West Side Fest 2025

The School for Temporary Liveness reimagines performance through the poetic frame of a school. STL asks: What if we approach performances as invitations to enter into study? Inversely, if we imagine the whole operation of a school as a performance, how does that change the ways we teach and learn, or what we think of as knowledge? When approached as a form that bears the excesses, instabilities, and ruptures of social life, performance—like school—can be an excuse for taking part in dissonant communion. Amid crumbling and defunct infrastructures for assembly, STL Vol. 4 proposes a para-site for renewal, refuge, and possibility.

On July 10-12, 2025 (Thursday–Saturday), The Kitchen presents School for Temporary Liveness Volume 4, consisting of a unique series of performances, sonic convenings, workshops, and conversations with over fifteen artists, alongside a multi-day reading room, participatory window installation, and screening program. Following three prior presentations in Philadelphia in 2019, 2020, and 2023, STL Vol. 4, presented in New York City for the first time and dually broadcasted live on Montez Press Radio, creates a site for emergent and collective study, mobilizing formats for practice, action, and reflection over three days. View full program and schedule here. Free and open to the public with encouraged RSVP.

In celebration of Edward Hopper’s 143rd birthday and in partnership with the Meatpacking District, we invite you to Step into Hopper. In this immersive experience 3D recreations created by Theresa Rivera Designbring Edward Hopper's paintings to life. Get your camera ready and step inside life-size sets of three of Hopper’s most iconic works. Pose on a bar stool in the Nighthawks diner. Enjoy French cafe culture in Soir Bleu (Tillie the Clown will be present to set the scene at select times throughout the weekend). And wander the sleepy streets of 1930s New York in Early Sunday Morning.

The Community Art Jam features work by over 70 community members of all ages in a variety of media.

New York City Scenes features paintings by MKS Adams, Barbara Berger, Debbie Berger, and Kimberly Hall.

As part of West Side Fest, Poster House is opening its archives to the public! Join Registrar Melanie Papathomas and Assistant Curator of Collections Es-pranza Humphrey for a special behind-the-scenes glimpse at the museum’s exceptional poster collection. Participants will gather in the Storage and Conservation Room on the lower level for a preview of select highlights from the upcoming spring 2026 exhibitions.

Space is extremely limited—this intimate tour is capped at 12 participants.

In collaboration with Keio University Art Center, Minato, Japan, Dia presents a selection of film and video works either featuring or realized by Kishio Suga, whose sculptures and installations will be on long-term view at Dia Beacon starting July 19, 2025.

The selection includes Being and Murder (1999), a feature-length, philosophical murder-mystery film that Suga directed on the occasion of his survey exhibition at the Yokohama Museum of Art, Japan, as well as video documentation of his performances and conversations with other artists—Yutaka Matsuzawa, Nam June Paik, and the theater group Tenjō Sajiki, among others—by the Tokyo collective Video Information Center (VIC, established 1972).

Learn how to design a poster in this special hands-on workshop with designer and printer Nicholas Hurd. Participants will look closely at two of the museum’s current exhibitions, Puerto Rico in Print: Lorenzo Homer and Fallout: Atoms for War & Peace, for ideas about how to create a successful poster design. Using collage, stencils, stamps, and pens, attendees will sketch ideas for posters focusing on the relationship between image and type, and consider text hierarchies, composition, color schemes, and effective ways of drawing the viewer’s attention to a message. No previous experience necessary. Nicholas Hurd is a designer and printer at Radix Printing and Publishing Cooperative in Brooklyn, New York. He began his artistic career designing flyers for punk shows in the Bay Area and spent many years working in print shops as a letterpress printer. He has a BFA in Printmaking from San Francisco Art Institute and an MFA from California College of the Arts. Hurd is also an alumnus of the Hatch Show Print internship program. He is an expert in hand-set type and digital design, and continues to design and print posters, books, and printed ephemera with Radix.

Stop by the museum’s Poster History Timeline anytime between 1:30 and 6:30 pm on July 11 during West Side Fest for a special screen-printing activity with The Arm. Visitors of all ages are invited to try their hand at screen printing and create a custom West Side Fest graphic on a complimentary tote bag. No experience necessary—just drop in while supplies last—first come, first served, so don’t miss out!

