In its latest museum grant announcement, the Institute of Museum and Library Services awarded twenty-one #NYSmuseums $4.3 million in funding from its Museums for America grant initiative.
One hundred and fifteen museums of diverse sizes, disciplines, and geographies will receive support for strategic, project-based efforts to serve the public through exhibitions, educational/interpretive programs, digital learning resources, professional development, community debate and dialogue, audience-focused studies, and/or collections management, curation, care, and conservation. In total, the program’s FY24 awardees will receive $23,361,915 in federal funding.
This year, IMLS saw an increase in MFA grant applications requesting funding for projects related to America250. America250 is the nationwide commemoration of America’s 250th anniversary in 2026 led by the U.S. Semiquincentennial Commission. IMLS is proud to support these institutions as they share America’s history, and where we stand today.
“IMLS remains committed to serving the museum field and furthering the goals of the American public,” said IMLS Acting Director Cyndee Landrum. “The Museums for America program encourages applicants to be creative in their response to challenges, and to envision a bold future for their institution.”
Adirondack Experience, $145,653
The Adirondack Experience will engage with a professional firm to conserve 139 drawings identified to be in urgent need of treatment following a survey of its drawing collection. This project will build upon previous IMLS-funded projects involving treatment of the oils on canvas, watercolors, and artists' sketchbooks. General treatment for most drawings will include both dry and aqueous surface cleaning, humidifying, and pressing, while some others will require more involved treatments such as removing supports, mending tears, and stabilizing iron gall ink. The conservation treatments will be documented in detailed reports including before and after photos; conditions addressed during treatment; the methods used, and high-resolution images. As a result, public access to the collection will be expanded by stabilizing and treating the objects so that they can be safely rotated in exhibitions.
American Museum of Natural History, $190,810
The American Museum of Natural History will improve the care and access of their collections of African and Asian elephant skulls, and African bovid specimens. Project activities will include unifying bovid specimens that are in offsite storage with the specimens in compact storage at the museum’s new Gilder Center; as well as cleaning, rehousing, digitizing, and moving elephant skulls to offsite storage where post-crania are kept. Two part-time conservation interns will provide support to the museum team by carrying out critical cleaning, stabilization, and documentation tasks on the skulls. Museum staff and researchers will experience increased access to frequently used specimens, and the objects will benefit from reduced exposure to key agents of deterioration.
BRIC Arts Media Brooklyn, $200,000
BRIC Arts Media Brooklyn will offer thirty-five to forty, twelve-session residencies per year partnering with New York City public schools. BRIC education staff will work collaboratively with teaching artists, teachers, administrators, and social service providers to design program curricula to strengthen arts and media mastery, develop critical thinking skills, and promote social-emotional well-being. The programs will engage in and enhance subject-area learning in social studies, language arts, and STEM to support meeting Common Core Learning Standards and the New York City Blueprint for Teaching and Learning the Arts. During each two-hour session, BRIC teaching artists and classroom teachers will deliver a custom curriculum that explores historical and contemporary works of art and engages students in hands-on, art-making activities. BRIC will supplement the residencies with BRIC House Gallery exhibition visits, family programs, and an annual exhibition to showcase student artwork.
City Lore, $235,153
City Lore will create exhibitions and programming focused on immigrant communities around the topics of women in the Blues, Cuban music, J’ouvert festival traditions, and the material culture of House Ballroom in the New York LGBTQ+ community. The exhibitions will be held in several locations in New York, Massachusetts, and Florida. Project staff will consult with cultural ambassadors to work with artists and communities and curate exhibitions. Staff will train cultural ambassadors on ethnographic methods to document cultural expression and assist them in establishing relationships with local government authorities. An online toolkit will be developed, which will provide professional information for artists, such as work samples for grant proposals and event production and promotion.
Genesee Country Village & Museum, $188,841
Genesee Country Village and Museum will strengthen interpretation related to the history of enslavement in 19th century New York State. The project will focus on the educational interpretation of four historic buildings on site: the Nathaniel Rochester House, Land Office, Livingston-Backus House, and Quaker Meeting House. Staff will work with interpretive and educational consultants to create content and evaluation plans as well as to train staff on content delivery. Staff will also work with local community partners as well as both local and national subject experts to create and review in-person interpretation, exhibit, audio tour, and school program content.
