MoMA closes in a week to complete long-planned expansion

Say goodbye to the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) as you know it. On June 15, the museum will shutter for four months until October 21 to complete its long-anticipated $400 million expansion.

The overhaul, developed by the museum with Diller Scofidio + Renfro and Gensler, will add more than 40,000 square feet of gallery space, a studio space for programming and performances, and a second-floor “platform”—an experimental space that will feature “facilitated conversations” and encourage visitors to “drop in to make art,” according to the museum. The street-level galleries, which will be free, are geared toward making the museum’s art more accessible to the local community, the museum says.

“Inspired by Alfred Barr’s original vision to be an experimental museum in New York, the real value of this expansion is not just more space, but space that allows us to rethink the experience of art in the museum,” Glenn Lowry, MoMA’s director, said in a statement.

“We have an opportunity to re-energize and expand upon our founding mission—to welcome everyone to experience MoMA as a laboratory for the study and presentation of the art of our time, across all visual arts,” he continued.

The museum will not only change physically, but it will shift its focus to include more diverse works by historically underrepresented artists: more women, and black and Latino artists.

Visitors can peruse a handful of special exhibits at the museum including Joan Miró: Birth of the World and Lincoln Kirstein’s Modern until June 15.

In October, art fans can expect four new exhibits: Sur moderno: Journeys of Abstraction―The Patricia Phelps de Cisneros Gift, which celebrates “abstract, concrete, and geometric art by artists from Brazil, Venezuela, Argentina, and Uruguay;” member: Pope.L, 1978–2001, installations by artist William Pope.L; Betye Saar: The Legends of Black Girls Window, exploring Saar’s works and her rare, early prints, made during the 1960s; and Studio Museum at MoMA, The Elaine Dannheisser Project Series, curated by director of Harlem’s Studio Museum Thelma Golden.