The opening of a major new museum is a rare event. On Thursday the Whitney Museum of American Art offered a preview of its new $400 million building in the Meatpacking District. As part of NY1’s special series on the new Whitney, Stephanie Simon filed a report.
The first thing you'll want to do once inside the brand new Whitney Museum is take a quick look around at the spacious galleries and then head right back outside. These stunning outdoor spaces offer the chance to experience great art and an incredible cityscape.
“We're standing on the Whitney's largest outdoor gallery and right now we have an installation by the artist Mary Heillman, it's an outdoor living room of sorts that she created 48 colorful chairs that give you great setups or views, both of the highline of a wonderful video that she produced in 1982 called “Sunset” and a wonderful mural that that’s hanging up on the wall that you can see coming down the High Line. So this will be used as an outdoor gallery, sometimes for art from the collection but often we'll artists to do performances film screenings and other kinds of installation pieces,” said Adam D. Weinberg, Alice Pratt Brown Director.
When it opens to the public May 1, visitors will of course get to see all the top American artists who really define the Whitney's permanent collection: Georgia O'Keeffe, Jasper Johns, Andy Wahol, Edward Hopper, Alexander Caler and Man Ray. But first impressions will probably be about the Renzo Piano designed building and the space itself.
“First of all there are these very beautiful long sweeping floors with sweeping vistas, beautiful wood floors.I think art looks really great here, in fact the colors pop in a way I haven’t seen before,” said Donna De Salvo, Chief Curator and Director for Programs.
There are so many great views here including this one of the Empire State Building and it's already inspired a special collaboration.
“For the Opening on May 1, from 8 p.m. until 2 a.m., they're taking 12 artworks, famous art works from the collection, and doing an a light show based on those art works,” said Weinberg.
Incredibly, you don't have to wait for your first glimpse. Some of the exhibits are visible from the High Line and the West Side Highway. Of course, in many ways, the building itself is a work of art.