Grey Art Gallery has been preserving the historical heritage of NY University for half a century. But, until now, it was not recognized as an art museum. That is coming to an end. The institution is relocating from the Washington Square to 18 Cooper Square. Also, the institution gets a new name and will reopen next year as the Grey Art Museum. With this, new history begins.

Changes at Grey Art Gallery to Better Represent Heritage

The gallery was a part of the university’s arts and science center on Washington Square. With relocating, it will get a much wider space. The reopening is taking place on March 2, 2024. The name changing’s goal is to more accurately represent its purpose and heritage. Also, the show called “Americans in Paris: Artists Working in Postwar France, 1946-1962” will highlight the event.

“We’ll be much more visible”, said Lynn Gumpert, who got the directorial possision in 1997. This NYU institution the initial American venue to stage a significant exhibition of Frida Kahlo. But, many though the Grey is a commercial space, from time to time. “We’re known nationally and internationally among the art crowd, but still lots of people in New York don’t know that N.Y.U. has a museum”, Gumpert said.

The gallery will have more public visibility on Cooper Square thanks to a large ground-floor area. Also, the gallery’s location will be inside 1901 brick-and-iron structure which NYU owns. The new location nearly doubles the dimension of Grey’s display spaces. Also, it provides a study centre to the museum for its inaugural time. Ennead Architects’ partner Richard Olcott designed the building.

Urban Painters Highlighting the Institution

Olcott also renovated the Yale University Art Gallery in New Haven. A bequest and a pledged gift of 200 art pieces from the collectors and social activists James Cottrell, a doctor, and Joseph Lovett, a documentary filmmaker, gave the initiative a boost. “One of our great areas of concentration is downtown art.We really tried to position the Grey as a bridge to the community”, Gumpert said of the Grey’s collection.

Adam Weinberg, the director of the Whitney Museum, stated that the Grey’s dedication to the city’s core set it distinct from other institutions. “They’re able to do some of the more focused shows that we don’t have a chance to do”, he said. Weinberg also mentioned exhibits on important urban painters like Tseng Kwong Chi and Peter Hujar, both of whom passed away from AIDS.

The Grey will soon host the exhibition “Americans in Paris”, which was organised by Gumpert and unaffiliated historian Debra Bricker Balken. It explores the wave of American artists moving to the French capital after World War II.