Teens are invited to Open Studio for Teens, a free artmaking program held on select Fridays. Join contemporary artists and educators to explore and learn new techniques through hands-on artmaking projects inspired by themes and artists in the Whitney’s exhibitions and collection.

Join Assistant Curator of Collections Es-pranza Humphrey for a guided tour of her show From the Bronx to the Battery: The Subway Sun. She’ll be discussing the history and influence of this entertaining (and informative!) PSA series for the New York subway system.

An exhibition of passage, transformation, and resistance featuring new work by twelve early-career, NYC-based artists and collectives. Ranging from painting and film to sculpture and performance, their works explore forces shaping our world: colonialism, migration, and environmental crisis. They search for healing out of historical trauma, investigate the ties between political borders and identity, and embrace the enduring power of generational spirituality in our everyday lives.

Artist and educator Sato Yamamoto will lead an engaging hands-on workshop focused on the art of linocut printing, a relief printmaking technique that combines creativity and craftsmanship. During this immersive session, participants will discover the essential steps involved in linocut printing, from carving their designs to inking the linoleum block, and finally producing their own prints.

Lorenzo Homar was one of Puerto Rico’s most influential graphic designers and is often referred to as the father of the Puerto Rican poster. This guided tour of Puerto Rico In Print: The Posters of Lorenzo Homar will focus on the history of the island as well as on the artist’s biography, providing an important context for his extensive body of work.

This tour will be given in Spanish. Additional Spanish-language tours will be offered throughout the summer.

As part of West Side Fest, Poster House is opening its archives to the public! Join Registrar Melanie Papathomas and Assistant Curator of Collections Es-pranza Humphrey for a special behind-the-scenes glimpse at the museum’s exceptional poster collection. Participants will gather in the Storage and Conservation Room on the lower level for a preview of select highlights from the upcoming spring 2026 exhibitions.

Space is extremely limited—this intimate tour is capped at 12 participants.

Admission to the Whitney is free for all visitors every Friday evening from 5–10 pm. Enjoy art, drinks, special programming, music with Public Records, city views, and more.

Join us for an evening of live jazz inspired by the dreamy vignettes in our current exhibition, Sam Moyer: Woman with Holes. Enjoy the music, relax on our outdoor terrace, and explore the art and immersive soundscapes. Take part in a highlights tour led by our Educators and unwind with a game on beautifully handcrafted stone backgammon boards!

Marwa Eltahir’s 99 Names: My Liberation Is Tied to Yours is an immersive, audiovisual performance examining themes of loss, grief, and connection using imagery from the Afro-Arab diaspora.

Enjoy a free, live concert on the beach at HRPK’s Gansevoort Peninsula by one of New York’s premier modern Latin bands as a part of West Side Fest!

Sonido Costeño is a modern day latin band in New York City. Their high energy music is a creative fusion of latin music and salsa along with other world music and their fabulous concerts transform their club audiences into dance hall performances. Sonido Costeño’s “staying power” is seen by the ensemble’s growing loyal fan base from not only the New York City area (Manhattan, Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens) but also the tri-state area and abroad.

Jazz vocalist, lyricist, and composer Eve Zanni enchants listeners with jazz-infused gems of song traditions from Celtic to Cuban and inspired originals. In Angels & Ancestors she will share original compositions, jazz standards, songs from ancestral stories, and traditions with Isaac Raz and special guests The Bliss Singers! Westbeth presents FREE concerts on the First Friday of every month, featuring resident artists in our community room.

Look & Listen reimagines the Silent Disco that first hit the scene in the 1960s as an immersive sound experience, creating a night of heightened contemplation and sonic socializing.

Through specially curated soundtracks delivered via wireless headphones, visitors are invited to discover new ways to explore three distinct exhibitions at the museum—Fallout: Atoms for War & Peace; Puerto Rico in Print: The Posters of Lorenzo Homar; and Copy/Paste/Print/Repeat: Mike King & the Art of the Gig Poster.

Journey into the astonishing universe of Pilobolus’s Other Worlds Collection, traversing the landscape of the human experience with heart-stopping grace, acrobatic power, and breathtaking artistry.

Standing On The Corner curates and convenes his second annual Bomba Festival on Little Island.

