CULTURE
Odds are if you like comics or video games, you've got an interest in more aspects of the popular arts. And, methinks if you like anime or manga, you've got a fascination with additional elements of Japanese culture. Discover some New York City institutions that fit these bills right here, as well as some other quirky NYC museums worth a peek. Plus, as a bonus, we've got a few real life locations for you to check out that have been used as backdrops in television and film. (It's kinda cultural.) Submit an institution here.
Museums and Institutions | As Seen On TV
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ASIA SOCIETY 725 Park Ave New York, NY 10021 |
Asia Society was founded in 1956 by John D. Rockefeller III. Initially established to promote greater knowledge of Asia in the US, Asia Society now works to exchange ideas both ways. Its events, exhibits, and presentations aim to enhance dialogue, encourage creative expression, and generate new ideas across the fields of arts and culture, policy and business, and education. Map | Website |
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BROOKLYN CHILDREN'S MUSEUM 145 Brooklyn Ave Brooklyn, NY 11213 |
A pioneer in education, the Brooklyn Children's Museum was the first museum created expressly for children when it was founded in 1899. Its success sparked the creation of similar institutions around the globe, and today the museum continues as a world-class institution with community roots. With continual expansion and new exhibits, the museum is both the world's oldest and the world's newest children's museum. Map | Website |
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CHILDREN'S MUSEUM OF MANHATTAN 212 West 83rd St New York, NY 10024 |
The Children's Museum of Manhattan inspires children and families to learn about themselves and our culturally diverse world through an environment of interactive exhibitions and programs. The museum's programs and exhibits are designed to address the multiple ways children learn and to help parents understand and support their child's development. Map | Website |
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COOPER-HEWITT NATIONAL DESIGN MUSEUM 2 East 91st St New York, NY 10128 |
This Smithsonian museum is the only museum in the nation devoted exclusively to historic and contemporary design. Presenting examples of forward-thinking design in all its forms -- urban, ecological, commercial, architectural, digital, industrial, typographical, etc. -- its collection is international in scope and extends from one-of-a-kind to mass-produced items. It may be the wonkiest museum in the world. It is located in the former home of Andrew Carnegie. Map | Website |
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DONALD KEENE CENTER OF JAPANESE CULTURE 507 Kent Hall, MC 3920 Columbia University New York, NY 10027 |
Founded in 1986 at Columbia University, the Donald Keene Center of Japanese Culture was established in honor of Professor Donald Keene, an internationally renowned scholar, teacher, and interpreter of Japanese literature and culture. The Keene Center's operations encompass a variety of activities, including lectures, symposia, exhibitions, academic fellowships, visiting fellows, and a translation prize program. Map | Website |
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HARBOR DEFENSE MUSEUM 230 Sheridan Loop Brooklyn, NY 11252 |
Metropolitan New York's military museum. Nestled in the heart of Fort Hamilton in Bay Ridge, the Harbor Defense Museum's mission is to preserve the history and evolution of New York City's coastal defense systems. The Harbor Defense Museum's collection of military artifacts runs from the Revolutionary War to World War II. Map | Website |
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INTREPID SEA, AIR & SPACE MUSEUM West 46th St & 12th Ave New York, NY 10036 |
The Intrepid Museum, opened in 1982, is centered on the aircraft carrier CVS-11 Intrepid, a ship which saw duty during WWII, Vietnam, and the Cold War. Visitors can tour the expanse of the Intrepid as well as the over 30 combat aircraft -- including an F-14 Tomcat, F-16 Fighting Falcon, A-12 Blackbird, AV-8A Harrier, TBM-3E Avenger, and MiG-15 -- in its collection. Map | Website |
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JAPAN SOCIETY 333 East 47th St New York, NY 10017 |
Since 1907, Japan Society has sought to bring the people of Japan and the United States closer together through mutual understanding, appreciation, and cooperation. Today, Japan Society is a world-class, multidisciplinary hub for global leaders, artists, scholars, educators, and English and Japanese-speaking audiences. More than 100 events -- from executive summits, to screenings, gallery shows, to language lessons -- are presented each year. Map | Website |
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MUSEUM OF COMIC AND CARTOON ART 594 Broadway Suite 401 New York, NY 10012 |
MoCCA is dedicated to the collection, preservation, study, and display of comic and cartoon art. It is the educational mission of the museum to promote the understanding and appreciation of comic and cartoon art as well as to detail and discuss the artistic, cultural, and historical impact of the art form. Its collection covers animation, anime, cartoons, comic books, comic strips, gag cartoons, political illustrations, caricatures, graphic novels, sports cartoons, and computer generated art. Map | Website |
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MUSEUM OF CHINESE IN AMERICA 215 Centre St New York, NY 10013 |
Founded in 1980, the Museum of Chinese in America is dedicated to preserving and presenting the history, heritage, culture, and diverse experiences of people of Chinese descent in the United States. Through its work, the museum not only encourages the understanding and appreciation of Chinese American arts, culture, and history, but it also informs, educates and engages visitors about Chinese American history that is in the making. Map | Website |
