New York is home to some of the world’s top museums, and the Guggenheim Museum stands out.
It offers a mix of permanent and temporary art collections that will inspire you.
One of its notable attractions is the Thannhauser collection, known for its impressive display of French Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, and Italian Futurist artworks.
With over 30 Picassos and pieces by artists like Degas and Gauguin, this collection shines.
In addition to its permanent collection, the Guggenheim is renowned for its changing temporary exhibitions.
These exhibitions usually last three to six months and can focus on various artists or individuals.
This article shares all the information you need to know about the exhibitions at the Guggenheim Museum before you visit.
Gego: Measuring Infinity
Open Till: September 10, 2023
Gego, also known as Gertrud Goldschmidt, initially trained as an architect and engineer at the Technische Hochschule Stuttgart.
This exhibition marks the first significant museum retrospective of Gego’s work in the United States since 2005.
It provides a comprehensive insight into the influential German-Venezuelan artist and her distinctive approach to abstract art.
Spanning five ramps within the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum’s rotunda, the retrospective offers a chronological and thematic overview of Gego’s life.
This exhibition showcases nearly 200 pieces from the early 1950s to the early 1990s.
These include sculptures, drawings, prints, textiles, artist’s books, and photographic documentation of installations and public works, sketches, publications, and letters.
The exhibition contextualizes Gego’s art within the artistic landscapes of Latin America that thrived during her extensive career.
It examines her connections with and deviations from significant transnational art movements like geometric abstraction and Kinetic art.
Gego introduced radical concepts through her meticulous explorations of structural systems.
Her unique body of work systematically delves into elements such as transparency, tension, fragility, spatial relationships, and the visual effects of motion.
This builds on the Guggenheim Museum’s tradition of presenting pioneering solo exhibitions of modern and contemporary art globally, emphasizing non-objective art.
Sarah Sze: Timelapse
Open till: September 10, 2023
In the 1990s, artist Sarah Sze (born 1969 in Boston) emerged, constructing a unique visual language that blurs the boundaries among different mediums.
The mediums include painting, sculpture, sound, print, drawing, video, and architecture.
Her work challenges the distinctions between digital and analog, tangible and imagined, and enduring and fleeting.
For her solo exhibition, Sze crafted site-specific installations that guide viewers through various spaces of the Guggenheim’s iconic Frank Lloyd Wright building.
The exhibition extends beyond the museum’s confines, spilling into the public domain.
Sze arranged an unexpected journey for visitors within the museum’s interior.
Inside the Guggenheim Museum, there’s a pendulum suspended over the rotunda floor’s fountain and an installation positioned in a hallway near the freight elevator.
These subtle gestures guide visitors upwards, leading them to the dome’s uppermost level.
Here, an immersive environment featuring fresh sculptures, paintings, installations, and sounds awaits.
Titled “Timelapse,” the exhibition encompasses lived and recollected experiences and, as the artist phrases it, “a contemplation on how we mark time and how time marks us.”
Thannhauser Collection
Date: Ongoing
The Thannhauser Collection, assembled by collector and art dealer Justin K. Thannhauser (1892–1976), introduced to the Guggenheim’s collection significant works by pioneering artists like:
- Edgar Degas
- Édouard Manet
- Vincent van Gogh
- Over thirty pieces by Pablo Picasso
This substantial donation offers a valuable overview of modernism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
During this crucial era, artists aimed to break free from traditional artistic genres and incorporate contemporary themes.
Justin Thannhauser was pivotal in spreading modern art across Europe and the United States during the early 20th century.
Starting from the 1910s, he collaborated with his father, Heinrich Thannhauser (1859–1935), at the Moderne Galerie in Munich.
They curated a dynamic exhibition series highlighting French Impressionists, Post-Impressionists, and contemporary German artists.
The gallery became a critical space for experimental art, hosting the inaugural exhibition of the Der Blaue Reiter and one of Germany’s first Picasso exhibitions in 1913.
The Thannhausers’ commitment to artistic advancement and support for emerging modern artists aligned with the vision of the museum’s founder, Solomon R. Guggenheim.
To honor this shared spirit and in memory of his late wife and two sons, Justin Thannhauser revealed in 1963 his gift of essential artworks from his private collection to the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation.
His widow, Hilde Thannhauser (1919–1991), later contributed additional artworks to the museum.
Megan Fontanella, the Curator of Modern Art and Provenance, oversees the organization of the Thannhauser Collection.
Only the Young: Experimental Art in Korea, 1960s–1970s
Date: September 1, 2023 – January 7, 2024
The exhibition ‘Only the Young: Experimental Art in Korea, 1960s–1970s’ will showcase groundbreaking and genre-defying artworks from a transformative era in South Korea.
The artworks were created by young artists who grew up after the Korean War.
They reflect the changing socioeconomic conditions influenced by domestic politics and global trends.
This exhibition at Guggenheim Museum is the first in North America to focus on Korean Experimental art (silheom misul) and the artists behind it.
These artists adopted a radical approach to materials and processes, leading to avant-garde practices that left a mark on twentieth-century art.
Taking place across three tower galleries, the exhibit will feature around eighty works.
It will provide an unparalleled chance to explore the creativity of this Korean artist generation.
Instead of a single aesthetic, these young artists pursued novelty.
This exhibition tells how these Korean artists harnessed art’s power to confront and reimagine an ever-changing present.
Going Dark: The Contemporary Figure at the Edge of Visibility
Date: October 20, 2023 – April 7, 2024
The “Going Dark: The Contemporary Figure at the Edge of Visibility” exhibition gathers artists from different generations.
They explore the idea of the ‘semi-visible’ figure—representations that are partially obscured, sometimes even darkened.
This concept of the semi-visible figure caught between clarity and concealment becomes a realm of intricate material exploration and experimentation.
The artists employ the notion of ‘going dark’ to probe enduring and pressing questions about the possibilities and challenges of being socially seen.
Across various mediums such as painting, photography, sculpture, video, and installation, the exhibition ‘Going Dark’ identifies, navigates, and assigns meaning to these semi-visible figures.
It argues that these figures possess distinctive conceptual and formal power, asserting their significance in contemporary art.
The exhibit at the Guggenheim Museum will use its six ramps to occupy the museum’s iconic rotunda space.
The exhibition will include works by the following artists:
- American Artist
- Kevin Beasley
- Rebecca Belmore
- Dawoud Bey
- John Edmonds
- Ellen Gallagher
- David Hammons
- Lyle Ashton Harris
- Tomashi Jackson
- Titus Kaphar
- Glenn Ligon
- Kerry James Marshall
- Tiona Nekkia McClodden
- Joiri Minaya
- Sandra Mujinga
- Chris Ofili
- Sondra Perry
- Farah Al Qasimi
- Faith Ringgold
- Doris Salcedo
- Lorna Simpson
- Ming Smith
- Sable Elyse Smith
- Stephanie Syjuco
- Hank Willis Thomas
- WangShui
- Carrie Mae Weems
- Charles White
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