In celebration of Edward Hopper’s 143rd birthday and in partnership with the Meatpacking District, we invite you to Step into Hopper. In this immersive experience 3D recreations created by Theresa Rivera Designbring Edward Hopper's paintings to life. Get your camera ready and step inside life-size sets of three of Hopper’s most iconic works. Pose on a bar stool in the Nighthawks diner. Enjoy French cafe culture in Soir Bleu (Tillie the Clown will be present to set the scene at select times throughout the weekend). And wander the sleepy streets of 1930s New York in Early Sunday Morning.

The School for Temporary Liveness reimagines performance through the poetic frame of a school. STL asks: What if we approach performances as invitations to enter into study? Inversely, if we imagine the whole operation of a school as a performance, how does that change the ways we teach and learn, or what we think of as knowledge? When approached as a form that bears the excesses, instabilities, and ruptures of social life, performance—like school—can be an excuse for taking part in dissonant communion. Amid crumbling and defunct infrastructures for assembly, STL Vol. 4 proposes a para-site for renewal, refuge, and possibility.

On July 10-12, 2025 (Thursday–Saturday), The Kitchen presents School for Temporary Liveness Volume 4, consisting of a unique series of performances, sonic convenings, workshops, and conversations with over fifteen artists, alongside a multi-day reading room, participatory window installation, and screening program. Following three prior presentations in Philadelphia in 2019, 2020, and 2023, STL Vol. 4, presented in New York City for the first time and dually broadcasted live on Montez Press Radio, creates a site for emergent and collective study, mobilizing formats for practice, action, and reflection over three days. View full program and schedule here. Free and open to the public with encouraged RSVP.

Merce Cunningham Dance Company was a longtime resident of Westbeth, creating iconic pieces in the 11th floor studios. For dancers, Cunningham’s spirit can still be felt around campus! In this one-hour, interactive session, dance lovers of all ages will learn a bit about Cunningham’s artistic process with famous collaborators, which often included the use of chance procedures as a creative tool. Participants will enjoy a brief explanation of Cunningham's artistic legacy before learning basic movements from the Cunningham technique and building phrases using chance procedures, like rolling dice.

Stop by the Poster History Timeline for a sticker-printing demonstration with artist Mikey Quackenboss! Try your hand at linoleum-block printing and make stickers inspired by West Side Fest and the museum’s current exhibitions.

More information coming soon!

This special in-person accessibility tour will focus on the exhibition Puerto Rico in Print: The Posters of Lorenzo Homar. Led by Lead Educator and Accessibility Coordinator Jes Hughes, this tour will include a vibrant verbal description of 6 posters as well as the history associated with them, and will allow guests to experience the posters up close. The tour will be enhanced with touch objects of items used in the silkscreen poster printing process. At the same time, ASL interpretation will also be provided on this tour by Inclusive Communication Services.

As part of West Side Fest, Poster House is opening its archives to the public! Join Registrar Melanie Papathomas and Assistant Curator of Collections Es-pranza Humphrey to behind the scenes for a rare glimpse into the museum’s collection. Participants will gather in the Storage and Conservation room on the lower level and get an early look at select highlights from the upcoming Spring 2026 exhibitions.

Space is extremely limited—this intimate tour is capped at 12 participants.

An exhibition of passage, transformation, and resistance featuring new work by twelve early-career, NYC-based artists and collectives. Ranging from painting and film to sculpture and performance, their works explore forces shaping our world: colonialism, migration, and environmental crisis. They search for healing out of historical trauma, investigate the ties between political borders and identity, and embrace the enduring power of generational spirituality in our everyday lives.

Stamps and stencils are versatile tools for creating images, offering a variety of textures and layering effects also found in printmaking. They can be used to form patterns, motifs, and typography, resulting in striking compositions.

In this workshop, participants will not only learn how to use these tools to produce eye-catching graphic images, but also how to create custom stamps and stencils from materials like cut paper, potatoes, sponges, bubble wrap, erasers, lace, flowers, netting, and other easily found supplies. Lear how to achieve remarkable shapes and texture by experimenting with ordinary objects in exciting new ways.

Join us in the gallery to meet exhibiting artist Jairo Sosa and learn about the work in his solo show, Boomerang. While you’re here, enjoy a custom flavor of vegan ice cream made by artist Paul John especially for the occasion. Ice cream will be served starting at 1 pm until we run out.