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MUSEUM OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK 1220 5th Ave New York, NY 10029 |
The Museum of The City of New York's mission is to explore the past, present, and future of our city and to celebrate its heritage of diversity, opportunity, and perpetual transformation. A variety of exhibitions, public programs, and publications all investigate what gives New York City its singular character. The Museum of The City of New York's collection spans over 1.5 million objects and images from its very origins to modern day. Map | Website |
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MUSEUM OF THE MOVING IMAGE 3601 35th Ave Long Island City, NY 11106 |
The Museum of the Moving Image advances the public understanding and appreciation of the art, history, technique, and technology of film, television, and digital media. It does so by collecting, preserving, and providing access to moving-image related artifacts, screening significant films and other moving-image works, presenting exhibitions of artifacts, artwork, and interactive experiences, and offering educational and interpretive programs to students, teachers, and the general public. Map | Website |
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MUSEUM OF SEX 233 5th Ave New York, NY 10016 |
The Museum of Sex seeks to preserve and present the history, evolution, and cultural significance of human sexuality. Since opening in 2002, the museum's permanent collection has grown to over 15,000 artifacts, including works of art, photography, clothing and costumes, technological inventions, and historical ephemera. The museum was built in an area of New York formerly known as the "Tenderloin", a district of NYC made notorious by the 19th century for its bordellos, dance halls, theaters, and saloons. Map | Website |
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NEW YORK CITY FIRE MUSEUM 278 Spring St New York, NY 10013 |
The New York City Fire Museum houses one of the nation's largest collections of fire related art and artifacts from the late 18th century to the present. Among its holdings are painted leather buckets, helmets, parade hats and belts, lanterns and tools, pre Civil War hand-pumped fire engines, horse-drawn vehicles, and early motorized apparatus. The New York City Fire Museum is located in a renovated 1904 firehouse. Map | Website |
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NEW YORK CITY POLICE MUSEUM 100 Old Slip New York, NY 10005 |
The New York City Police Museum gives visitors an insider's look at the history and traditions of the largest police force in the country and its role in the history of New York City. With artifacts that date back to the island's Dutch settlers, visitors can inspect the impact of the NYPD over the last three centuries. In addition to exhibits on the past of the NYPD, the badges of every officer who has fallen in the line of duty since 1857 are enshrined on the museum's walls. Map | Website |
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NEW YORK GO CENTER 323 East 52nd St New York, NY 10022 |
The New York Go Center was created to foster knowledge and appreciation of the art of Go and to promote international friendship through the game. The New York Go Center was founded by Japanese Go player Iwamoto Kaoru, who sought to use the game as a way to promote peace and global understanding after witnessing the atom bombing of Hiroshima in August 1945. Go, for the unfamiliar, is a 4,000 year-old strategy board game. Map | Website |
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NEW YORK HALL OF SCIENCE 47-01 111th St Queens, NY 11368 |
Built initially as a pavilion for the 1964 World's Fair, the New York Hall of Science is now a hands-on science and technology center. Since 1986, NYSCI's mission has been to convey excitement and understanding of science and technology to children, families, and teachers through creative, participatory ways to learning. One of NYSCI's key exhibits is its rocket park, a collection of rockets and spacecraft that were state-of-the-art at the time of the New York World's Fair and helped initiate the space race. Map | Website |
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NEW YORK TRANSIT MUSEUM Boerum Pl & Schermerhorn St Brooklyn, NY 11201 15 Vanderbilt Ave New York, NY 10017 |
The New York Transit Museum is the largest museum in the United States devoted to urban public transportation history. It explores the development of the greater New York Metropolitan region's transit system through presentations of exhibitions, tours, educational programs, and workshops dealing with the cultural, social, and technological history of public transportation. The museum is housed in a historic 1936 IND subway station in Brooklyn Heights and also operates a gallery annex in Grand Central Terminal, located just off the Main Concourse next to the Station Master's Office, that presents rotating exhibits. Map 1 | Map 2 | Website |
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NOGUCHI MUSEUM 9-01 33rd Rd Long Island City, NY 11106 |
The Noguchi Museum, opened in 1985, presents a comprehensive collection of Japanese American artist and architect Isamu Noguchi's (1904-1988) works in stone, metal, wood, and clay, as well as models of select public projects and gardens. Noguchi's sculptures appear in cities from Tokyo, to Paris, to throughout NYC. Map | Website |
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THE PALEY CENTER FOR MEDIA 25 West 52nd St New York, NY 10019 |
The Paley Center for Media broaches discussions about the cultural, creative, and social significance of television, radio, and emerging media platforms for the professional community and media-interested public. The Paley Center has an international collection of nearly 150,000 programs covering almost 100 years of television and radio history, and, throughout the year, it hosts a range of events with influential newsmakers, journalists, writers, directors, producers, and actors which examine the creative process behind great entertainment. Map | Website |
