Upper East Side – Culture

Given that the Upper East Side is home to much of Museum Mile, we could easily talk exclusively about museums when discussing the neighborhood’s cultural scene. (In previous posts, we have indeed discussed them.) And while the Metropolitan Museum of Art, one of the world’s great museums, is a must-visit, there are more specialized museums too, plus live entertainment to discover.

 

Guggenheim

Guggenheim’s eye-catching curvaceous building, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, is reason enough to visit. For lovers of modern art, of course, there is plenty more to explore. Works by Beuys, Brancusi, Calder, Chagall, Kandinsky, Manet, Mapplethorpe, Modigliani, Mondrian, Picasso, and Pollock are among those in the museum’s permanent collection. And then there are the numerous temporary exhibitions. Recent shows included installations by Sarah Sze and “Young Picasso in Paris”; among exhibits scheduled for 2024 are an LED presentation by Jenny Holzer and “Harmony and Dissonance: Orphism in Paris, 1910-1930.”

 

Neue Galerie

This museum is dedicated to fine and decorative art created in Austria and Germany between 1890 and 1940. If that seems too narrow a focus for a museum, clearly you’ve not yet visited Neue Galerie. Paintings by Gustav Klimt (including his instantly recognizable Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I), Egon Schiele, and Oskar Kokoschka are part of the permanent collection, as are furnishings by Marcel Breuer, Walter Gropius, and Josef Hoffmann; Bauhaus, Expressionism, and Wiener Werkstätte are among the movements spotlighted. If you work up an appetite after taking in all the art, you can enjoy a Viennese-style meal or snack at the museum’s Café Sabarsky.

 

The Jewish Museum

More than an art museum—though its permanent collection includes nearly 30,000 artworks and artifacts by Jewish makers—this museum explores the experience of Jews worldwide over four millennia. Ornate ketubahs (marriage contracts) and chuppahs (wedding canopies), antique and modern Torah finials and menorahs, photography by Diane Arbus and Nan Goldin, and paintings by Larry Rivers and Ben Shahn are only a few highlights of the permanent collection.

 

Café Carlyle

Located in the Carlyle Hotel, this cozy cabaret harks back to the glamorous supper clubs of the 1930s and ’40s. Amid the 1950s murals by Marcel Vertès, you can listen to live jazz, show tunes, and American pop classics while dining on oysters and prime rib and sipping a favorite cocktail. Herb Alpert, Michael Feinstein, and Sutton Foster are among the myriad big-name talents that return repeatedly to perform in this relatively small venue.

 

59E59 Theaters

This nonprofit Off-Broadway organization presents new plays and solo shows from around the country and the world on its trio of stages. It’s perhaps best known for its annual Brits Off Broadway program, during which it has presented the U.S. premieres of works by Alan Ayckbourn and hosted the UK’s National Theatre and Bristol Old Vic, among other plays and companies.