowery, on theLower East Side ofManhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1977 byMarcia Tucker.
The museum originally opened in a space in the Graduate Center of the then-namedNew School for Social Research at 65 Fifth Avenue.[2] The New Museum remained there until 1983, when it rented and moved to the first two and a half floors of the Astor Building at 583 Broadway in theSoHo neighborhood.[2]
In 2001 the museum rented 7,000 square feet of space on the first floor of theChelsea Art Museum on West 22nd Street for a year.[3]
The New Museum has exhibited artists from Argentina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Cameroon, China, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Germany, India, Poland, Spain, South Africa, Turkey, and the United Kingdom among many other countries. In 2003, the New Museum formed an affiliation withRhizome, a leading online platform for global new media art.
In 2005, the museum was among 406 New York City arts and social service institutions to receive part of a $20 million grant from theCarnegie Corporation, which was made possible through a donation by New York City mayorMichael Bloomberg.[4][5]
The New Museum was established by an independent curatorMarcia Tucker in 1977. It is dedicated to introducing new art and new ideas, by artists who have not yet received significant exposure or recognition. Ever since it was founded, the museum has taken on the mission to challenge the stiff institutionalization of an art museum. It continues to bring new ideas into the art world and to connect with the public.[6]
On December 1, 2007, the New Museum opened the doors to its new $50 million location at 235 Bowery, betweenStanton andRivington Streets.[7] The seven-story 58,700-square-foot facility,[8] designed by the Tokyo-based firm Sejima + Nishizawa/SANAA and the New York-based firmGensler, has greatly expanded the museum's exhibitions and space.
SANAA's design is chosen because it is in accord with the museum's mission—the flexibility of the building, its changeable atmosphere corresponds to the ever-changing nature of contemporary art. Its bold decision to put a stack of white boxes in the Bowery neighborhood and its success to achieve a harmonious symbiotic relationship between the two manifest the coexistence of different dynamic energy of contemporary culture.[9]
In April 2008, the museum's new building was named one of the architectural New Seven Wonders of the World byConde Nast Traveler.[10] The New Museum has been and will continue to be a crucial landmark of the Bowery district. “Bowery embraces idiosyncrasy in an unprejudiced manner and we were determined to make the museum building feel like that”,[6] as one of the directors of the museum puts it. The neighborhood appears to be a fearless confrontation with the convention image of downtown Manhattan—an adventurous spirit that the New Museum always sees itself searching for.
The Bowery location has gallery and events space, plus a Resource Center with books and computers for access to their main web site and digital archive. The New Museum Digital Archive is an online resource that provides accessibility to primary sources from exhibitions, publications, and programs. The archive holds 7,500 written and visual materials for artists and researchers to access. The New Museum Digital Archive's database is searchable through 4,000 artists, curators, and organizations connected to New Museum exhibitions, performances, and publications.[11]
The museum bought the neighboring building at 231 Bowery in 2008.[12] The New Museum announced plans for an annex on the site in 2016 after raising $43 million of an $80 million capital campaign;[13] the museum later increased its capital fundraising goal to $125 million.[14] The New Museum and hiredOMA to design an annex at that location in 2017.[15][16] Shohei Shigematsu of OMA publicized plans for the annex in 2019, at which point the annex was to cost $63 million.[17][18] The annex would have seven floors (at the same heights as the 2007 building's floors), a glass facade, and 60,000 square feet (5,600 m2) of gallery space.[18][14] There would be an elevator and stair on the annex's exterior.[19] The annex was to be named for Toby Devan Lewis, who donated $20 million for its construction.[20]The New York Times described the new New Museum annex as emphasizing "transparency and upward movement".[19]
Initially, the annex was to be completed in 2022,[21] but construction did not even start until then.[22] The museum building closed in March 2024 so the annex could be completed.[22] During the building's closure, museum staff hosted walking tours, as well as discussions with panels of artists.[23] The annextopped out in November 2024,[24] and the museum announced in February 2025 that the museum would reopen later that year.[14][19][25] The reopening date was delayed; on January 13, 2026, the museum announced that it would reopen on March 21, 2026.[26] The expansion would allow the museum to double its exhibition space.[14][25] Oberon Group and Julia Sherman were also hired to operate afull-service restaurant at the annex's base.[27][28]
On January 24, 2019, eligible employees at the New Museum voted 38–8 to unionize, with a plan to join NewMuU-UAW Local 2110.[29] Asked for their reasons for unionizing, the New Museum employees said, “As the New Museum Union, we ask, above all, that these ideals be mirrored in the museum's working conditions, hiring practices, wages, and benefits. We believe that fair compensation and transparency for all workers throughout the museum is essential to ensuring its diversity, reducing turnover, and strengthening the New Museum community: salaries, wages, and benefits at the museum must be sustainable for everyone, regardless of the privileges afforded them by race, class, or gender.”[30]
When she founded the museum, Marcia Tucker decided it should buy and sell works every 10 years so that the collection would always be new. The plan was never carried out. In 2000, the museum accepted its first corporate donation of artworks.[3] The museum then held a modest collection of about 1,000 works in many media.[8] In 2004, it joined forces with theMuseum of Contemporary Art, Chicago and theHammer Museum in Los Angeles in raising $110,000 from two foundations -- $50,000 from the American Center Foundation and $60,000 from thePeter Norton Family Foundation—to help pay for commissioning, buying, and exhibiting the work of emerging young artists.[31] As of 2021, the New Museum has been a non-collecting institution.[32]
The museum presents the work of under-recognized artists, mounting surveys ofAna Mendieta,William Kentridge,David Wojnarowicz,Paul McCarthy andAndrea Zittel before they received widespread public recognition. In 2003, the New Museum presented the highly regarded exhibitionBlack President: The Art and Legacy ofFela Anikulapo-Kuti.