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SKYSCRAPER MUSEUM 39 Battery Pl New York, NY 10280 |
The Skyscraper Museum celebrates NYC's rich architectural heritage and examines the historical forces and individuals which have shaped its successive skylines. Through exhibitions, programs, and publications, the museum explores tall buildings as objects of design, products of technology, sites of construction, investments in real estate, and places of work and residence. Map | Website |
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SOUTH STREET SEAPORT MUSEUM 12 Fulton St New York, NY 10038 |
The South Street Seaport Museum preserves and interprets the history of New York City as a world port. Designated by Congress as America's National Maritime Museum in 1998, the museum is comprised of over 30,000 square feet of exhibition space and educational facilities in NYC's largest concentration of restored early 19th century commercial buildings. The museum is also home to the nation's largest fleet of privately maintained historic vessels. These vessels represent a range of craft typical of the kinds of cargo ships and working vessels that filled New York Harbor in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Map | Website |
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TENRI CULTURAL INSTITUTE 43A West 13th St New York, NY 10011 |
The Tenri Cultural Institute is a non-profit organization with a mission to promote the study of the Japanese language and the appreciation of international art. The institute offers both short- and long-term language classes and plays host to over 100 musical and dance performances a year. Its gallery space has presented the works of artists from both New York and Japan -- as well as Europe, Asia, and Africa. Map | Website |
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BROADWAY AND 72ND SUBWAY STATION Broadway & 72nd St New York, NY 10023 |
In Die Hard With A Vengeance, John McClane and Zeus Carver must race to pick up a pay phone at the Broadway and 72nd Street Subway Station as part of Simon Gruber's game. When they reach the phone, Gruber poses this riddle, "As I was going to St. Ives, I met a man with seven wives. Every wife had seven sacks, every sack had seven cats, every cat had seven kittens. Kittens, cats, sacks, and wives, how many were going to St. Ives?" Map |
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EMPIRE STATE BUILDING 350 5th Ave New York, NY 10018 |
In the Doctor Who episode "Daleks In Manhattan", the Daleks hatch a cunning plan involving pig slaves, squid faces, and fixing panels of something called Dalekanium onto the tip of the Empire State Building. While much of the action in this episode takes place in and on top of the Empire State Building, it's all make believe -- the whole thing actually shot in Cardiff in the UK. Map | Website |
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GHOSTBUSTERS FIREHOUSE 14 North Moore St New York, NY 10013 |
Hook and Ladder Company No. 8 has a very special claim to fame. Established in 1865, they took up residence in their current building in 1912, and in 1984, their firehouse was used in Ivan Reitman's Ghostbusters. You can walk by Hook and Ladder Company No. 8 and the building still looks much as it did when it was the Ghostbusters HQ. Just don't ask to slide down their fire pole. Map |
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GREYSHOT ARCH Central Park West Between 61st & 62nd Sts New York, NY 10023 |
Constructed in 1860, the Greyshot Arch is faced with ornamental Westchester Country variegated gneiss. The balustrade, or railing, is made of New Brunswick sandstone and carved with a fleur-de-lis pattern. The vaulted archway is lined with Philadelphia red brick. It is where Rob and Beth seek shelter in the final scene of Cloverfield. Map | Website |
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OHEKA CASTLE 135 West Gate Dr Huntington, NY 11743 |
Oheka Castle was the country home of financier and philanthropist Otto Hermann Kahn. Built by Kahn between 1914 and 1919, it was and remains the second largest private home in the United States. In the USA Network's Royal Pains, it is used as the home of German nobleman Boris Kuester von Jurgens-Ratenicz. Oheka Castle also served as partial inspiration for Gatsby's estate in F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, and in Citizen Kane, Oheka was used in some shots to portray the fictional Xanadu. Map | Website |
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PETER PARKER'S BUS RUN Queens Blvd & 44th St Sunnyside, NY 11104 |
At the start of the first Sam Raimi Spider-Man movie, Peter Parker runs through these streets while trying to catch his school bus. It doesn't work out so well. Denis Leary's Rescue Me periodically shoots in this neighborhood as well. Map |
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SILVERCUP STUDIOS 42-22 22nd St Long Island City, NY 11101 |
Silvercup Studios is the largest film and television production facility in New York City. It has been operating since 1983 in what was formerly the Silvercup Bakery. TV series and movies which have been shot inside Silvercup include 30 Rock, Gangs of New York, Mad Men, Mickey Blue Eyes, Sex and The City, and The Sopranos. The final fight in Highlander takes place atop the building, with the neon Silvercup sign clearly visible. Map | Website |
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WNYX OFFICE 1450 Broadway New York, NY 10018 |
NewsRadio -- staring Dave Foley, Maura Tierney, and Phil Hartman -- was set on the 14th floor of the fictitious Criterion Building at 1450 Madison Avenue. In reality, the show was made in LA and exterior shots of the building at 1450 Broadway were used in establishing shots of the Criterion. It is of no relation to NYC's Commodore Criterion Building. Map |