Boomerang presents an installation of new ceramics-based works by Sosa that navigate personal and communal histories, hope, tragedy, and the nuanced weight of aspiration. Sosa was nominated for the opportunity by artist Hugh Hayden. Learn more and RSVP here.

In collaboration with Keio University Art Center, Minato, Japan, Dia presents a selection of film and video works either featuring or realized by Kishio Suga, whose sculptures and installations will be on long-term view at Dia Beacon starting July 19, 2025.

The selection includes Being and Murder (1999), a feature-length, philosophical murder-mystery film that Suga directed on the occasion of his survey exhibition at the Yokohama Museum of Art, Japan, as well as video documentation of his performances and conversations with other artists—Yutaka Matsuzawa, Nam June Paik, and the theater group Tenjō Sajiki, among others—by the Tokyo collective Video Information Center (VIC, established 1972).

Explore the galleries through in-depth engagements with a single artist or artwork. Each Playsets program includes hands-on exercises that invite participants to see, think, and imagine in new ways. On July 12, Dia educators will focus on the work of Steve McQueen. Free. Recommended for families with children ages five and up.

The High Line gardens are teeming with plants, soil, fungi, and insects that are all working together to make NYC a greener place. Guided by High Line Teaching Artists, families will look closely at the plants on the High Line while learning about the special relationships that help plants thrive. Join us as we create artworks inspired by the beauty we see in urban ecology. To learn more and reigster, please visit this page.

Artists will be hosting open studios throughout the historical Westbeth Artists Housing Complex. Through self-guided tours, take a peek into the inner workings of Westbeth and the artists who live there.

Get a behind-the-scenes look at how a major museum exhibition is created in this exciting design and curatorial tour of Fallout: Atoms for War & Peace. Poster House Executive Director & Curator, Angelina Lippert, and Director of Design & Exhibits, Ola Baldych, will give you their insiders’ perspectives on how departments collaborate on major shows, from research and the development of ideas to installation.

Chelsea Odufu’s Transmissions from the Archive: Unearthing Gold’s Frequency blends artist talk, sonic ritual, and collective reflection to explore our evolving relationship with gold, from sacred material and ancestral memory to currency and colonial extraction. Through personal storytelling, historical context, and the project’s soundscape, Odufu invites the audience to rethink gold as a living frequency and portal to the archive of self and spirit.

Join a free tour of 'Steve McQueen' with Donna De Salvo, senior adjunct curator, special projects, and Emily Markert, curatorial assistant.

Join us for a tour of Stephanie Comilang’s first solo institutional exhibition in the United States, Stephanie Comilang: An Apparition, A Song. The Filipino dessert halo-halo (“mix-mix”) will be served from 2–4pm, followed by an exhibition walkthrough at 4pm. Halo-halo evokes the syncretic sensibility explored in Comilang's works on view, which trace colonial entanglements and diasporic influences.

Interested in learning about Mike King’s career directly from Mike King himself? This West Side Fest weekend, join Mike for a rollicking thirty-minute romp through Copy/Paste/Print/Repeat: Mike King & the Art of the Gig Poster. Hear about how he went from a one-man printer of his own band’s posters to a one-man empire of everyone else’s band’s posters.

Journey into the astonishing universe of Pilobolus’s Other Worlds Collection, traversing the landscape of the human experience with heart-stopping grace, acrobatic power, and breathtaking artistry.

A zine-making, futurist-archive-in-the-making activation, where participants contribute to collective imagining. Participants respond to the guiding questions with a quick zine, using pre-folded paper and materials provided. Finished zines are donated, or photocopied and added to a “zine wall”, or scanned and added to a “collective digital archive”.

Join the New York City AIDS Memorial and Kinfolk Tech for a Community Imagination Workshop at the LGBT Community Center. Participants are invited to dream with the archives to explore the under-told histories of LGBTQ+ communities, and to imagine expansive futures through collaging and zine-making using archival materials. This workshop is presented as part of Portals of Remembrance (May 2025—April 2026), a new exhibition featuring three monuments created by four renowned contemporary artists.

FREE REGISTRATION 

Jarrett Key’s Hair Painting No. 40 is a live performance in the artist’s “Hair Paintings” series, in which they use their hair to create paintings honoring their grandmother, Ruth Mae Giles.

