Art museums in NYC: 24 of the best

It would take multiple visits to fully appreciate this sprawling–as in 13-acres of Central Park sprawling–collection of over 5,000 years of art from every corner of the world. As one of the biggest museums in the world, the gorgeous late 19th century neo-classical institution displays some of the finest examples of art spanning from mummified royalty of ancient times to avant garde fashion couture from last year’s runway.

Don’t miss: The Temple of Dendur, an Egyptian temple from 10 B.C. that was transported from its Nile-side location to the bright, sun-drenched space overlooking a reflective pool.

While the Guggenheim’s collection of modern artworks is certainly impressive, it is impossible to separate the museum’s contents from its form with architect Frank Lloyd Wright’s brilliant and controversial design. Opened in 1959 on Fifth Ave across from Central Park, just months after Wright’s death, the concrete inverted ziggernaut (a Babylonian step pyramid), stomped on the expectations and tradition of clean square galleries exemplified and cherished by the neighboring Upper East Side museums, like the nearby Metropolitan Museum. Instead Wright combined his use of geometric shapes and nature, to create a gallery space that presented art along a flowing, winding spiral, much like a nautilus shell, with little in the way of walls to separate artists, ideas or time periods.

Don’t miss: Seeing the building the way Wright intended by taking the elevator to the top of the museum and following the gentle slope down. The art is revealed at different angles along the descent and across the open circular rotunda in a way that even the most well-known Monet landscape might seem like a revelation.

Considering the MoMA’s reputation for having one of the world’s finest collections of art from the 18th century through today, it’s no surprise that around nearly every corner of the venerated museum hangs a seminal piece by an artist trumpeted in art history or coveted by contemporary collectors.

Don’t miss: UNIQLO Free Fridays (held on the first Friday of the month).

Find the Whitney Museum in the Meatpacking District inside a building designed by international starchitect Renzo Piano. Planted at the foot of the Highline along Ganesvoort Street, the Whitney building boasts some 63,000 square feet of both indoor and outdoor exhibition space. Founded in 1931 by sculptor and art patron Gertrude Vanderbilt, the Whitney is dedicated to presenting the work of American artists. Its collection holds about 15,000 pieces by nearly 2,000 artists, including Alexander Calder, Willem de Kooning, Edward Hopper (the museum holds his entire estate), Jasper Johns, Louise Nevelson, Georgia O’Keeffe and Claes Oldenburg.

Don’t miss: The Whitney Biennial held in even-numbered years—it’s the most prestigious (and controversial) assessment of contemporary art in America.

Brooklyn’s premier institution is a less-crowded alternative to Manhattan’s bigger-name spaces, though the innovative and impactful items found inside are just as important as anything you'll find in the city. The museum, found on the edge of the sprawling Prospect Park, has a large holding of Egyptian art as well as the famous feminist piece, The Dinner Party, by Judy Chicago. Works by such Impressionists masters as Cézanne, Monet and Degas are also included in the collection along with with prime examples of Early American Art, period rooms and so much more.

Don’t miss: All the exhibitions and events for its 200-year anniversary.

The Frick Collection is reopening at its East 70th Street location in 2025. The opulent residence that houses a private collection of great masters (from the 14th through the 19th centuries) was originally built for industrialist Henry Clay Frick. The firm of Carrère & Hastings designed the 1914 structure in an 18th-century European style, with a beautiful interior court and reflecting pool. 

Don’t miss: Sculpture and furniture by the likes of Rembrandt, Vermeer, Renoir and French cabinetmaker Jean-Henri Riesener.

Housed in a distinctive Romanesque Revival building (a former public school), PS1 mounts cutting-edge shows and hosts an acclaimed international studio program. Artwork crops up in every corner, from the stairwells to the roof. PS1 became an affiliate of MoMA in 1999, and sometimes stages collaborative exhibitions. Reflecting the museum’s global outlook, it has focused in recent years on such luminaries as Janet Cardiff and Olafur Eliasson.

Don’t miss: Its popular sumer Warm Up events, a long-running outdoor music and art series held in MoMA PS1’s courtyard.

The Jewish Museum, housed in the 1908 Warburg Mansion, mounts temporary exhibitions of contemproary and modern art and also has a substantial collection of artworks of art and Judaica. There is a permanent exhibit specifically for children, as well as a restuarant that includes an Uptown outpost of Russ & Daughters, the iconic Lower East Side purveyors of Kosher delicacies like lox, sable and whitefish.

Don’t miss: Its free hours on Saturdays and select Jewish holidays.

This elegant addition to the city’s museum scene is devoted entirely to late-19th- and early-20th-century German and Austrian fine and decorative arts. Located in a renovated brick-and-limestone mansion that was built by the architects of the New York Public Library, this brainchild of the late art dealer Serge Sabarsky and cosmetics mogul Ronald S. Lauder has the largest concentration of works by Gustav Klimt and Egon Schiele outside Vienna.

Don’t miss: Its bookstore, a chic (and expensive) design shop and the Old World–inspired Café Sabarsky, serving updated Austrian cuisine and ravishing Viennese pastries. (And don’t miss the Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I a.k.a The Lady in Gold painting by Klimt.)

The Museum of Broadway, which celebrates more than 100 years of theater in New York City, opened its doors in November 2022. Exhibits include costumes, rare documents, photographs, sketches and immersive tributes to popular musicals.

Don’t miss: its most recent exhibit about Disney Broadway shows.

Located in East Harlem (a.k.a. El Barrio), El Museo del Barrio is dedicated to the work of Latino artists who reside in the U.S., as well as Latin American masters. The 6,500-piece permanent collection ranges from pre-Colombian artifacts to contemporary installations. The space also features updated galleries, an exposed courtyard for programming and events, and a Pan-Latino cafe that serves tacos, chili, and rice and beans.

