Where to see art beyond the museum in New York City
Though the city is known for its world-class institutions, its abundance of free, public art scattered throughout the streets, subways, parks and restaurants offer daily discoveries to passersby and enthusiasts alike
Words By Siska Lyssens
"Metropolitan Faces" (2019), NY, NYCT 57 St Station. Artwork: © Alex Katz / Artists Rights Society (ARS). Photo: Etienne Frossard
Few things in life — especially in New York City – are free, but one of the best things is: encountering works of art as you move about the city and experiencing them as an integral part of this dynamic epicentre of creative exchange. These 15 art pieces in publicly accessible places have either made their mark on New York’s cityscape for decades or are currently defining a moment in time.
News, Isamu Noguchi (1938-39) Location: 50 Rockefeller Center
An example of what Noguchi termed ‘useful sculpture,’ his 22-foot-tall stainless-steel relief at 50 Rockefeller Center — near Christie’s New York headquarters — is more than a purely aesthetic element marking the entrance of one of the complex’s 14 original Art Deco buildings. Titled News, the monumental sculpture was created by the Japanese-American sculptor for what was then The Associated Press Building. It celebrates the ‘Machine Age’ through its geometric depiction of reporters working in a hectic newsroom, using the newest tools of their rapidly evolving profession: a camera, a telephone and a wirephoto machine.
Noguchi’s News was the largest stainless steel relief ever produced when it debuted at Rockefeller Center. Photo by Tomás Fano/CC-SA-by 2.0
The artist working on his plaster original for the relief. Photo courtesy the Isamu Noguchi Foundation and Garden. Artwork: © INFGM
Heads or Tails, Genesis Belanger (2026) Location: City Hall Park
Belanger is best known for her installations of everyday objects made of pastel-toned ceramics and cast-concrete objects; the American artist’s works are subtle critiques of the manipulative power of capitalist myths through advertising and consumption. Her newest mise-en-scène, commissioned by Public Art Fund, is of a larger and more robust scale. On view until 15 November 2026, Belanger’s Heads or Tails stages oversized birds, potted fruit trees and figures inspired by Lady Justice in bronze and pigmented cement at City Hall Park. Their resemblance to the park’s existing fountain and traditional sculptures invites reflection on what is real or fake, how we connect to nature and how civic values are represented in the public spaces that surround us.
Artwork: © Genesis Belanger, Lady Justice Unbiased, 2026. Courtesy of the artist, Pace Gallery and Perrotin. Photo: Nicholas Knight. Courtesy: Public Art Fund, NY
Artwork: © Genesis Belanger, Eclipse, 2026. Photo: Nicholas Knight. Courtesy: Public Art Fund, NY
Alamo, Tony Rosenthal (1967)Location: Astor Place Plaza
Just steps from the entrance to the Astor Place subway station on the western edge of the East Village, Tony Rosenthal’s abstract sculpture Alamo has been greeting commuters for more than 59 years. Initially, it was intended to be a temporary public piece of art, but a neighborhood petition made the work — the first contemporary art sculpture to be purchased by New York City — permanent. With a structure of Corten steel that measures 15 by 15 feet, the sculpture weighs nearly a tonne and can be rotated. Its imposing solid black surface features geometrical patterns that aid in the piece’s interactive nature, allowing passersby to climb on it and participate in the artwork further. Enduringly popular, the ‘Astor Place Cube,’ as it’s also dubbed, Alamo cemented Rosenthal’s reputation as a highly visible yet obscure contemporary American artist.
Tony Rosenthal’s Alamo rotates on its corner, inviting visitors to spin it, but it takes some teamwork to push the 15’ Cor-Ten steel sculpture. Photo courtesy of the Village Alliance
Eyes, Louise Bourgeois (1995) Location: Wagner Park
Wagner Park, a green space at the waterfront of Lower Manhattan, reopened in 2025 after a two-year renovation that addressed climate resiliency needs. Among the native plantings and ecological zones that support local diversity and reduce water use, three new sculptures received a new permanent home in the park. One of them is Louise Bourgeois’s Eyes, two black granite spheres aimed towards the Statue of Liberty. The French-American artist’s motifs of isolated body parts — abstract yet related to the human form — express recurring themes in her work, such as identity, family and sexuality. This particular iteration of disembodied eyes plays further with the idea of ‘eyes that see the reality of things or … eyes that see your fantasy,’ as she once stated. With protruding pupils rather than hollowed out ones, Bourgeois plays upon us an uncanny surrealist trick.