Love Copy/Paste/Print/Repeat: Mike King & the Art of the Gig Poster? Join Mike King himself for an engaging, hands-on collage-making workshop! Participants will dive into the fascinating world of layout, color theory, and composition while manipulating vibrant reproductions of Mike’s amazing posters as both inspiration and source material for a collage-style poster of their own.

Gansevoort Peninsula, which opened in 2023, is the largest stand-alone recreational space in Hudson River Park with its 5.5 acres of incredible public green space. From a sandy shoreline beach with tide pools to a pine grove, pile field and salt marsh, it is also one of the most fascinating sites to learn about local ecology. Shoreline Strolls tours meet at the southwestern corner of Gansevoort Peninsula near the sand bluff. 

During Shoreline Strolls, you’ll have the chance to learn more about these fascinating ecosystems from our River Project team. Grab your binoculars and try to spot some of the shorebirds seen regularly dabbling in our salt marsh, or see if you can spot some of the resident hawks that use the light poles (and sometimes even on the inspiring Day’s End public art installation, which was donated to Hudson River Park by the Whitney Museum of American Art) as a perch to find their next meal.

Their mixed-media sculptural installation Residence Time | The Sea Is History will be brought to life through a 15 – 20-minute poetry session led by Afro-Dominican poet Yaissa Jimenez. This performance will serve as a ceremonial tribute to the orisha Yemaja, embodying the cultural and spiritual significance of the work. The poetry reading will be given in Spanish.

In honor of the many jazz posters on view in Puerto Rico in Print: The Posters of Lorenzo Homar, Poster House is thrilled to host an unforgettable evening of live jazz during West Side Fest with the remarkable Josh Lawrence. Against the backdrop of the Poster History Timeline, Josh will showcase his award-winning sounds in a set in the Afro-Caribbean jazz vernacular, drawing from artists like Dizzy Gillespie, Horace Silver, and Juan Tizol. Prepare for an evening brimming with passion, soul, and electrifying energy.

Soul Summit Music is a trio of Brooklyn based DJs: Jeffrey Mendoza, Sadiq Bellamy, and Tabu. They collaborated 20 years ago to create events around soulful dance music. Those parties turned into a movement that draws huge crowds and fills dance floors for a series of revolving events that have become the most anticipated in New York City and beyond. Outdoor games and hydration stations provided by Topo Chico. A selection of street vendors with food and goods for sale and special giveaways.

Join White Columns for a musical performance by Private Time to celebrate the launch of their new EP Walkable, the latest release from White Columns’ vinyl-only record label The Sound of White Columns (TSoWC). TSoWC amplifies the organization’s long-standing engagement with artist-musicians, with prior releases by Richard Hell/Robert Quine, Malcolm Mooney, Kim Gordon and others.

Journey into the astonishing universe of Pilobolus’s Other Worlds Collection, traversing the landscape of the human experience with heart-stopping grace, acrobatic power, and breathtaking artistry.

Standing on the Corner’s frontman, Gio Escobar, hosts a live recording of his monthly radio show, “Puerto Rican Rumble Rock Radio Offensive”, where you can expect fresh salsa and Latin soul music remixes.

In celebration of Edward Hopper’s 143rd birthday and in partnership with the Meatpacking District, we invite you to Step into Hopper. In this immersive experience 3D recreations created by Theresa Rivera Designbring Edward Hopper's paintings to life. Get your camera ready and step inside life-size sets of three of Hopper’s most iconic works. Pose on a bar stool in the Nighthawks diner. Enjoy French cafe culture in Soir Bleu (Tillie the Clown will be present to set the scene at select times throughout the weekend). And wander the sleepy streets of 1930s New York in Early Sunday Morning.

Participants will practice a traditional Puerto Rican craft highlighted in one of Lorenzo Homar's posters: paper flowers! They can choose to keep their flower or add it to the flower wall.

Kids will have the chance to explore the artistic choices and processes that inform letterpress printing. They will have the opportunity to improve upon their fine/gross motor skills as well as spatial reasoning through the placement of letters and the distribution of ink.

Participants will have the opportunity to highlight a NYC landmark that is important to them. They will be provided with paper with the Subway Sun logo as well as the materials to draw that specific landmark.

