The Harlem Renaissance was born out of the Great Migration, when millions of Black people headed north seeking refuge and a better life away from the oppression of the South and Jim Crow laws. It ignited a cultural exodus rooted in literature, visual arts, and music that shaped American culture.
Now, more than a century later, Harlem is experiencing another rebirth. As much of what defined Harlem’s Jazz Age slowly fades, a new cultural evolution is taking shape.
“When people say that Harlem is changing, that’s just an acknowledgment that this is a living neighborhood,” said Thelma Golden in an email interview with Afar. Golden has been the Ford Foundation director and chief curator of the Studio Museum in Harlem since 2005.
And on Saturday, November 15, the museum will reopen in a new seven-story, 82,000-square-foot building, after an extensive renovation that began in 2018.
“It has always been in evolution—it always will be,” Golden said. “Our new home is joined in the immediate neighborhood by new homes of the National Black Theatre, the Apollo Stages at the Victoria Theater, and the Urban League Empowerment Center of the National Urban League and its Urban Civil Rights Museum.”
The Museum’s permanent collection represents more than 800 artists and 200 years. It is displayed in the exhibit From Now: A Collection in Context.
Photo by Kris Graves
The history of the Studio Museum in Harlem
The Studio Museum in Harlem started out in a rented loft on Fifth Avenue in 1968; a decade later, it was gifted a five-story commercial building, the former home of the New York Bank for Savings. Pioneering Black architect J. Max Bond Jr. redesigned the bank’s facade, and the new iteration of the Studio Museum opened at 144 West 125th Street in 1982.
(Bond then formed the architectural firm Bond Ryder and Associates with Donald P. Ryder, and together they would go on to design other cultural and community anchors: the neighboring Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, a half mile from the museum, the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change in Atlanta, and the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute in Alabama.) But even with Bond’s work, the bank building was never ideally suited for an arts museum, and by the early 2000s, the building was over a century old, making additional renovation impractical.
“We needed a new building of our own, designed specifically for our mission,” Golden said. “The question was whether to build on our existing site on 125th Street, or seek a new location. We decided it was crucial to remain where we were—in the very heart of Harlem—where our community knows us as an anchor and gathering place.”
So the decision was made to replace the old structure with a completely new one—one that could be customized to the institution’s long-held mission. For the rebuild, the museum enlisted another trailblazing Black architect, Sir David Adjaye, of Adjaye Associates, who has designed spaces globally, such as the Abrahamic Family House in Abu Dhabi and the National Cathedral of Ghana, as well as community hubs, including the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History & Culture in Washington, D.C., and Harlem’s Sugar Hill Mixed-Use Development with affordable housing, a children’s museum, and early childhood center.
The museum’s design incorporates statement moments, such as the Grand Stair and rooftop terrace
Photos by Albert Vecerka/Esto
A new building with a design that connects past, present, and future
For Golden, the reimagined Studio Museum needed to reflect the rich architecture that defines Harlem’s vibrant history. “[Adjaye and I] talked about the soaring sanctuaries of Harlem churches, the performing arts stages on which so much of Harlem’s culture takes place, and the street scene that gives Harlem its pulse. These are spaces of aspiration and inspiration, of expression and creativity, and of vibrant community.”
Today, guests can see references to those churches in a top-lit gallery with high walls, to those street scenes in the building’s framed windows, and even to the old museum in tables made from repurposed beams from the former building.
Throughout the collaborative process, she noted that Adjaye Associates considered another key element of the new design, the “Inverted Stoop.” Located on the museum’s lower level, this large, descending staircase will serve as a casual, welcoming gathering space and a seating area for live performances and discussions. The Inverted Stoop draws inspiration from Harlem’s abundant brownstones, a feature that has long married private and public spaces across generations.
The newly designed museum will also offer events and curatorial opportunities that were not possible in the old space. As Golden explained, it will provide twice the exhibition space: “Our curatorial team has the freedom to program as never before.”
She added that the galleries will be arranged in varying “proportions, scales, and floor treatments” to accommodate the wide range of works on display. Additionally, artworks will now fill the entire building, using nearly all public spaces. Other, less glamorous but still essential features include a new proper loading dock and freight elevator.
Another crucial element of the Studio Museum is its Artist-in-Residence program, which has been a stepping stone for nurturing some of today’s leading Black and Brown visual artists—such as Kehinde Wiley, Mickalene Thomas, Sanford Biggers, David Hammons, Julie Mehretu, Kerry James Marshall, and Wangechi Mutu—since the museum first opened.
In the new building, the artists in residence’s private studio spaces are situated adjacent to the galleries, and they will be open to the public on select days so that the artists stay connected to the community, audiences, and students of all ages.
That connection to community begins right at the museum’s entrance, which Golden describes as a “single, unified experience” that creates a welcoming and joyful atmosphere. Walking through glass doors, visitors are flanked by a diverse collection of artworks from the 19th century to recent commissions. These pieces highlight the building’s elegance and grandeur, while immediately grounding the visitor in the arts of the Harlem neighborhood.
This feeling is captured in a light sculpture in the lobby’s wall by Bronx-born conceptual artist Glenn Ligon, titled “Give Us a Poem” (2007). The installation repeatedly flashes the words, “ME/WE,” in neon lights, inspired by a speech Muhammad Ali gave during his 1975 visit to Harvard University. When a Harvard student asked Ali to recite a poem for the audience, he replied, “me, we,” a simple yet profound statement that, as Golden said, “connects the individual and collective experience.”
The Inverted Stoop is a gathering place at the museum inspired by the brownstones that can be found all around Harlem.
Photo by Albert Vecerka/Albert Vecerka/Esto
Opening day event on November 15
To commemorate the reopening, the Studio Museum will host a Community Day celebration on November 15 (11 a.m. to 9 p.m.) with activities, performances, and art-making workshops for all ages. Guests can enjoy hot chocolate at the Rooftop Cocoa Bar, share notes and doodles for the community reflection wall (near the Inverted Stoop), or take part in an art session led by multidisciplinary artist Azikiwe Mohammed on the terrace.
Several exhibitions will debut on reopening day, including solo works by visual artists Christopher Myers and Camille Norment, along with From the Studio: Fifty-Eight Years of Artists in Residence, a retrospective highlighting the lasting impact of the Museum’s flagship artist-in-residence program, which has supported the careers of more than 150 artists since its inception in 1968, and an immersive visual timeline of the museum’s journey.
In a full-circle moment, the museum will also redisplay the same exhibit it opened with: Electronic Refractions II, light sculptures by visual artist, activist, and community organizer Tom Lloyd.
As NYC undergoes rapid changes, longtime or native New Yorkers can feel like we are losing a part of our city’s identity. But the Studio Museum’s reopening reaffirms its role as one of Harlem’s cultural anchors along 125th Street.