George Eastman Museum, $249,849
The George Eastman Museum will digitize and provide free online access to a collection of audio and audiovisual recordings. The nearly 600 hours of recordings document the interviews, lectures, and gallery discussions of significant photographers, actors, filmmakers, scholars, curators, and critics who have influenced the study of visual culture over the past seventy-five years. Building on a previous IMLS-funded digitization project, the museum will reformat the recordings, which currently require technologically obsolete playback equipment to access, to open-source digital formats accessible through the museum’s website. The project will support a temporary full-time project processing archivist. The digitization of the recordings will improve long-term preservation by minimizing handling and will allow the museum to provide free online access for the benefit researchers, historians, enthusiasts, and the public throughout the world.
Heckscher Museum of Art, $250,000
The Heckscher Museum of Art will undertake a collaborative effort to produce exhibitions and associated educational programming showcasing major works by LGBTQ+ artists. A community advisory board and a youth advisory board will inform exhibit interpretation and programming to ensure that LGBTQ+ youth voices and perspectives are centered. Exhibitions will include works by LGBTQ+ artists in the museum's permanent collection, a retrospective of American neoclassical sculptor Emma Stebbins (1815–1882), and a photography exhibition created by teen participants on the youth advisory board. A full-time Community Outreach Coordinator will be hired to facilitate the advisory boards, collaborate with the museum's education team to inform school programming, and work with core project team members including a guest curator, exhibition design contractor, and external evaluator. As a result of the project, the museum will build sustainable relationships with the local LGBTQ+ community, support the mental health and well-being of local LGBTQ+ youth, and elevate, contextualize, and interpret experiences of LGBTQ+ figures in American Art History, past and present.
Historic Saranac Lake, $250,000
Historic Saranac Lake will create an exhibit about the history of Saranac Lake and its role as an international center for tuberculosis treatment and scientific research. Informed by an interpretive planning process and a previous design project supported by IMLS, staff will work with exhibit design professionals and humanities scholars to draw connections to topics such as the development of public health in the U.S., the history of occupational therapy, and the evolution of tuberculosis treatment and prevention. The exhibit will be installed in both the home of Dr. E. L. Trudeau and the neighboring Saranac Laboratory Museum. Beneficiaries of the project will include local residents, visitors, students, and members of the academic community.The Intrepid Museum will create accessible and interactive exhibits within seven compartments in Intrepid’s medical facility, known as sick bay. The exhibits will blend storytelling with multisensory elements and advanced augmented reality (AR) experiences and engage visitors with the experiences of medical personnel and their patients. The cross-departmental museum team will partner with the NYU Ability Project, experts in creating accessible environments through assistive technology and adaptive design for people with disabilities. The project team will also engage with a media group that combines producers and AR technology experts. Throughout the project, Disability Advisory Group, self-advocates with a range of lived experience and expertise, will provide continuous feedback on each exhibit element. This project will address an ongoing and documented interest from visitors of all ages and geographic regions in accessing more of the ship's historic areas, of which only 44% are currently open to the public.
Intrepid Museum, $250,000
The Intrepid Museum will create accessible and interactive exhibits within seven compartments in Intrepid’s medical facility, known as sick bay. The exhibits will blend storytelling with multisensory elements and advanced augmented reality (AR) experiences and engage visitors with the experiences of medical personnel and their patients. The cross-departmental museum team will partner with the NYU Ability Project, experts in creating accessible environments through assistive technology and adaptive design for people with disabilities. The project team will also engage with a media group that combines producers and AR technology experts. Throughout the project, Disability Advisory Group, self-advocates with a range of lived experience and expertise, will provide continuous feedback on each exhibit element. This project will address an ongoing and documented interest from visitors of all ages and geographic regions in accessing more of the ship's historic areas, of which only 44% are currently open to the public.
Long Island Museum, $134,334
The Long Island Museum will create a permanent exhibition and associated programs to explore the fight for equal rights in horse-drawn public transportation in the United States. The exhibition will be anchored by a c. 1885 streetcar that will include an accessible entrance for visitors to climb aboard, interact with the vehicle, and examine episodes such as the story of Elizabeth Jennings, a Black school teacher who fought for her right to ride a New York City streetcar in 1854. The project team will contract with a design firm to fabricate exhibition components, develop programs for families, students, and individuals living with memory loss, and make adjustments to the exhibition based on assessment findings. As a result, visitors of all ages and abilities will engage with an immersive and interactive gallery space.