The Whitney offers free admission during Free Second Sunday. Visitors of all ages will enjoy artmaking, tours, classes, and other special activities that celebrate Whitney exhibitions and community events. Free Second Sunday also includes free story times with The New York Public Library at 11 am, 1 pm, and 3 pm.

Penny Jones & Co. Puppets have charmed audiences in the West Village with their Old Time interactive puppet theater in an intimate space for young children. The company has appeared on television and all over New York from the High Line to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and BAM. Penny Jones was awarded the Education Award from the Puppeteers of America and is a Westbeth Icon. The story of Peppi will be sure to charm all. Children will be invited to make a puppet after.

Try something new this summer on the High Line. We will bring all our High Line wellness instructors together for one special day to sample Tai Chi, Afrobrazilian Dance, and Fit and Lit for a sampling of everything we have to offer this Summer! To learn more and register, please visit this page.

This special West Side Fest Sketching Nature class offers guided nature-inspired drawing at the Gansevoort Peninsula salt marsh! The Hudson River has inspired great works of art for a reason. Let the beautiful Park views ignite your inner artist! Free to join, all materials provided & all levels are welcome.

A one-of-a-kind storytelling performance follows a lost toy, Catbear, as they travel through the tunnels of New York City on six different subway lines, looking for their owner. Each train has its own story, and Catbear experiences all the sights and sounds of New York City before landing home again.

Create a button featuring your favorite band highlighted in the Mike King exhibit!

In collaboration with Keio University Art Center, Minato, Japan, Dia presents a selection of film and video works either featuring or realized by Kishio Suga, whose sculptures and installations will be on long-term view at Dia Beacon starting July 19, 2025.

The selection includes Being and Murder (1999), a feature-length, philosophical murder-mystery film that Suga directed on the occasion of his survey exhibition at the Yokohama Museum of Art, Japan, as well as video documentation of his performances and conversations with other artists—Yutaka Matsuzawa, Nam June Paik, and the theater group Tenjō Sajiki, among others—by the Tokyo collective Video Information Center (VIC, established 1972).

An exhibition of passage, transformation, and resistance featuring new work by twelve early-career, NYC-based artists and collectives. Ranging from painting and film to sculpture and performance, their works explore forces shaping our world: colonialism, migration, and environmental crisis. They search for healing out of historical trauma, investigate the ties between political borders and identity, and embrace the enduring power of generational spirituality in our everyday lives.

Artists will be hosting open studios and an ART&CRAFT&VINTAGE MARKET throughout the historic Westbeth Artists Housing Complex. Through self-guided tours, take a peek into the inner workings of Westbeth and the artists who live here.

Join the Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art at CUE Art for a free family art activity. Inspired by mandalas in the Rubin collection, create your own mandala while reflecting on the spectrum of human emotions. This activity is designed to create a memorable intergenerational experience for adults and children alike.

Artists will be hosting open studios throughout the historical Westbeth Artists Housing Complex. Through self-guided tours, take a peek into the inner workings of Westbeth and the artists who live there.

Journey into the astonishing universe of Pilobolus’s Other Worlds Collection, traversing the landscape of the human experience with heart-stopping grace, acrobatic power, and breathtaking artistry.

Join us for a tour of Stephanie Comilang’s first solo institutional exhibition in the United States, Stephanie Comilang: An Apparition, A Song. The Filipino dessert halo-halo (“mix-mix”) will be served from 2–4pm, followed by an exhibition walkthrough at 4pm. Halo-halo evokes the syncretic sensibility explored in Comilang's works on view, which trace colonial entanglements and diasporic influences.

Poster House is dedicated to showcasing the history, culture, and design of posters—but did you know that some poster artists were also children’s book illustrators? Join Poster House for Storytime: Rare Print, an interactive reading of a unique children’s book featuring striking and fantastical illustrations.

Want to hear some good vibrations? This sound show explores how sound is made and how we hear it. Everyone will be shocked as we create a dinosaur roar with simple materials. Explore the science of speakers with us as we create a funky disco show with magnets and your skull! You’ll really “rock out” with this supersonic audio experience.

Understand the use of color (CMYK and Single Channel) in printing through screen printing! Participants will also have the opportunity to try their hands at screen printing and print some of the posters featured at Poster House!