Whitney Museum Partners with Public Records to Bring Music to its Terraces and Theater During Free Friday Nights

Photograph by Filip Wolak

The Whitney Museum of American Art is partnering with Brooklyn-based performance venue and community space Public Records to bring music to its popular Free Friday Nights initiative, which provides free admission to the Museum from 5–10 pm every Friday. Public Records will present music on the Museum’s iconic terraces—which offer views of the Statue of Liberty, Empire State Building, and more—and in its theater at select Free Fridays Nights over the summer. This music partnership adds to the robust offerings at the Museum each Friday, including performances, world-class exhibitions of contemporary American art, cocktails with views at its Studio Bar, and more. While admission to the Whitney is free on Friday nights, tickets are required, and registering in advance is strongly encouraged.

The Public Records partnership kicks off on Friday, July 12 with music by bassoonist and composer Joy Guidry. Guidry’s electronic and ambient sounds are blended with elements of jazz and soul and are inspired by her early exposure to gospel music. Guidry is an experimental and versatile improviser whose style infuses storytelling and the intricacies of life to create unique and daring new works.

The July 12 inaugural performance of this partnership coincides with the first night of the second annual West Side Fest. A weekend-long celebration of arts and culture, West Side Fest takes place at 20 cultural organizations located along the West Side of Manhattan and includes free admission days, special programming, artmaking for all ages, and more.

On Friday, July 19, the Whitney welcomes Laraaji, a multi-instrumentalist musician specializing in piano, zither, and mbira, to keep the vibrant energy going at Free Friday Nights. Laraaji will combine the tones of the zither with ambient notes to create a celestial music performance at the Museum. The next performance in this series will happen on Friday, August 9, and feature percussion duo NOMON, formed by sisters Shayna Dunkelman and Nava Dunkelman. NOMON draws on their passion for experimental, industrial, contemporary and electronic music to develop intricate musical arrangements of various instruments. This August 9 Free Friday Night will be one of the last chances to see Whitney Biennial 2024: Even Better Than the Real Thing in its entirety before it closes on Sunday, August 11.

In addition to seeing the landmark Whitney Biennial, Free Friday Nights offers visitors the opportunity to explore all of the special exhibitions on view, including the recently opened Survival Piece #5: Portable Orchard and Wanda Gág’s World. Visitors can also interact with CENTO, the beloved AR “creature” that hovers above the Whitney terraces.

More event details about the Public Records performance series at Free Friday Nights will become available online as they are confirmed. To stay updated, please visit whitney.org/events. While general admission to the Museum is free on Friday nights from 5–10 pm, tickets are still required and capacity is limited. Advance booking is strongly recommended and tickets can be reserved at whitney.org/tickets.

Special events, programs, exhibition-related performances, and film screenings may require additional tickets. For more information on these offerings, please visit whitney.org/events.

Free Friday Nights and another Whitney initiative, Free Second Sundays, both aim to reduce barriers to access, removing admission fees and offering programs that are entry points for anyone interested in visiting. Photo and video assets from previous Free Friday Nights and Second Sundays at the Whitney can be found at whitney.org/press/free-days-and-nights.

PROGRAM SUPPORT

Free Friday Nights are generously supported by Jen Rubio and Stewart Butterfield and Paul Arnhold and Wes Gordon.

Generous support for Second Sundays is provided by Art Bridges Foundation’s Access for All program.

ABOUT THE WHITNEY

The Whitney Museum of American Art, founded in 1930 by the artist and philanthropist Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (1875–1942), houses the foremost collection of American art from the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Mrs. Whitney, an early and ardent supporter of modern American art, nurtured groundbreaking artists when audiences were still largely preoccupied with the Old Masters. From her vision arose the Whitney Museum of American Art, which has been championing the most innovative art of the United States for ninety years. The core of the Whitney’s mission is to collect, preserve, interpret, and exhibit American art of our time and serve a wide variety of audiences in celebration of the complexity and diversity of art and culture in the United States. Through this mission and a steadfast commitment to artists, the Whitney has long been a powerful force in support of modern and contemporary art and continues to help define what is innovative and influential in American art today.

Whitney Museum Land Acknowledgment
The Whitney is located in Lenapehoking, the ancestral homeland of the Lenape. The name Manhattan comes from their word Mannahatta, meaning “island of many hills.” The Museum’s current site is close to land that was a Lenape fishing and planting site called Sapponckanikan (“tobacco field”). The Whitney acknowledges the displacement of this region’s original inhabitants and the Lenape diaspora that exists today.

As a museum of American art in a city with vital and diverse communities of Indigenous people, the Whitney recognizes the historical exclusion of Indigenous artists from its collection and program. The Museum is committed to addressing these erasures and honoring the perspectives of Indigenous artists and communities as we work for a more equitable future. To read more about the Museum’s Land Acknowledgement, visit the Museum’s website.

VISITOR INFORMATION

The Whitney Museum of American Art is located at 99 Gansevoort Street between Washington and West Streets, New York City. Public hours are Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday, 10:30 am–6 pm; Friday, 10:30 am–10 pm; and Saturday and Sunday, 10:30 am–6 pm. Closed Tuesday. Visitors eighteen years and under and Whitney members: FREE. The Museum offers FREE admission and special programming for visitors of all ages every Friday evening from 5–10 pm and on the second Sunday of every month.