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Hyperallergic’s newsletter recaps a dense New York art week: Arthur Jafa’s largest survey to date at the New Museum, Taryn Simon at the Guggenheim, Teresa Margolles at MoMA PS1, and union contract fights at three museums, with a strike deadline set at the Whitney.
A stormy week in New York closed out a crowded stretch of Armory Week art events that saw major new exhibitions open at the New Museum, the Guggenheim, and MoMA PS1, while unionized museum staff at three institutions pushed forward contract campaigns, including a strike deadline of October 5 set by the Whitney Museum union, according to Hyperallergic’s New York newsletter.
The largest exhibition of the week was Arthur Jafa’s retrospective “I Am Tony” at the New Museum, described by Hyperallergic contributor Stephanie Wambugu as the artist’s biggest show to date. Occupying two floors of the Lower Manhattan museum, the densely packed survey extends beyond the video work for which Jafa is known, touching on Black music, religion, American cinema, political violence, popular culture, and the Internet. Wambugu, author of Lonely Crowds (2025), identified what she called a trail of “prescriptive esotericism” running between the art, its curation, and its title, and judged that the show’s ambitions were achieved “with mixed results.”
Along Museum Mile, critic Aruna D’Souza reviewed Taryn Simon’s “Father Country I Do Love You”, installed spiraling around the Guggenheim’s rotunda. D’Souza wrote that the sheer accumulation of material itself becomes the spectacle, leaving viewers with strong anecdotes and a sense of how power extends into ordinary life — but also, in her reading, “a sense of helplessness.”
At MoMA PS1, contributor Alex Santana reviewed Teresa Margolles’s “En el lugar de los hechos (At the Scene)”, arguing that the artist’s minimal, distilled gestures attempt to show a system of violence that reinforces divisions of “us” and “them” across artificial borders in the name of capital. Elsewhere, the Museum of the City of New York inaugurated a new permanent exhibition on 250 years of activism and organizing in the city, and the Morgan Library & Museum‘s large tarot exhibition entered its final days.
On the labor front, Hyperallergic reported that unionized staff at the Brooklyn Museum and the American Folk Art Museum were deliberating on tentative agreements proposed in recent days, while the Whitney Museum union set October 5 as its strike deadline.
Why the Union Deadlines Stand Out
The contract campaigns come at a moment when New York’s museums are drawing peak fall crowds, giving cultural workers unusual leverage in negotiations. The October 5 strike deadline at the Whitney is the most concrete escalation of the week: if no agreement is reached, it could produce one of the most visible labor actions at a major New York museum in recent years. The tentative agreements at the Brooklyn Museum and American Folk Art Museum, if ratified, would show a path to settlement without a work stoppage.
The exhibitions themselves also mark a seasonal high point. Jafa’s show is billed as his largest to date, making it a likely reference point for how institutions present one of America’s most prominent living artists. Simon’s rotunda fill and Margolles’s MoMA PS1 solo give critics and audiences sharply different models of politically engaged art to weigh against each other.
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Armory Week and Its Aftermath
: “The exhibition openings and labor news unfolded immediately after Armory Week, the annual cluster of art fairs and satellite events that fills New York’s early fall calendar. Hyperallergic’s Hakim Bishara described this year’s Armory Show as “awfully quiet and downcast,” comparing it unfavorably even to the financial-sector trade show on the floor below. A nor’easter at week’s end further dampened the fair-week bustle.
Other developments reported in the newsletter included a herd of 40 life-sized buffalo puppets migrating through parts of the city for “Return of the Buffalo: Tatanka Owe Akupi” (Lakota for “buffalo trail home”), and news that former MoMA board member Leon Black plans to convert an iconic Manhattan property into a foundation to display his estimated $5 billion art collection. Beijing-based artist Liu Wei was also reported to be returning to New York with new work.
“The largest exhibition of his work to date, its ambitions — which it achieves with mixed results — seem to be to engage in the same themes Jafa has continually mined, this time in even more idiosyncratic and brash ways.”
— Stephanie Wambugu, Hyperallergic contributor
Contract Talks Still in Motion
Several key outcomes remain unresolved. It is not yet clear whether the Whitney union and museum management will reach an agreement before the October 5 strike deadline, or whether the strike will proceed. The tentative agreements at the Brooklyn Museum and American Folk Art Museum are still subject to member deliberation and ratification votes, and no terms have been publicly detailed in the source report. The long-term institutional plans mentioned — including Leon Black’s proposed foundation — also remain in early stages, with no timeline or opening date announced.
Watch the October 5 Deadline
The most immediate milestone is the Whitney union’s October 5 strike deadline; watch for either a announced contract agreement or a strike authorization in the days before it. Ratification votes at the Brooklyn Museum and American Folk Art Museum will determine whether those tentative deals hold. On the exhibition side, the Morgan Library’s tarot show closes within days, the Museum of the City of New York’s activism exhibition is now a permanent installation, and Jafa’s “I Am Tony,” Simon’s Guggenheim project, and Margolles’s MoMA PS1 show continue into the season, with full reviews available at Hyperallergic.
Key Questions
What is Arthur Jafa’s exhibition at the New Museum?
“I Am Tony” is described as the largest exhibition of Jafa’s work to date, spanning two floors of the New Museum and covering themes including Black music, religion, cinema, political violence, and the Internet. Critic Stephanie Wambugu judged its ambitions achieved “with mixed results.”
Why might the Whitney Museum go on strike?
Unionized staff at the Whitney have set October 5 as a strike deadline amid a campaign for a fair contract, according to Hyperallergic. Whether a strike occurs depends on the state of negotiations before that date.
What other museum unions are negotiating?
Unionized staff at the Brooklyn Museum and the American Folk Art Museum are deliberating on tentative agreements proposed in recent days, according to Hyperallergic’s report.
What is showing at the Guggenheim and MoMA PS1 right now?
The Guggenheim is presenting Taryn Simon’s “Father Country I Do Love You” spiraling around its rotunda, while MoMA PS1 is showing Teresa Margolles’s “En el lugar de los hechos (At the Scene).”
How was this year’s Armory Show received?
Hyperallergic’s Hakim Bishara described this year’s Armory Show as “awfully quiet and downcast,” writing that the financial-sector trade show on the floor below seemed lively by comparison.
Source: rss
