Culture & Events to Know in New York City: Spring 2026

Find out what new exhibitions, openings and events in New York City should be on your radar in our springtime dispatch.

The New Museum officially reopened on March 21, revealing an impressive 60,000-square-foot expansion designed by OMA / Shohei Shigematsu and Rem Koolhaas in collaboration with Cooper Robertson. The new building doubles the existing Bowery galleries—dedicated to contemporary art—and also adds new cultural and performance spaces, a new restaurant and an enlarged seventh-floor Sky Room. Reports Indagare culture contributor Mario Mercado, “The opening exhibition, 'New Humans: Memories of the Future,' is a generous and wide-ranging survey of works by writers, scientists and filmmakers considering the effects of technological and societal change; new and recent work by artists like Pierre Huyghe, Wangechi Mutu and Anicka Yi are set in contrast with those by Francis Bacon, Salvador Dalí and Eduardo Paolozzi.” Pay-what-you-wish hours are on offer from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. on Thursday; the museum is open every day except Monday.

The oldest museum in New York City—The New York Historical (formerly the New York Historical Society)—will also soon reveal a new facility expanding the museum’s landmark building on Central Park West. “The Tang Wing for American Democracy is expected to open on June 18," continues Mario. "Designed by Robert A.M. Stern Architects, the 71,000-square-foot, five-story wing includes spacious ground floor galleries embellished with Tennessee marble showcasing monumental works of American art, a sculpture garden, classrooms, a conservation studio and renovated and expanded storage for the institution’s library, which includes the archives of historian Robert A. Caro (including millions of manuscripts, maps, photographs and prints documenting American history). Special exhibitions include art by Native Americans from 1880 to the present, paintings by Old Masters of the Dutch Golden Age (connecting the world of Amsterdam with that of the colony of New Amsterdam) and a revelatory examination of the contributions of women to the Revolutionary War.”

Plus: A new contemporary art space devoted to video, sound and other time-based performances—CANYON—will open on the Lower East Side later this year. Technology, hospitality and social connection will also be a focus, creating a hybrid museum-venue experience that will be best enjoyed in the evening. (Also expected later this year is the launch of the groundbreaking Hip Hop Museum further uptown, in the Bronx.)

For two weeks in May, the city will host some of its most significant art fairs and events, including the Met Gala on May 4 (on the theme of "Fashion is Art"), TEFAF New York (from May 15 to 19 at the Park Avenue Armory) and Frieze New York (from May 13 to 17 at The Shed). The 82nd edition of the Whitney Biennial—the longest-running survey of American art—has also just opened at the Whitney Museum of American Art and is on through August 23, 2026, featuring the work of 56 artists. (For more intel on navigating the fairs, explore this Indagare guide.)

Below, find the new exhibitions to know across Manhattan’s top art museums and galleries:

"Keith Haring" at The Brant Foundation
Early masterworks from pop artist and activist Keith Haring are now on display at The Brant Foundation in the East Village—the area where Haring first launched his career, starting with subway graffiti and evolving into internationally-acclaimed murals focused on the HIV/AIDS and drug epidemics of the 1980s. •  On through May 31, 2026

"Running Through Heaven: Visions of Jack Kerouac" at The Grolier Club
In advance of the infamous first-draft scroll of On the Road going up for auction for the first time in over 20 years, this exhibition at the Grolier Club traces writer Jack Kerouac’s life through some 60 objects drawn from the private collection of Jacob Loewentheil, including unpublished letters and manuscripts, inscribed first editions from Kerouac's personal library, original drawings, magazines and other ephemera. •  On through May 16, 2026

"Frida and Diego: The Last Dream" at The Museum of Modern Art
In a first-of-its-kind collaboration, MoMA is partnering with the Metropolitan Opera to create an installation that mirrors the opera's new production of El Último Sueño de Frida y Diego, a magical-realist debut by composer Gabriela Lena Frank and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Nilo Cruz (on May 14 – June 5, 2026). The MoMA exhibition features works by both artists highlighting their enduring impact on Mexican identity and global culture, within a theatrical setting by designer Jon Bausor that evokes the plot of the opera—Rivera’s imagined reunion with Kahlo after her passing on the Day of the Dead. •  On through September 12, 2026