Metropolitan Museum of Art, $250,000
The Metropolitan Museum of Art will develop and launch a suite of public programs tied to the reopening of the galleries dedicated to the Arts of Africa, Ancient Americas, and Oceania. The initiative will activate the collections and ideas explored in the new galleries, create multiple entry points for the museum’s diverse audiences, and incorporate Indigenous perspectives essential to understanding the collections. Project components will include performances and concerts, study days and salon-style discussions, symposia, thematic gallery tours, and additional programs such as art-making workshops, classes for teens, and access programs for visitors of varying abilities. The museum will build upon outreach efforts to civic, social, and professional groups in New York City and the tri-state area. The resulting suite of programs will further develop relationships with source communities at the museum while generating lasting resources for educators, artists, scholars, individual learners, and families.
Museum of the City of New York, $249,920
The Museum of the City of New York will create programs and classroom resources aligned with New York City’s “Civics for All” public school initiative. The museum will convene a paid teacher advisory group to work with a curriculum consultant to develop educational resources for students in grades six through eight. The advisory group will also provide feedback on two new “Civics for All”-themed field trips. In addition, the museum will host several professional development programs for New York City teachers focused on civic engagement themes. To support project activities, the museum will contract with a curriculum consultant, project evaluator, graphic designer, and translation services to translate curriculum materials into Spanish to reach a broader student population. The new “Civics for All”-aligned curricula and field trips will reach an estimated 10,000 New York City students and teachers.
National September 11 Memorial and Museum, $160,069
The National September 11 Memorial & Museum will create an exhibition of children’s artwork of 9/11, which will highlight the experience of children as witnesses to the events of 9/11 through the art they created in the year following. Museum staff will select works from the museum’s permanent collection of more than 800 works of children’s art. For the project, staff will develop an audio tour and online educational resources. To accompany the exhibition, staff will conduct educational public programming. Beneficiaries of the project will include multigenerational audiences, educators, adult visitors who were children on 9/11, and youth visitors.
New Museum of Contemporary Art, $246,718
The New Museum of Contemporary Art will expand and refocus its educational programming to address the need for teachers to meet the New York Department of Education’s Culturally Responsive-Sustaining Education framework, an educational strategy for student-centered learning that uses aspects of students’ race, social class, gender, language, sexual orientation, nationality, religion, or ability to learn about the world around them and connect across cultures. The museum will partner with teaching artists and twelve New York City public high school teachers to develop and implement lesson plans. The museum will then engage 360 teachers in professional development workshops. Ultimately, 2,600 teachers across the city will benefit from access to digital lesson plans that they can implement in their classrooms, and over 78,000 New York City high school students will benefit from art-based instruction, which has increasingly been cut from public schools.
New York Botanical Garden, $249,912
The New York Botanical Garden will implement the second phase of its Therapeutic Horticulture and Rehabilitative Interventions for Veteran Engagement (THRIVE) program to provide horticultural therapy programming for local veterans. In partnership with the Resilience and Wellness Center in the Bronx-based James J. Peters Veterans Administration Medical Center, the garden's Edible Academy will expand services and outreach for participating veterans and THRIVE alums. Program participants will learn about plants and nutrition by growing, harvesting, preparing, and consuming fresh produce with horticultural therapy specialists. The garden will hold a symposium with cultural institutions, horticultural therapy specialists, and veterans' organizations to share strategies and best practices informed by the THRIVE program, and staff will present findings and share information about horticultural therapy intervention for veterans at professional conferences and via new digital resources.
Paleontological Research Institute (Museum of the Earth), $101,976
The Museum of the Earth will expand access to the collection of Cenozoic corals from the Western Atlantic by digitizing specimens and sharing data through online portals and educational resources. Project activities will include photographing 200 specimens and creating 50 illustrated species pages that will be published on the museum’s free, web-based educational portal. The museum will hire a collections assistant and train them in all aspects of specimen digitization and curation. A team of interns and volunteers will be trained to associate labels to specimens, enter information for the specimens in the collections database, and re-box items. This project will enhance the collection’s long-term preservation and accessibility for scientists, students, and the public to understand how coral reefs, which are one of the ocean’s most threatened habitats, respond to environmental stresses.
