Friday ushered in the long-awaited rebirth of the Whitney Museum of American Art with a ribbon-cutting ceremony attended by FLOTUS herself. Right on the High Line at Gansevoort Street, the new building, designed by architect Renzo Piano, has already been widely celebrated. Its 50,000 square feet of gallery space has been called “amazingly comfortable,” an art paradise where exhibitions look better than they would elsewhere.
You’re no doubt feeling pretty left out if you missed the opening festivities, but guess what? This is New York, where the social-media literate don’t just look at a piece of art, they take a picture, filter it, and stick it on Instagram. You can visit the place without ever leaving the comfort of that train that stalled mercifully above ground. Here, then, are the top 15 most-Insta’d things from the new Whitney.
15. Joe de Feo’s The Rose
14. Chuck Close’s Phil/Bam
13. Jasper John’s Three Flags
12. Robert Gober’s Untitled
11. Marisol’s Women and Dog
10. Claes Oldenburgs’ Giant Fagends
9. Feliz Gonzalez-Torres’ Untitled
8. Nam June Paik’s V-yramid
7. Colorful chair terrace
6. Barbara Kruger’s Untitled (We Don’t Need Another Hero)
5. Peter Saul’s Saigon
4. Rooftop terrace
3. Jean-Michel Basquiat’s Hollywood Africans
2. George Segal’s Walk, Don’t Walk
1. Glenn Ligon’s Rückenfigur