"Carol Bove" at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
The first museum survey of the contemporary American artist Carol Bove's diverse body of work—spanning more than 25 years and including book assemblages, paper collages and monumental steel sculptures—has landed in the Guggenheim's iconic spiral rotunda by Frank Lloyd Wright. The exhibition deals with questions of surface, color, scale and space, in conversation with interactive installations as well as works by other artists, including a rare mural by Joan Miró and Josep Llorens Artigas. •  On through August 2, 2026

"For The Win: Objects of Sports Excellence" at the American Museum of Natural History
The Natural History Museum's revamped Halls of Gems and Minerals welcome a crowd-pleasing exhibition of more than 70 objects sourced across some 15 sports—and 150 years—inspecting the championship rings, Olympic medals and other prizes of fine jewelry and sculpture that are used to recognize athletic greatness. Some star-power pieces on view will include the NFL's Vince Lombardi Trophy, Yogi Berra's 1975 Babe Ruth Crown and one of Jesse Owens' gold medals from the 1936 Berlin Summer Olympics. •  Opens May 15, 2026

Plus, Mario Mercado reports on other highlights:

“Raphael: Sublime Poetry” at The Metropolitan Museum of Art
This landmark show explores the breadth of the life and career of Raffaello di Giovanni Santi, an undisputed genius of the Italian Renaissance. With loans from the world’s major collections, this comprehensive exhibition details Raphael’s origins in Urbino, his flourishing career in Florence (where he rose as a peer to Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo) and his final decade at the papal court in Rome. Although Raphael’s life spanned just 37 years (1483 to 1520), he achieved distinction as a painter, designer and architect. His legacy is represented in more than 200 works—drawings, paintings, tapestries and decorative arts—that feature both celebrated masterpieces and seldom-seen treasures. •  On through June 28, 2026

“Marcel Duchamp” at The Museum of Modern Art
This survey of the French artist is the first in New York since 1973 and brings together 300 works from the collections of the Museum of Modern Art and the Philadelphia Museum of Art (where the show will move from October 31 to January 31, 2027), in collaboration with the Centre Pompidou in Paris. Duchamp’s work resists categorization—yet this chronological showcase, ranging from 1900 to 1968, across all mediums (from painting to “ready-made” sculptures), aims to reveal and clarify (and likely question) Duchamp’s place in modern art’s key movements: surrealism, cubism, conceptual art and Dada. Viewers can engage anew in such notorious works as the (urinal) Fountain and L.H.O.O.Q., a postcard reproduction of the Mona Lisa defaced with a mustache and goatee. •  On April 12 – August 22, 2026

“Costume Art” at the Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute
This spring’s Costume Institute exhibition, ”Costume Art,” presents historical and contemporary garments from the institute alongside art and other objects from the museum’s collection, spanning prehistory to present. The show explores how clothing and the body have been represented through art over time. ”Costume Art” will be the first exhibition in the museum’s new 12,000-square-foot galleries next to the Great Hall. •  On May 10 – January 10, 2027

There are still a few weeks left to catch these winter season headliners:

• “Gainsborough: The Fashion of Portraiture” at The Frick Collection: A first in New York, this show includes more than 24 portraits representing each period of British artist Thomas Gainsborough’s four-decade career and chronicles changes within the fashion industry itself. •  On through May 11, 2026
• “Revolution!” at The Metropolitan Museum of Art: This installation in the American Wing commemorates the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, showcasing works from the museum’s collections that trace the Revolutionary War’s origins, events and consequences. •  On through August 6, 2026

The Lost Boys at the Palace Theatre
On the heels of Sinners, vampire culture is back with a vengeance in the Broadway adaptation of this 1987 rock-horror film, directed by two-time Tony-Award-winner Michael Arden. •  Opens April 26, 2026 (previews began March 27)

Cats: The Jellicle Ball at the Broadhurst Theatre
This immersive, inclusive reimagination of Andrew Lloyd Webber's classic Cats is a glittering celebration of ballroom culture and voguing. •  On April 7 – September 6, 2026 (previews began March 18)

