The Museum of Modern Art’s newly re-designed building (by architect Yoshio Taniguchi) opened in November 2004. Situated in midtown Manhattan near Rockefeller Center and across the street from the American Folk Art Museum, the building uses imaginative materials, a creative application of light, and modern spaces to house its permanent collection and touring exhibitions.

Within the museum you’ll find everything from mass-produced industrial objects from the mid-19th century to the present, displayed in the Architecture and Design galleries, to such masterpieces of modern art as Vincent Van Gogh’s The Starry Night (perhaps the museum’s most popular holding). Another universal crowd-pleaser can be found suspended above the escalators—be sure not to miss Arthur Young’s Bell-47D1 helicopter, one of 3,000 of its kind manufactured between 1946 and 1973.

Special exhibitions, such as the recent Richard Serra retrospective, make use of the building’s outdoor sculpture garden, where weekend crowds can spread out a bit. Adult programming includes a heavy schedule of film screenings, lectures, and symposia, not to mention the adult programming for the younger set—it’s not unusual to find M.I.A. performing at the annual Party in the Garden. Family programs run the age gamut, with events such as Tours for Fours (for children age four and their adult companions), family art workshops, and Watch This! Films for Tweens.

Although the museum does offer free admission on Friday evenings, the ticket line often stretches around the block, and while a lively crowd is great in the garden, it can make for difficult viewing of the museum’s more staggeringly famous artworks from Cézanne, Dali, Monet, Picasso, Pollack, Warhol, et al.

Museum of Modern Art Information