May Gallery Guide
This May, Manhattan’s galleries are filled with extraordinary exhibitions by some of art history’s heavy-hitters from Dalí to Matisse as well as shows highlighting the work of exciting contemporary voices. Below are a few of our recommendations for the shows to see in New York now.
Dalí: The Great Years at Di Donna
As the final exhibition in its Madison Avenue space before launching a new venture, Di Donna presents a magnificent, museum-quality exhibition that brings together 24 paintings, drawings, and sculptures by Salvador Dalí created between 1929 and 1939, when the icon of Surrealism was developing his visual language. The majority of these works are loans from leading artinstitution, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Salvador Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida. One of the most significant presentations of Dalí in New York in decades, this special exhibition is absolutely not to be missed before it closes in June.
April 16-June 13
744 Madison Avenue
Salvador Dalí, La Profanation de l'hostie (Profanation of the Host), circa 1930, Oil on canvas, 100 by 73 cm (39⅜ by 28¾ in.), Collection of The Dalí Museum, St. Petersburg, FL, © 2026 Salvador Dalí, Fundació Gala-Salvador Dalí, Artists Rights Society. Courtesy of Di Donna.
Matisse | The Pursuit of Harmonyat Acquavella
Featuring fifty paintings, works on paper, and sculpture by Henri Matisse on loan from museums, foundations, and private collections, Matisse | The Pursuit of Harmony at Acquavella is a museum-quality exhibition tracing Matisse’s investigation of form over the course of his career. Featuring vivid canvases and striking sculpture displaying Matisse’s mastery over harmony and form, this incredible exhibition is another one of May’s must-see shows. We recommend getting the gallery in the morning, when it opens, to avoid the line.
April 9-May 22
18 East 79th Street
Henri Matisse, Odalisque en manteau rouge [Odalisque in Red Coat], 1937, Oil on canvas, 21 5/8 x 18 inches (55 x 46 cm), Private Collection, © 2026 Succession H. Matisse / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Courtesy of Aquavella Galleries.
David Hockney: The Moon Roomat Pace
Created while quarantining at his 17th-century Normandy farmhouse, Pace presents a meditative exhibition of David Hockney’s iPad paintings from the artist’s Moon Room series. The first time these works will be shown in New York, the exhibition will feature large paintings depicting the moon at various phases and vantage points from throughout Hockney’s 12-acre farm. Hockney appreciated his ability to quickly create works on his iPad, and these dreamy compositions display the artist’s mastery over his subject and mediums.
May 15-August 14
540 West 25th Street
David Hockney, 31st October 2020, No. 1, 2020 © David Hockney. Courtesy of Pace.
Sanford Biggers | The Gift of Tongues at Boesky Gallery
Never one to shy away from working across mediums, the Los Angeles-based artist Sanford Biggers transformed Boesky Gallery into an imaginative playhouse, filled with artworks imbued with history, myths, and endless possibility—all mediated by playful curtains and false walls. Developing a recognizable visual language as he strips familiar imagery of their original contexts to provide new possibilities, Biggers acts as our intermediary as he performs a historical reckoning. His new works—filled with quilt and cloud motifs, among others—allude to histories and then imbue them with beautiful meaning.
April 30-June 13
507 West 24th Street
Sanford Biggers, A Fool Left Unnumbered, 2026, photo by Jason Wyche.
Danielle Mckinney | Forest for the Trees at Boesky Gallery
Also on view at Boesky is an exhibition of intimate new paintings and watercolors by the rising star painter Danielle Mckinney. Coinciding with the artist’s major museum exhibition at the Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach, Forest for the Trees presents beautiful, cinematic portraits featuring intimate, rich scenes.
May 7—June 13
509 West 24th Street
Danielle Mckinney, Forest for the Trees, 2026. Courtesy of Boesky.
Lisa Yuskavage at David Zwirner
A highly-anticipated show, the bold and beloved painter Lisa Yuskavage will present new and recent paintings and works on paper at David Zwirner. If you loved Yuskavage or missed the mighty presentation Lisa Yuskavage: Drawings, on view at The Morgan Library June 2025-January 2026, the first comprehensive museum presentation of the Yuskavage’s works on paper, you should make sure to visit the forthcoming exhibition at David Zwirner.
May 14-June 26
533 West 19th Street
Lisa Yuskavage, The Joy of Painting, 2025, courtesy of David Zwirner
Gerhard Richter: Landschaften at David Zwirner
While you’re at it, don’t miss David Zwirner’s incredible presentation of historical paintings by Gerhard Richter. The landscapes on view at Zwirner by this celebrated artist of photorealistic paintings are swoon-worthy—and absolutely not to be missed.
