The 40th Annual Museum Mile Festival Tuesday, June 12, 2018 6 pm to 9 pm

New York, NY, May 30, 2018 - Now celebrating its 40th year, the annual Museum Mile Festival takes place rain or shine on Tuesday, June 12, 2018, from 6:00 pm to 9:00 pm.  Over 1.5 million people have taken part in this annual celebration since its inception. Festival attendees can walk the Mile on Fifth Avenue between 82nd Street and 105th Street while visiting six of New York City’s finest cultural institutions, which are open free to the public throughout the evening. The Museum Mile Festival’s opening ceremony takes place at 5:45pm at The Metropolitan Museum of Art (1000 Fifth Avenue at 82nd Street). Traditionally, the Commissioner of Cultural Affairs and other city and state dignitaries open the Festival.

The six institutions participating in this highly successful collaboration are The Metropolitan Museum of Art; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum; Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum; The Jewish Museum; Museum of the City of New York; and El Museo del Barrio. 

Fifth Avenue is closed to traffic and becomes New York City’s biggest block party. There is something for everyone at each of the venues. Special exhibitions and works from permanent collections are on view inside the museums’ galleries, with live music and art-making workshops on Fifth Avenue at selected museums.

Exhibitions and programs at each museum include:

El Museo del Barrio will feature music by DJ NEB; art-making workshops; an appearance by the Harbor Performing Arts Academy; musical workshops with The Little Orchestra Society, and a special performance by Los Pleneros de la 21,  who are celebrating 35 years of bringing bomba y plena to the community!

Museum of the City of New York: Through a Different Lens: Stanley Kubrick Photographs explores a formative phase in the career of one of the 20th century’s most renowned motion picture directors. Elegance in the Sky: The Architecture of Rosario Candela tells the story of the renowned architect who played a major role in defining luxury living in early 20th century Manhattan.

The Jewish Museum: Chaim Soutine: Flesh highlights the unique visual conceptions and painterly energy that the artist brought to still life and features Soutine’s remarkable paintings of hanging fowl, beef carcasses, and rayfish. The Jewish Museum will also present an art activity for families, and in conjunction with Bang on a Can, a performance by Frank London’s Klezmer Brass All-Stars, an eclectic mix of brass, clarinets, bass, and percussion led by London, known for his far-reaching influence on klezmer music as well as his significant contributions to the preservation of Hungarian-Jewish music and culture.

Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum: The Senses: Design Beyond Vision examines how multisensory design amplifies everyone’s ability to receive information, explore the world, satisfy essential needs, and experience joy and wonder.

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum: Giacometti, the first major museum exhibition in the United States in more than 15 years dedicated to the Swiss-born artist, Alberto Giacometti (1901–1966), includes the artist’s sculptures, paintings, archival photographs, and drawings, some of which have never before been shown in this country the United States.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art: Huma Bhabha: We Come in Peace - a site-specific installation overlooking Central Park - features haunting human figures that hover between abstraction and figuration, monumentality and entropy (weather permitting).

Lower Manhattan Cultural Council (LMCC) is a Cultural Partner for the Museum Mile Festival. LMCC empowers artists by providing them with networks, resources, and support to create vibrant, sustainable communities in Manhattan and beyond, and presents the 17th Annual River To River Festival of free arts and culture on June 15–24, 2018.

ABOUT THE MUSEUM MILE FESTIVAL
Established in 1978 to increase public awareness of its member institutions and promote public support of the arts, the Museum Mile Festival serves as a model for similar events across the country. For details on the Festival’s offerings, the public may visit MuseumMileFestival.org.