Rochester Museum and Science Center, $240,302
The Rochester Museum & Science Center will partner with the Ganondagan State Historic Site and the Friends of Ganondagan to offer programming related to the opening of the museum’s Hodinöšyö:nih (Haudenosaunee) Continuity, Innovation, and Resilience exhibit. Curated by a Seneca Knowledge Keeper, and informed by Haudenosaunee community member feedback, the exhibit will explore themes of Haudenosaunee cultural continuity and change, identity, and sovereignty through featured artists and artworks. A series of educational programs featuring traditional Haudenosaunee artistry through artist demonstrations, workshops, and cultural festivals will be planned and carried out. Project staff will provide professional development for staff, docents, and volunteers across the organizations to increase cultural knowledge and awareness about partner collections and resources. In addition to hosting field trips, staff will share online associated lesson plans and educational videos for the benefit of teachers, students, and Haudenosaunee audiences.
Sciencenter, $249,660
The Sciencenter will partner with regional libraries to expand equitable access to hands-on STEM learning by leveraging and supporting public libraries as trusted spaces that offer relevant and engaging experiences. The project team will use input from prior library collaborations and listening sessions to co-create STEM activity kits and establish a learning community with library educators to support locally relevant STEM learning opportunities that address regional challenges. Project activities will include prototyping activities with museum and library visitors, disseminating kits for at-home and library learning, and a developmental evaluation. As a result, the museum will strengthen partnerships to reach new audiences with a focus on rural communities and libraries; regional libraries and families will increase their capacity to facilitate STEM learning; and children will improve science process skills through increased STEM learning and engagement.
Staten Island Museum, $248,057
The Staten Island Museum will build a collaborative approach to the stewardship of the Native American and Indigenous collections in its care. Museum staff will work directly with Lenape representatives to catalog the Lenape archaeology collection and ensure appropriate handling, storage, and interpretation. The collection contains nearly 3,500 artifacts found on Staten Island and surrounding areas, part of the traditional homeland of the Lenape people. The museum will host advisory meetings with Lenape representatives to gain insight regarding the cultural and spiritual significance of the artifacts. The project will support the hiring of a part-time collections assistant and a museum fellow. This project will increase the care of the collection while allowing the museum to make the collection as accessible to the public as possible in a way that respects the heritage and significance of the artifacts.
Studio Museum in Harlem, $200,853
The Studio Museum in Harlem will install an inaugural exhibition in the new building about the life and artistic achievements of Tom Lloyd, that will address Lloyd's career as an artist, community organizer, and museum leader. The exhibition will include every known extant electronic sculpture Lloyd created, as well as works in metal and paper, and will be traveled to three venues along with an exhibit publication. Project activities at the museum will include free, weekly educational programs, art-viewing and art-making workshops, exhibition tours, and public programs for adults. During the museum’s opening year, the exhibition will be featured in free tour programs for all schools in New York's District 5. The project team will partner with institutions focused on underserved populations and addressing needs of their local communities to host the traveling exhibition. The resulting exhibition will be an entry point for arts learning for new audiences and non-traditional museum goers around the country.
University of Rochester (Memorial Art Gallery), $62,955
The Memorial Art Gallery at the University of Rochester will work with a professional conservator to complete conservation treatments on 29 South Asian miniature paintings and drawings. These artworks range in date from the 16th through the 19th centuries and are inaccessible to visitors and very limited to researchers due to their present condition. The conservator will document the treatment in full photographic and written reports, and museum staff will re-mat the works and compile the treatment data for inclusion in the collection object records. As a result, the paintings and drawings will be available to the public, either on display in the Asian Art gallery or made accessible through photographs on the museum website.
Learn more and IMLS Museums for America: https://www.imls.gov/news/imls-awards-over-23m-grant-funding-through-museums-america-program?utm_campaign=&utm_content=&utm_medium=email&utm_name=20240808&utm_source=govdelivery
