Animal Group by Carsten Höller at The New Museum
If you’re a parent traveling to New York, you’ll want to soak in the city’s vibrant art scene without boring your kids. Fortunately, we’ve found some exhibits that will appeal to both you and your little ones. They’re engaging, colorful and perfect for when the kids can’t take any more Monet.
Carsten Höller: Experience, New Museum of Contemporary Art. The Belgian artist has created a veritable funhouse for adults, but it’s even more enchanting for children. Kids will love marveling at the life-size sculptures of brightly colored animals (the neon green hippo and yellow walrus are especially cute). They can also try on the upside down goggles and stick their heads into Holler’s Aquarium, where they can watch fish swim above them. Kids at least 48 inches tall can line up for a ride on the high-speed 102-foot slide—and parents, you won’t want to skip your turn either. Catch the exhibit before it ends January 15, 2012.
Jim Hodges, Gladstone Gallery. This hip gallery in Chelsea displays daring contemporary art. At the 24th Street location (there’s another on 21st Street) you can catch an exhibit by installation artist Jim Hodges. Kids will be entranced by Untitled, a white space where paint drips from holes in the ceiling at different intervals. In another room, you’ll watch a giant disco ball slowly descend into a pit of water as the space fills with swirling lights. The exhibit ends December 23, 2011.
Pop Objects and Icons from the Guggenheim Collection, Guggenheim. The eye-popping colors and shapes in this compilation, which includes works from Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein, goes over well with kids (as does the museum’s famous curving ramp). The retrospective of provocative Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan hanging in the atrium gives tykes plenty to look at too, but you might not want to linger long—death is a theme in some of the sculptures.
Photo courtesy Benoit Pailley/New Museum