Louise Bourgeois, Eyes. Artwork: © 2026 The Easton Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Courtesy: Battery Park City Authority
Adam and Eve, Charles Ray (2023) Location: 385 Ninth Avenue
The figurative and narrative sculptures of Charles Ray challenge the viewer with their tension between reality and fiction, often referencing art history and popular culture. What better story to mine, then, than that of the Book of Genesis, with its account of the first humans’ fall from Eden? Ray’s Adam, standing, and Eve, seated, look listlessly around their perch nearby Hudson Yards — seemingly surveying the urban landscape ages after their choice to give into temptation relegated humanity to the mortal realm. The now-aged couple seems unperturbed with the state of the world, a jarring yet serene presence amid this shiny new Manhattan West development, raising more questions than they answer.
Adam and Eve are each crafted from a solid block of stainless steel, together comprising one of Charles Ray’s very few completed public sculptures. Artwork: © Charles Ray, Courtesy Matthew Marks Gallery. Photo: Timothy Schenck
The High Line, various artists, 2009 onwardsLocation: Gansevoort Street to 34th Street, between 10th and 12th Avenues
When trains stopped running 30 feet above Chelsea in 1980, a wild landscape emerged along the tracks. Today, the perennials, grasses, shrubs and trees that shape the High Line’s design were selected by Piet Oudolf for their hardiness, sustainability and ever-changing textures and colours across the seasons. The contemporary art installations that dot the park are continuously evolving as well. This June saw the temporary addition of Tyler Mitchell’s Time for a New Sky, placed right next to the High Line at 18th Street and 10th Avenue. The billboard, up until September 2026, featured a theatrical photograph with a cerulean background that foregrounds a solitary Black subject who is pulling toward him a golden hour-hued scenic backdrop, as if rearranging a studio set. Through his photography, Mitchell creates utopias that bring dreams a little closer to reality. For High Line visitors, encountering art along the approximately 1.45-mile verdant trail, the sense of wonder is always palpable.
Once an abandoned railway, the High Line is now a popular public park where Piet Oudolf’s ever-changing landscape meets a rotating programme of contemporary art. Left: Artwork: © Tyler Mitchell, Time for a New Sky II, 2026. Photo: Timothy Schenck. Courtesy: The High Line. Right: Stefano Politi Markovina / Alamy
7000 Oaks, Joseph Beuys (1982) Location: West 22nd Street between and including 10th and 11th Avenues
The only public artwork in New York of Joseph Beuys — perhaps the most important postwar German artist — is spread across Chelsea Arts District in the form of trees and stones. Initiated at the legendary art fair Documenta in Kassel in 1982, Beuys planned to plant 7,000 trees paired with a companion basalt stone throughout that German city. The same was to be repeated in cities across the world as a testament to a global mission to bring about environmental and social change. In 1988, with support from Dia Art Foundation, the project, 7000 Oaks, was expanded to New York. In total, thirty-eight trees have been planted in Chelsea so far, of species including Japanese pagoda, ginkgo and sycamore.
Joseph Beuys’s 7000 Oaks brings his vision for environmental and social change to Chelsea, pairing trees with basalt stones throughout the neighborhood. Artwork: © 2026 Joseph Beuys / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn. Photo: Bill Jacobson Studio, New York. Courtesy: Dia Art Foundation, New York
Bemelmans Bar at The Carlyle (1947) Location: 35 E 76th Street
The prolific illustrator and writer Ludwig Bemelmans is best known as the author of the Madeline children’s books, but his audience extended to adults as well. He contributed regularly to the mid-century travel periodical Holiday Magazine, where he told illustrated tales of post-war Europe. In an elaborate mural in Bemelmans Bar, the cocktail lounge and piano bar at The Carlyle on New York’s Upper East Side, he paired his signature whimsy within a setting perfectly calibrated for martini sipping. In the iconic vignettes, Bemelmans blends everyday New York life with dreamlike absurdity, including Madeline and her classmates strolling through Central Park and an ice-skating elephant.
Bemelmans Bar. Photo: LZUMA Press, Inc. / Alamy
Bemelmans Bar. Photo: Ɱ / Wikimedia Commons
Manuela (2024) Location: 130 Prince Street
For art immersion from all angles, dine at Manuela in Soho, where more than a dozen artists have made both large-scale and more subtle contributions to this one-of-a-kind setting. The colorful bistro dining tables with organic cut-out tiles are by Mary Heilmann; floating above is a delightfully idiosyncratic mushroom-laden chandelier by Mika Rottenberg. Rashid Johnson created a seven-meter-long mosaic dining table, and Pat Steir contributed a pastel-colored mural in her signature pouring technique. The list goes on: Custom textiles by fashion designer Duro Olowu, a Louise Bourgeois spider crawling up a wall and a bright Nicolas Party canvas all add to the joyfully disparate Gesamtkunstwerk of sorts that Manuela has become.