The Rocky Horror Show at Studio 54
Tony-Award-winner Sam Pinkleton (behind Oh, Mary!) directs a campy Broadway revival of Richard O'Brien's cult-classic starring Luke Evans, Rachel Dratch, Juliette Lewis and more. •  On March 26 – June 21, 2026

Every Brilliant Thing at the Hudson Theatre
In this fresh, interactive one-man play by Duncan Macmillan and Jonny Donahoe, a child grapples with generational trauma, depression and suicide—and discovers how life's many brilliant things can help us all get through it. Daniel Radcliffe's shining 13-week run in the role will conclude on May 24, and it has just been announced that Law and Order's Mariska Hargitay will take up the lead with a five-week run from May 26 to June 28. •  On March 12 – June 28, 2026

Plus, Mario Mercado reports on other highlights:

Giant at the Music Box Theatre
After its triumphant Olivier-Award-winning London run, this drama by Mark Rosenblatt comes to Broadway, again starring John Lithgow as Roald Dahl, in a devastating portrait of the writer—and antisemitism in the United Kingdom. The production, designed by Bob Crowley, is staged by Nicholas Hytner. •  On March 11 – June 14, 2026

Dog Day Afternoon at the August Wilson Theatre
Adapted from the 1975 film Dog Day Afternoon by Pulitzer Prize-winner Stephen Adly Guirgis and Rupert Goold (who also directs), the production of this play features acclaimed actors Jon Bernthal and Ebon Moss-Bacharach, best known for their roles in the hit television series The Bear. •  On March 10 – July 12, 2026

Death of a Salesman at the Winter Garden Theatre
Tony Award winners Nathan Lane and Laurie Metcalf star in the 20th-century tragedy by Arthur Miller, directed by Joe Mantello. •  On March 6 – June 13, 2026

Ragtime at the Vivian Beaumont Theater
This stirring revival of what has come to be regarded as one of the great new Broadway musicals (first opened in 1998) has been extended to mid-June. Based on the novel by E.L. Doctorow about three families chasing the American Dream at the beginning of the 20th-century, the stage musical has a book by Terrence McNally, music by Stephen Flaherty and lyrics by Lynn Ahrens. Lear deBessonet directs a cast led by Joshua Henry, Caissie Levy, Brandon Uranowitz and Colin Connell. •  On through June 14, 2026

Mario Mercado reports:

The Metropolitan Opera

New productions of Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde are rare enough to sell out almost as soon as they are announced. The Metropolitan Opera’s impressive cast features Norwegian soprano Lise Davidsen as the Irish princess and American tenor Michael Spyres in the role of Tristan, the besotted Cornish knight, in this tale of illicit love. Music director Yannick Nézet leads all performances (on March 9 – April 12). This spring, the Met also presents the company premiere of Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho’s final opera, Innocence, an impassioned response to senseless violence in contemporary society. With a libretto by Finnish writers Sofi Oksanen and Aleksi Barrière, the plot depicts enduring trauma in the aftermath of a school shooting. The cast includes mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato as the grieving mother and Finnish ethno-pop singer Vilma Jää as her daughter killed in the shooting (on April 6 – 29). In addition to El Último Sueño de Frida y Diego (above), other spring productions include Puccini's La Bohème (on through May 2) and Turandot (on through June 6), Verdi's La Traviata (on through June 6) and Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin (on April 20 – May 16, 2026).

The American Ballet Theatre

After celebrating its first full season this March at the David H. Koch Theater at Lincoln Center, the American Ballet Theatre will move to the Metropolitan Opera House for summer performances of Don Quixote, Swan Lake, Onegin and Sylvia. •  On June 17 – July 18, 2026

New York Philharmonic

In September, Gustavo Dudamel takes the reins of the New York Philharmonic as the 27th music director in the orchestra’s 183-year history. This spring, Dudamel appears with the Phil in three concerts, joined by British cellist Sheku Kanneh-Maso, the Philharmonic Artist-in-Residence and soloist in Bloch’s Schelomo: Rhapsodie Hébraïque. The program includes the New York premiere of Earth Between Oceans by Ellen Reid and Stravinsky’s The Firebird suite. •  On April 3 – May 2, 2026

Editor's Note: Due to the sheer volume of openings, this report is focused on Manhattan. Subscribe to our newsletter and keep an eye on our Stories page for the latest from the other boroughs.