We love art galleries and their openings just as much as the next aesthete, but the art world is about more than just exhibitions. Expand your horizons from the fine wine and hobnobbing at the latest vernissage. Here are some of our favorite art-adjacent happenings to look forward to in New York City this fall.

Edges of Ailey (Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, September 25, 2024-February 9, 2025)

“Edges of Ailey” Performances

Alvin Ailey is known as the father of Black modern dance. Six years in the making, the exhibition at the Whitney will include over 90 live dance performances, classes, and engaging talks held in the museum’s third-floor theater. The performance program will showcase the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and Ailey II, along with a diverse lineup of artists inspired by and honoring Alvin Ailey’s legacy.

We’re excited for Deathbed by Trajal Harrell, one of contemporary dance’s most important choreographers blending voguing with post-modern dance. In this project, Harrell explores Japanese Butoh dance from the ‘50s and ‘60s, combined with theories of early modern dance, playing with ideas of memory and culture by weaving two otherwise distinct idioms of dance.

Where: Whitney Museum, third-floor theater
When: Beginning September 25th, tickets on sale now
Buy tickets here

The Art of the Score concert at the NY Phil. Courtesy of NY Philharmonic.

Live Orchestral Film Scores

Duh Dun. The visceral intensity of John Williams’s legendary score for Jaws made Steven Spielberg’s movie a global phenomenon. The titular mechanical shark only appeared in 4 minutes of the movie, yet Williams’s insidious theme maintained tension and terror throughout.

In celebration of the film’s 50th anniversary, the New York Philharmonic will be screening Jaws for three nights with a live orchestra playing its score beneath the silver screen as part of Art of the Score series. Future shows include Elf, Back to the Future, and The Empire Strikes Back all in concert.

Where: Wu Tsai Theater, David Geffen Hall, 10 Lincoln Center Plaza, New York
When: September 26 – 28. Starts at 7pm
Buy tickets here

Renderings of “Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas” Light Trail.
Credit: LETSGO COMPANY, Creative Director: Felype de Lima, Illustrator: Borja Arrufat

Tim Burton Nightmare Before Christmas Light Trail

With a sequel of Beetlejuice in cinemas, it’s the season of Tim Burton. This fall, the New York Botanical Garden will be collaborating with Disney to present Burton’s Nightmare Before Christmas Light Trail for 9 weeks only. The 45min – 1hr paved trail will wind through the garden’s historic grounds, including light installations, interactive video projections, intelligent LED lighting and 3D sculptures of the holiday film’s iconic characters, scenes, and music against the botanical backdrop of the gardens. Bring the kids, because the dazzling night-time light show will be appropriate for all ages.

Where: New York Botanical Garden
When: September 27 – November 30
Buy tickets here

The main hall at Pioneer Works. Photo courtesy of Pioneer Works.

Pioneer Works Returns!

Housed in a former 19th century ironworks factory, The Red Hook arts center Pioneer Works is reopening, heralding a new era of expanded programs and greater capacity.

One of their first events will be the premiere of Voyage Into Infinity by the Brooklyn-based anonymous multidisciplinary artist and performer Narcissister. This is the hometown hero’s first large-scale commissioned performance in over a decade, featuring “physical feats, lo-fi magic tricks and indoor pyrotechnics.

Other events at Pioneer Works to consider among their extensive musical programming include the Ragas Live Festival in October, which promises 24 hours of sublime music, as well as a performance by Shintaro Sakamoto, frontman for the underground Japanese psychedelic rock band Yura Yura Teikoku.

Where: 159 Pioneer Street, Brooklyn

Massive Attack play to tens of thousands of people at the low carbon music and art festival Act 1.5 set up by Massive Attack on the 25th of August 2024, Clifton Downs, Bristol, United Kingdom. (photo by Kristian Buus/In Pictures via Getty Images)

Massive Attack Live

The British trip-hop group Massive Attack is coming to New York for the first time since in 2019 for an outdoor show. They kicked off their European tour in Sweden. The crowd went wild when longtime collaborator Elizabeth Fraser of Cocteau Twins made a surprise appearance, delivering a spellbinding rendition of her ex-lover Tim Buckley’s “Song to the Siren.”

It’s rumored that the founder and sole consistent member Robert Del Naja, also known as 3D, is Bansky, who just went on that rampage with the stenciled animals in London but it might be totally unconnected.

Where: Forest Hill Stadium, Queens
When: October 24, 7:00pm
Buy tickets here

Elbow Bread is slated to open at 1 Ludlow St sometime in October. Image courtesy of Zoë Kanan

Gallery Hopping Fuel: Baked Goods 

Denizens of Dimes Square and Henry Street gallery haunters will soon be lining up for challah croissants, ladyfinger cream cakes, and pletzels, focaccia-ish bread topped with sautéed onions and poppy seeds, at Elbow Bread, the neighborhood’s upcoming hyped bakery. The new boulangerie is founded by Zoë Kanan, the baker behind nomadic pop-up Zoë’s Doughies that specialized in circular baked goods. The bakery will be opening at 1 Ludlow St, the 19th century corner building that hosted the buzzy Club Rhubard exhibition earlier this year. Keep an eye on Elbow Bread’s socials for an exact opening date.

María Magdalena Campos-Pons speaks to participants in Harlem Art Park
Photo: Argenis Apolinario. Courtesy of the artist and Madison Square Park Conservancy

Art and Poetry Walk

María Magdalena Campos-Pons, who had her long-overdue New York survey at the Brooklyn Museum earlier this year, is a photographer, painter, sculptor, and performance artist born in Cuba in 1959 whose santeria-influenced practice grapples with colonialism.

On the morning of September 20, Procession of Angels for Radical Love and Unity will unite artists, musicians, poets, and the public to walk through Manhattan, stopping at sites significant to Black, Cuban, and Cuban American communities. Each stop will be activated by readings from prominent poets such as Richard Blanco, Patricia Spears Jones, and 10-year-old New York Poet Laureate Kayden Hern. The procession will culminate in a Carnegie Hall Citywide concert in Madison Square Park by Grammy-nominated jazz singer Daymé Arocena. 

Where: Meet at  Monument to José Julián Martí, south Central Park
When: September 20th, 9am – 2pm