May in Museums
This spring and summer, New York’s museums are visited by art history’s most famed geniuses from throughout history, including the Renaissance power-house Raphael, the pioneering modern artist Duchamp, and a survey of the Dutch Masters. Below are our picks for the museum exhibitions you shouldn’t miss this season.
Raphael: Sublime Poetry at The Met
Open for two more months, Raphael: Sublime Poetry offers a portal to the Italian High Renaissance as it surveys the depth and variety of one of its geniuses. Presenting both iconic and lesser-known works across painting, design, and architecture, this exhibition unites over 200 works by Raphael and his peers (including Pietro Perugino, his father Giovanni Santi, Leonardo da Vinci, and Michelangelo) and includes some of the most famous paintings of the High Renaissance, jaw-dropping tapestry copies of the Sistine Tapestries designed by Raphael, as well as an immersive projection that transports you to the Sistine Chapel. This crowd-pleasing exhibition is worth seeing and will be remembered for years to come.
Through June 28
1000 Fifth Avenue
Visitors viewing Portrait of the Nude Fornarina (La Fornarina) (ca. 1520) at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Photo by Ben Davis, courtesy of artnet.
Costume Art at The Met
Inaugurating the Met’s new 12,000-square-foot space dedicated to the fashion department, Costume Art is a sweeping survey connecting garments from The Costume Institute with objects from across the museum’s collection, focusing primarily on Western art from prehistory to the present. Costume Art will surely be one of this season’s most anticipated shows, unveiling this new wing with a vast celebration of the relationship between art and how we adorn our bodies.
May 10-January 10
1000 Fifth Avenue
Image courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, BFA.com/Matteo Prandoni.
Marcel Duchamp at MoMA
This full-scale reckoning with an artist who flipped the very-meaning of arton its head, Marcel Duchamp at MoMA is one of this season’s most exciting shows. Combining world-famous works with surprising, lesser-known ones, this exhibition presents us with the Duchamp we all know (including his famous Readymades “Fountain” and “Bottle Rack” or Modernist masterpiece “Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2”)—then this sprawling exhibition highlights the artist’s rare genius, portraying just how easily Duchamp moved between mediums and movements. One walks away from the exhibition impressed and wowed.
Through August 22
11 West 53rd Street
“Nude Descending a Staircase (No. 2)”, 1912. Credit: Association Marcel Duchamp/ADAGP, Paris/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Carol Bove at the Guggenheim
This season, the Guggenheim’s rotunda is filled with colorful, undulating forms by a powerhouse sculptor who dominates the contemporary art world today, the Geneva-born, Berekely-raised, and NYC-based artist Carol Bove. Her colorful, steel works play with volume, scale, color, and surface—transforming the Guggenheim into a wonderland of delightful geometries.
Through August 2
1071 Fifth Avenue
Image courtesy of the Guggenheim
Old Masters, New Amsterdam at New York Historical
A truly delightful show that all New Yorkers will love, Old Masters, New Amsterdam shines a light on works by the amazing Dutch Old Masters of “New Amsterdam,” a new Dutch settlement in America. Brimming with possibility and optimism, this extraordinary exhibition just opened, featuring the astounding work of artists we travel the world-over to see, including Rembrandt, Jan Steen, Frans Hals, and more.
Through August 30
170 Central Park West
Whitney Biennial 2026
The temperature check for art in America that occurs every other year, the Whitney Biennial asks what the very meaning of “American Art” is. Featuring 56 artists and collectives, this year’s biennial - it’s 82nd edition - features not only art made by artists in America but also art made by international artists whose work discusses America’s reach abroad.
Through August 23
99 Gansevoort Street
Whitney Biennial 2026, installation view. Courtesy: © BFA 2026, courtesy Whitney Museum of American Art; photograph: Darian DiCanno/BFA.com
New Museum
The new, New Museum opened March 21st, inaugurating its 60,000-square-foot expansion with New Humans: Memories of the Future. New Humans traces the evolution of technology through art, speaking to our ideas of what the future will be as these evolutions unfold. This expansive exhibition features the work of 200 artists and thinkers ranging from contemporary voices such as Pierre Huyghe, Wangechi Mutu, Precious Okoyomon, Hito Steyerl, and Anicka Yi to Francis Bacon, Salvador Dalí,Hannah Höch, and El Lissitzky.
Ongoing
235 Bowery
Installation image courtesy of New Museum.
Iris Van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses at Brooklyn Museum
A bold visionary whose sculptural fashion design pioneers new technologies, Iris Van Herpen is known for her innovative couture that draw on disciplines seemingly far from fashion design, such as fractal geometry, mathematics, neuroscience, and biology. This exhibition celebrates Van Herpen’s genius, origami-like creations that are a red carpet darling, worn by the likes of Beyoncé, Björk, Cate Blanchett, and Lady Gaga.
May 16-December 6
200 Eastern Parkway
Image courtesy of the Brooklyn Museum.
MoMA PS1
This summer, MoMA’s Queens outpost dedicated to contemporary art and culture presents a calendar of performances by the most cutting-edge performance artists working today, artist interventions, and exhibitions, including Greater New York 2026, its signature exhibition surveying artists living and working in NYC today. Celebrating its 50th anniversary, MoMA PS1 is not to be discounted and offers cutting-edge works, an escape from the usual Manhattan art scene, and free admission for all!
22-25 Jackson Avenue
James Turrell. Meeting. 1980–86/2016. Light and space. The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Gift of Mark and Lauren Booth in honor of the 40th anniversary of MoMA PS1. Photo by Pablo Enriquez.