The museum organizedThe Generational: Younger Than Jesus, curated byMassimiliano Gioni, in 2009 which went on to become the first edition of its exhibition series the "New Museum Triennial".[33] Subsequently, the museum held the second and third editions of its Triennial, respectively; "The Ungovernables" (2012 – curated byEungie Joo)[34] and "Surround Audience" (2015 – curated byLauren Cornell andRyan Trecartin).[35]
Margot Norton has organized exhibitions, including one by Turner Prize-winner Laure Prouvost and the museum solo of Judith Bernstein.[36]
The museum hosted a show on July 20, 2016, called "The Keeper". With over 4,000 objects from more than two dozen collectors, it presented object lessons about the process of collecting.[37]
In March 2023, it was announced that Vivian Crockett and Isabella Rjeille will co-curate the 6th edition of the New Museum Triennial in 2026.[38]
Rhizome, a not-for-profit arts organization that supports and provides a platform for new media art, has been an affiliate organization of New Museum since 2003. Today, Rhizome's programs include events, exhibitions at the New Museum and elsewhere, an active website, and an archive of more than 2,000 new media artworks.[42]
In 2008, art dealerBarbara Gladstone initiated the formation of the Stuart Regen Visionaries Fund at the New Museum, established in honor of her late son and renowned art dealer. The gift supported a new series of public lectures and presentations by cultural visionaries, the Visionaries Series, which debuted in 2009 and features prominent international thinkers in the fields of art, architecture, design and contemporary culture. In 2020 the series shifted to focus on first-ever public conversations between leading figures, withClaudia Rankine andJudith Butler (2020) andJeremy O Harris andArthur Jafa (2021).[43][44] Previous speakers included authorRachel Kushner (2018, in conversation with novelistBen Lerner); explorerErling Kagge (2017); essayist and criticFran Lebowitz (2016, in conversation with filmmakerMartin Scorsese); critic and authorHilton Als (2015); director, screenwriter, and producerDarren Aronofsky (2014, in conversation with novelist and criticLynne Tillman); writer, director, and producerMatthew Weiner (2013, in conversation with writerA.M. Homes); artist and architectMaya Lin (2012); chef, author, and activistAlice Waters (2011); founder of WikipediaJimmy Wales (2010); and choreographerBill T. Jones (2009), whose talk inaugurated this program.[45]
NEW INC,[46] the first museum-led incubator, is a shared workspace and professional development program designed to support creative practitioners working in the areas of art, technology, and design. Conceived by the New Museum in 2013, the incubator is a not-for-profit platform that furthers the museum's ongoing commitment to new art and new ideas. Launched in summer 2014, NEW INC provided a collaborative space for an interdisciplinary community of one hundred members to investigate new ideas and develop a sustainable practice. NEW INC full-time members include Erica Gorochow, Anders Sandell,Lisa Park, Kevin Siwoff, Kunal Gupta, Justin Cone, Jonathan Harris,Joe Doucet, Greg Hochmuth, Luisa Pereira, Nitzan Hermon, Tristan Perich,Sougwen Chung, Philip Sierzega,Paul Soulellis, Charlie Whitney, Binta Ayofemi,Ashley Zelinskie and Emilie Baltz.Salome Asega has led NEW INC since 2021.
In 2021, the New Museum launched the biennial Hostetler/Wrigley Sculpture Award to commission five women artists to create sculptures. Each winning project is allotted $400,000 for its production and installation.[47][48]
IdeasCity was a nine-year New Museum platform to explore art and culture beyond the walls of the museum. Founded in 2011 by Lisa Phillips and Karen Wong, IdeasCity was a collaborative initiative between hundreds of arts, design, education, and community organizations that consists of two distinct components: the biennial IdeasCity Festival in New York City, and IdeasCity Global Programs in key urban centers around the world, including Athens, Detroit, Istanbul, New Orleans, São Paulo, Shanghai, and Toronto.[49] IdeasCity curators included Richard Flood, Joseph Grima, V. Mitch McEwen, and Vere Van Gool. The IdeasCity program concluded in 2020.
In 2002, the New Museum sold its previous home in SoHo for $18 million. It subsequently bought the new Bowery site for $5 million. In order to cover the building and endowment, it raised an estimated $64 million.[8]
From its founding in 1977 to 1999 Marcia Tucker was Director of the museum. In 1999, Marcia Tucker was succeeded as director by Lisa Phillips, previously the curator of contemporary art at the Whitney Museum of American Art.[50] On September 25, 2025, the Museum announced that Phillips would retire in April 2026.[51] Following her retirement she will become Director Emeritus and will curate an exhibition on the cultural history of the Bowery.
Since taking office, directorLisa Phillips expanded board membership to 42 from 18. As of 2015, it includes collectorsMaja Hoffmann,Dakis Joannou, andEugenio López Alonso, among others.[52]
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