Don’t miss: “Flow States – LA TRIENAL 2024,” El Museo del Barrio’s second large-scale survey of Latinx contemporary art that’s on now.

Located in a building originally constructed to house the now defunct Huntington Hartford Gallery of Modern Art, the Museum of Arts and Design (MAD) features cutting edge examples of ceramics, furniture design, fiber art and metalsmithing, all involving "processes ranging from the artisanal to the digital," as its mission statement put its. As a result, MAD often mounts some of the liveliest shows of contemporary art around. Packed with amazing things to look at, this Columbus Circle spot is definitely worth a visit.

Don’t miss: The ongoing Barbie exhibit.

As its name suggests, the American Folk Art Museum celebrates traditional craft-based work, and the work of the self-taught, including Outsider artists. AFAM also hosts performances, tours, discussions and other activities for every age.

Don’t miss: Visionary works by Henry Darger and Martin Ramirez to quilts and Early American portrait painting.

The Asia Society sponsors study missions and conferences while promoting public programs in the U.S. and abroad. The headquarters’ striking galleries host major exhibitions of art culled from dozens of countries and time periods—from ancient India and medieval Persia to contemporary Japan—and assembled from public and private collections, including the permanent Mr. and Mrs. John D. Rockefeller III collection of Asian art.

Don’t miss: The spacious, atrium-like café, with a pan-Asian menu, and a beautifully stocked gift shop make the society a one-stop destination for anyone who has an interest in Asian art and culture.

This Madison Avenue institution began as the private library of financier J. Pierpont Morgan and is his artistic gift to the city. Building on the collection Morgan amassed in his lifetime, the museum houses first-rate works on paper, including drawings by Michelangelo, Rembrandt and Picasso; three Gutenberg Bibles; a copy of Frankenstein annotated by Mary Shelley; manuscripts by Dickens, Poe, Twain, Steinbeck and Wilde; sheet music handwritten by Beethoven and Mozart; and an original edition of Dickens’s A Christmas Carol that’s displayed every yuletide.

Don’t miss: its regular recitals and concerts in Gilder Lehrman Hall.

Founded in 1971 and featuring more than 1,000 works, this multicultural art museum shines a spotlight on 20th- and 21st-century artists who are either Bronx-based or of African, Asian or Latino ancestry. The museum sporadically offers family programming.

Don’t miss: All exhibitions and events will take place in its north galleries as it undergoes a massive renovation.

This museum featuring artists in Queens and from around the world recently underwent an expansion to double the size of its galleries as well as add public-event spaces, two new entryways and a glass facade facing Grand Central Parkway.

Don’t miss: The Panorama of the City of New York, a 9,335-square-foot scale model of the five boroughs, created for the 1964 exposition and featuring Lilliputian models of landmarks. 

Set in a lovely park overlooking the Hudson River, the Cloisters houses the Met’s medieval art and architecture collections. A path winds through the peaceful grounds to a castle that seems to have survived from the Middle Ages. (It was built less than 100 years ago, using material from five medieval French cloisters.) 

Don’t miss: The famous Unicorn Tapestries, the 12th-century Fuentidueña Chapel and the Annunciation Triptych by Robert Campin.

The Fashion Institute of Technology owns one of the largest and most impressive collections of clothing, textiles and accessories in the world, including some 50,000 costumes and fabrics dating from the 5th century to the present. Overseen by fashion historian Valerie Steele, the museum showcases a selection from the permanent collection, as well as temporary exhibitions focusing on individual designers or the role fashion plays in society.

Don’t miss: 

When sculptor (and landscape architect, and theatrical-set and furniture designer) Isamu Noguchi opened his Queens museum in 1985, he was the first living artist in the U.S. to establish such an institution. It occupies a former photo-engraving plant across the street from the studio he had occupied since the 1960s to be closer to stone and metal suppliers along Vernon Boulevard. The entire building was designed by Noguchi to be a meditative oasis amid its gritty, industrial setting.

Don’t miss: Noguchi’s drawn, painted and collaged studies, architectural models, and stage and furniture designs.

With 750,000 objects, The Hispanic Society Museum & Library boasts the largest assemblage of Spanish art and manuscripts outside Spain. The collection includes many religious artifacts, including 16th-century tombs from the monastery of San Francisco in Cuéllar, Spain. The museum features a variety of exhibitions each year. A permanent fixture of the museum, however, is Valencian painter Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida’s Vision of Spain, comprising 14 monumetal oil paintings commissioned by the Society in 1911. Each massive panel reflects a different region of Spain in vivid colors, featuring tuna fishing, bull fighting and an Easter parade, along with objects including oranges and flowers.

The museum, founded by the son of a railroad magnate in the early 1900s, is free to visit. 

Don’t miss: Its outdoor installations on its restored Audubon Terrace.

As it names suggests, The Drawing Center is devoted to exhibiting and promoting works on paper, both historical and contemporary. A Soho stalwart since its founding in 1977, The Drawing Center is as much a museum as it is a gallery, but its wooden floors and cast-iron columns are reminiscent of Soho’s glory days as a gallery district.

When Studio Museum opened in 1968, it was the first black fine-arts museum in the country, and it remains the place to go for historical insight into African-American art and the art of the African diaspora. Under the leadership of director Thelma Golden (formerly of the Whitney), this neighborhood favorite has evolved into the city’s most exciting showcase for contemporary African-American artists.

Note: As of summer 2023, the Studio Museum is currently closed for the construction of its new building.