Queens Museum Of Art

Photos of Renovated Museum & Queens International Exhibit 2013

November 10, 2013 / Flushing Neighborhood / Art Museums in Queens / Queens Buzz. I attended the re-opening weekend of the newly remodeled Queens Museum of Art on November 9th & 10th of 2013.

I came strolling through Flushing Meadows Corona Park from the #7 subway stop. I could see the new façade of the Queens Museum as I approached the Unisphere. The warm golden light shone through the large floor-to-ceiling windows of the two main floors along the eastern side of the museum. Only a year ago, this side of the building was nearly all cement, interspersed with a few far, far smaller windows.

Inside there was a plethora of activity. Just beyond the ticketing area, I stepped down into a large open space. Much of this space had been in place prior to the renovation, but the area was difficult to access, and was used more as a backroom than as the showcase into which it had recently been transformed.

Just ahead of the entrance, a bit off to the right, was the Museum’s very first claim to fame - the miniaturized building-by-building replica of New York City called the Panorama. Click here to read the rest of our report about the newly renovated Queens Museum of Art in Flushing. The report includes numerous photos of the newly remodeled museum and the Queens International 2013 art exhibit which went on display in this month.

Queens Museum Of Art

Photos of Renovated Museum & Queens International Exhibit 2013

November 10, 2013 / Flushing Neighborhood / Art Museums in Queens / Queens Buzz. Continued. The Queens Museum had planned numerous activities for the re-opening weekend, so there were hundreds of people milling about as you can see from the photo above. While walking through the museum I saw cultural performers putting on a show in the performance space described in the introduction, I saw dancers preparing to give a performance near the theater on the second floor, and I saw a musical performance being given inside the theater. This was all in the course of a couple of hours on the re-opening weekend. The theater had not been part of the renovation and appeared to have been untouched.

Panorama of the City of New York - QMA

The New York City Panorama has been inside the museum since the 1964 World's Fair. Master Planner Robert Moses commissioned the work, which contained 895,000 buildings when the 1964 World's Fair first opened. Heretofore this unique exhibit had, in a sense, been buried out in the open. While it has been on display since the 1964 World's Fair first opened, access to it from inside the museum was, in a sense, hidden. In the past you could get into it from one of the galleries on the first floor where it was unmarked, and from the second floor, again not easily found. But the renovated Queens Museum now provides easy, well-marked access into it from the main foyer / performance space. And inside I found more people walking through the exhibit than I've seen in a long, long time.

New Galleries at the Queens Museum of Art - Tiffany Glass & Relief Map of NYC Water Supply System

I made my way off to the left of the entrance from the park, into the new galleries which were a part of the renovation. Inside these galleries was something old and something new. The Tiffany Glass Collection, also one of the longstanding exhibits of the Queens Museum, had finally found a home worthy of its beauty. At the south east end of the Queens Museum, you'll find a gallery dedicated to the Tiffany Glass Collection. This had once been exhibited in the foyer just off the elevator on the second floor along the wall.

The Relief Map of the New York City Water Supply System had also been moved into one of the new galleries. This map shows all of the acqueducts built in the 19th and 20th centuries, which continue to supply NYC with its water. The water comes from far afield upstate, as the wells in Brooklyn and Queens were so polluted by private industrialists prior to and following the turn of the 20th century, that NYC had to close them as the water was unfit to drink. Click here to learn more about Newtown Creek and water pollution in NYC.

New Galleries at the Queens Museum of Art - Queens International 2013

There were about three or four of the new galleries dedicated to the Queens International Exhibit 2013. The Queens International 2013 exhibit just opened and showcases local artists' works. It's a biennial [every second year] event that has drawn a following as it's a eclectic panoply of subject matter and mixed media. This year the theme is Poets in the Galleries. And over the course of the next few months [it closes in March of 2014], you'll have an opportunity to view the fascinating works - some of which are shown in the slide show below - and attend poetry readings and performances which I assume will be done in the new performance space.

Click here for an earlier report on the Queens Museum of Art Queens International exhibit in 2009.

Second Floor of the Queens Museum of Art

It seemed to me that the second floor of the Queens Museum, along the northern side of it, had largely been kept intact. But the provision of the extra space enabled them to let the 1964 and the 1939 World's Fair exhibits breathe a bit. The 1964 and the 1939 World's Fair exhibits had been displayed along a corridor on the second floor. They were easy to pass by and kind of hard to observe, because they were along a fairly heavily trafficked corridor. But today they now stand where the Tiffany Glass Collection had once been, in the foyer of the second floor, just off the elevator. The difference about this space today, is that it's now at the 'back' of the museum as the front entrance to the Queens Museum has moved to the facade facing the Unisphere and the facade facing the Grand Central Parkway.

Queens Museum of Art - Studios & Cafe

The Queens Museum also created a number of smaller and larger studio rooms on the first floor. It looks as if these may be used both as galleries and as artists' studios. For the re-opening they had installed a number of artists in each of the rooms with their works and they talked about them for the artistically curious.

The remodeled Queens Museum of Art also has a new cafe which looks out onto the Unisphere. This is likely to attract people to this destination more often, providing not just an artistic venue, but also a place to relax and discuss the art. The second floor area overlooking the Unisphere was also kept intact, but again made more accessible by a modern, elevated stairway that connects with the central performance space.

Queens Museum of Art - Queens International 2013

As mentioned above, the Queens International 2013 is now on exhibit. The exhibit ends in March of 2014 and showcases local artists. The works, as you can see from the photos of the Queens International 2013 below, evoke a playful, possibly haunting, other worldliness about them. There are four scheduled poetry reading events associated with the Queens International 2013 exhibit over the four weekends of November 9th and 16th, as well as December 7th and 14th. We'll post in our events calendar - Things To Do In Queens - which you can access from the top navigation bar of this site.

Queens Museum of Art - History & Architecture

All in all it looks like a very nicely done upgrade. The Queens Museum of Art building was first erected for the 1939 / 1940 World's Fair and called the New York City Pavilion. Following WWII it became home to the newly created United Nations General Assembly from 1946 - 1950. It was also used as a skating rink from 1941 - 1945 and 1952 - 1962. And in 1972 it became the Queens Museum.

The building was originally designed in the style of Beaux-Arts architecture and the redesign effort reflects a modernist style of the 21st century. The redesign was done by Grimshaw Architects.

Click here for a map of the Queens Museum of Art in Flushing.

Queens Museum of Art - Photos Of Remodeled QMA & Queens International Art Exhibit 2013

Click this link or watch the following slide show containing photos of the remodeled Queens Museum of Art and the Queens International Art Exhibit 2013.

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Click here for the Reasons Clue exhibit at the Queens Museum of Art.

Click here for a report on the Boo Spooktacular and Children Programs at the Queens Museum of Art.

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