May 7-July 10
537 West 20th Street
Photography by Samantha Kohl.
Mark Manders at Tanya Bonakdar
Converging the past, present, and future into a palette of whites, the Dutch artist Mark Manders questions and emphasizes the material nature of art. In his sixth solo exhibition at Tanya Bonakdar, Manders presents new work ranging from monumental bronze busts to abstract sculptural landscapes and discrete paintings and works on paper. These works are astounding and jaw-dropping—and well worth a visit!
April 31-July 31
521 West 21st Street
Mark Manders, BONEWHITE CLAY HEAD WITH VERTICAL CLOUD, 2024-2025. Image courtesy of Tanya Bonakdar.
Firelei Báez: feet squelching on wet grass,
nourished by uncertainty at Hauser & Wirth
The Dominican Republic-born, New York-based artist Firelei Báez creates vivid, exuberant worlds that explore the lasting legacies of colonial rule across the Americas, Caribbean, and beyond. Using a complex and rich visual language informed by Afro-Carribbean culture, Báez draws on mythology, folklore, science fiction and more to create fantastic, layered scenes. Hauser’s 22nd Street gallery will be filled with these beautiful works across painting, works on paper, and sculpture.
May 12-July 31
542 West 22nd Street
© Firelei Báez. Photo: Elisabeth Bernstein. Courtesy of Hauser & Wirth.
Giuseppe Penone: The Reflection of Bronze at Gagosian
The immersive Giuseppe Penone exhibition taking over three gallery spaces (and curated by Adam Weinberg, Director Emeritus of the Whitney) is remarkably moving. Rooted in Penone’s exploration of trees from the 1960’s that led to the artist’s celebrated carved tree works, the exhibition features new bronze sculptures that together create an enveloping forest environment that inspires great admiration of Penone as a master of his materials.
April 22-July 2
555 West 24th Street
Jose Dávila: The Simple Act of Positioning at Sean Kelly
Jose Dávila’s practice is consumed with positioning, arranging, and re-arranging elements, breaking down sculpture into its most basic form: the investigation of placing one element in relation to another. Born in Guadalajara, Mexico where Dávila initially studied architecture, the artist has always explored space, design, and the experiential aspects of art. His new works on view at Sean Kelly are lovely, meditative, yet interrogating.
April 17-May 30
475 Tenth Avenue
Jose Dávila, Fundamental Concern, 2026. Courtesy of Sean Kelly.
Julie Mehretu: Our Days, Like a Shadow (a non-abiding hauntology) at Marianne Goodman Gallery
The Ethiopian-American artist Julie Mehretu is known for her expansive, layered abstract paintings that are built with layers of paint, often overlaid with frenetic pencil, pen, and ink forms. A prelude to her forthcoming large-scale commission Uprising of the Sun, which will be unveiled on the façade of the new Obama Presidential Center in Chicago in June, this exhibition features new and recent bodies of work (including her TRANSpaintings/Upright Brackets and Black Paintings) that are daring, imaginative, and imbued with meaning.
April 14-June 6
385 Broadway
Julie Mehretu, Black Monolith (after Atopolis: For Édouard Glissant by Jack Whitten), 2024-2026
Alyson Shotz | Deep Field at Derek Eller
Featuring new work composed of plated steel, glass, paper and wood, “Deep Field” is a solo exhibition by the artist Alyson Shotz that narrows in on the circle as part of a macro and microcosmic universe, investigating this form across scales. Known for her experimental sculptures inspired by natural phenomena, this exhibition similarly calls into focus beautiful experiences of gravity, light, and space.
May 1-30
38 Walker Street
Alyson Shotz, Deep Field #3, 2026. Courtesy of Derek Eller.
Nick Doyle: Collective Hallucinations at Perrotin
In the artist’s bold confrontation with the ever-challenging relationship between land and technology, Nick Doyle has created a series of fascinating collages and an immersive installation of a psychic parlor. Invoking the symbols of the wild American West with denim, cacti, and clouds, the Southern Californian Doyle drives forth themes of Americana and capitalism, asking what it means for our future.
April 24-May 30
130 Orchard
Nick Doyle, Perimeter, 2026. Bleached and collaged denim on panel. Installed: 64 x 93 inches. Photo: Guillaume Ziccarelli. Courtesy of the artist and Perrotin.