At Manuela, art is incorporated into every corner, from Mary Heilmann’s tables and Mika Rottenberg’s mushroom chandelier to works by Louise Bourgeois, Rashid Johnson, Duro Olowu, and Nicolas Party. Courtesy: Manuela
Love Matters Bear, Brendan Murphy (2026) Location: Hudson Yards Plaza
It’s clear that Hudson Yards has asserted itself as a cultural hub on the west side of Midtown Manhattan since opening in 2019: Frieze New York now takes place at The Shed, which is also a destination year-round for new art forms and experiences, and Thomas Heatherwick’s interactive honeycomb sculpture gleams on Hudson Yards Plaza. Just nearby, a new larger-than-life sculpture has landed in the neighborhood. A monumental teddy bear inscribed with messages of emotion, connection and optimism shimmers pink and purple, seemingly dropped there nonchalantly. The piece by Brendan Murphy, titled Love Matters Bear, is one of a series appearing in public spaces around the world. Contrasting with the angular built environment, the work is a reminder that softness is still possible, even in places where we least expect it.
The Love Matters Bear, which has been installed at Hudson Yards until October 31, 2026. Photo: Brendan Murphy Collectibles
Metropolitan Faces, Alex Katz (2019) Location: 57th Street subway station
Alex Katz’s most recognizable works are large-scale portraits of friends and family, simplified figures against planes of bold color, devoid of context. The artist has lived in New York for over 90 years and was an avid subway rider while at Cooper Union, when he took to observing everyday commuters and sketching them instead of the models in the college’s figure drawing studio. Over time, Katz’s portraiture has retained that fragmented yet familiar quality of sitting across a fellow commuter at close range but viewing them in broken-up moments before landing on a moment in time — framing a close up of a batted eye, or a hand combing through hair. This is what makes Metropolitan Faces, the permanent public installation of Katz’s portraits paired with floral compositions in Manhattan’s 57th Street subway station, so poignant. Even though the works were not created specifically for the site, the portraits create a dialogue with their surroundings. They’re juxtaposed with the many faces passing through the station each day, while the floral panels subtly echo nearby Central Park, lending a sense of poetry to the frantic New York commuter experience.
"Metropolitan Faces" (2019), NY, NYCT 57 St Station. Artwork: © Alex Katz / Artists Rights Society (ARS). Photo: Etienne Frossard
Clemente Bar, Francesco Clemente (2024)Location: 11 Madison Avenue
Neapolitan artist Francesco Clemente has cultivated a connection with New York since the 1980s, when he moved to the city to study Sanskrit, later collaborating with Andy Warhol, Jean-Michel Basquiat and even Allen Ginsberg. His less-than-traditional work has often figured in larger creative entities such as the Palladium nightclub and performing arts projects with the Metropolitan Opera. At Eleven Madison Park, step inside Clemente Bar, a more permanent home for Clemente’s art that integrates his symbolism-imbued figurative works with the equally artistic culinary vision of chef Daniel Humm. Just upstairs from the acclaimed restaurant’s dining room, guests can sip cocktails and enjoy sushi amid site-specific works by Clemente painted directly onto the bar’s walls and paired with curated vintage pieces, furniture by Los Angeles-based designer Brett Robinson and custom lamps by German artist Carsten Höller.
Clemente Bar. Photo: Jason Varney
Group of Four Trees, Jean Dubuffet (1969–1972)Location: 28 Liberty Plaza
Amid Wall Street’s stark modernism, the abstraction of Jean Dubuffet’s Hourloupe sculpture Group of Four Trees, commissioned by David Rockefeller, makes a statement. Evolved from doodles in ballpoint pen that the French artist made during a phone call in 1962, the piece was never a sculpture in his eyes but rather a drawing extended into three-dimensional space. Loosely referencing arboreal forms with interlocking parts that function as trunks and canopies, the piece is made of fibreglass, resin and polyurethane paint supported by an aluminum and a steel frame. At 25 tonnes and 40 feet high, it was the largest public artwork at the time of its installment in 1972.
Dubuffet’s Group of Four Trees compliments the Isamu Noguchi sculpture on the same property, Sunken Garden, which was installed in 1964. Each rebels against the rectilinear architecture of FiDi. Photo: Wikimedia Commons
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