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New York City Digital Art Guide

Le Random presents a curated guide to New York for digital art lovers, featuring an Art Walk map and highlighting must-see galleries, neighborhoods and artists that define the city’s vibrant digital art scene.

Outline:

1. Framing NYC by Emily Edelman
2. Planning Your Trip by Josh Yakov
3. Art Destinations by LoVid
4. Local Artists
5. Art Itineraries
6. Resources
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1. Framing NYC

By Emily Edelman

On the D train from Brooklyn to the Lower East Side, I'm lucky when I look up from my phone just in time to see one of my favorite public artworks, the little-known Masstransiscope. It's an analog animation by Bill Brand, who installed and illuminated 220 hand-painted panels in the underbelly of New York. Located in a subway tunnel behind a wall with evenly spaced slits, the persistence-of-vision effect takes place, animating the panels as the train flies by.
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It's sublime: a 300-foot piece of New York art history hidden underground, only accessible to anyone at all who is willing to look up, only functional as an animation with the speed of the train itself. Made in 1980, the piece still captures something essential about the character of New York:
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It's a city of momentum and spontaneity and innovation. 

Digital art might mean screens or projected light to some but the innovation of New York artists transcends mediums. There’s a restless curiosity for all forms of art and a particular hunger to use technology creatively. To expose yourself to art in New York is as simple as looking, accepting art as part of your daily life, the natural surroundings.

What you see in New York is both scrappy and polished, worn and lavish, steeped in history yet permanently in flux. Its underground art scenes flourish as much as its renowned institutions are respected. The city feels like a gravitational center for digital art because it thrives in these contradictions.

New York's digital art is made by artists with a fervent desire to transform our oldest ideas with the tools of today while working in the midst of a metropolis with exposure to new communities, new ideas and new institutions. The excitement here isn’t centered on technology or art alone but on their rich intersections—with each other and the city itself.

Even in the last few years, the city has showcased generative artists on MoMA’s Garden Lobby wall, the roots of AI art with Christiane Paul’s Harold Cohen: AARON at the Whitney and the inaugural Rare Digital Art Festival in 2018. But the city has been prominent in the birth of digital art itself, with one of the first computer art shows at Howard Wise Gallery in 1965, before the seminal 9 evenings by Experiments in Art and Technology (E.A.T.) and MoMA’s The Machine. Today, New York remains as vibrant as ever, scaffolded by an unmatched historical legacy.

New York seeps art, fueled by the power of digital media. Like the Masstransiscope, art is in the city’s very guts—around every corner, just look. It results from the curiosity and impulse of the people that built it, are still building it, haven't started building it yet but might be on their way, and might even be you. This is the thing that makes the digital art scene in New York special and the thing keeping me here: the people.

Visit Adam at HEFT Gallery for a look at artists using systems in fascinating ways. Go to an opening at Nguyen Wahed for a welcoming community of friends spilling out onto the street. Take a studio tour with one of the local artists below. Do a food tour. See live music. Come to karaoke. And you can meet me at the DeKalb Av D train stop for a literal underground art experience!

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2. Planning Your Trip

When to go for art‍

The best times to visit New York for art are the first half of May and early September, when the city’s major art fairs—Frieze and Armory—anchor full, dizzying seasons of gallery openings, events and institutional programming. These weeks are the most active, drawing artists, curators and collectors from around the world. This year’s 2025 May Art Fair Calendar also includes Rhizome World and 7x7.
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NFT.NYC, usually in April or June, also brings digital and Web3 artists into focus, with pop-ups, events and panels across the city.

That said, quieter months like February or late summer offer a slower pace and more room to explore under-the-radar shows. New York’s art scene doesn’t stop—it just shifts.

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Neighborhoods for art

By Josh Yakov

Depending on your agenda and vibe, there are many great places to stay and be in New York. For visitors, start with this map first and stay ideally around where you are planning to be. Can’t decide? We have some recommendations and one place potentially to avoid.
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‍Recommendations

‍‍Downtown East
‍I would ideally stay in the area south of Houston St, east of SoHo and north of Two Bridges. This covers places like Chinatown, Lower Manhattan, Nolita and everything east. Here you’ll find the greatest density of the more avant-leaning contemporary galleries like Various/Artists and Yeche Lange. Zantar by Mitchell F Chan will be on view at Nguyen Wahed in May 2025—a cannot miss. In Dimes Square, there is currently an amazing solo show at Foreign & Domestic by Genevieve Goffman, All the words that came down to meet the body that came up from the ground, which received Artforum’s critic’s pick. See our Art Walks Map for several more galleries and walks in the area: #2 Bowery, #3 SoHo, #4 East Village & Lower East Side, #5 Chinatown, #6 Brooklyn Bridge and #7 Governors Island. All this art may conjure an appetite. I recommend Cervo’s for a drink and/or snacks and maybe a slice at Scarr’s. Finally, just south of Two Bridges is Rhizome World. May 10–11 is the last weekend and the quality of the programming is unmatched. Public Hotel and Citizen M are popular local and centrally located options.
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‍Chelsea
‍If you’re in town for Frieze in particular and want to be surrounded by the city’s more established gallery scene, Chelsea is the place for you with our Art Walk 1. Early May’s weather allows you to enjoy the area to the fullest. After a day walking around The Kitchen, Whitney and Chelsea’s countless galleries, you may be hungry. If you’re near Frieze (The Shed) and the end of The High Line, you’ll end up around the Vessel (controversial, I know). Indulge in any of the specialties at Little Spain Mercado or make a reservation at Ci Siamo between your appointments and viewings. Accommodation will be pricier in this area but the location can make it worth it. If available, we like the Victorian Gothic Hotel Chelsea, built in 1883.

‍Queens
‍For a more off-the-beaten-path stay, Queens offers a nice base, especially around PS1 or MOMI for our Art Walk 9.
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Avoid

Upper East Side
‍With so many options, can you really go wrong? Well, it depends. If you’re looking to explore the contemporary scene with its limited viewing schedules, I would recommend not staying on the Upper East Side or by Museum Mile.

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3. Art Destinations

By LoVid

There’s always an overwhelming amount of art to experience in New York, with digital art on view across the city, from public art to artist-run spaces, music venues, galleries and art fairs. How to narrow it down? We put together a list of venues that we personally follow closely, including many that we’ve worked with over the decades. This is not a complete list because the city always changes; spaces constantly close and new ones open.

Below you will see familiar names due to their specialized programs in media/digital art, like bitforms, Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), Museum of the Moving Image (MOMI), Whitney and Rhizome. Then there are the newer digital galleries: HEFT, Nguyen Wahed and Offline.

But we also aim to spotlight many unfamiliar places—organizations that have been supporting and exhibiting media art as part of their general programming for decades, whether it’s traditional art, public art, music, etc.
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As much as it is important to have places dedicated to specific art forms such as digital art, it is critical for the evolution, appreciation and preservation of digital art to have this work seen and contextualized within the broader contemporary art conversation and history.

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Museums

MoMA, MoMA PS1, Whitney, New Museum, MOMI, Guggenheim, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

‍MoMA and MoMA PS1
‍You’re likely familiar with The Agnes Gund Garden Lobby wall screen, but also check out their Architecture and Design department, where they organize shows like Never Alone: Video Games and Other Interactive Design (2023). Other departments to watch at MoMA include Film, which organizes screenings and live events weekly in their amazing theater, as well as Media and Performance, where curators Stuart Comer and Erica Papernik-Shimizu have shown key exhibitions on video by artists like Joan Jonas and Shana Moulton.

Go to MoMA PS1 in Queens no matter what’s on; it’s always a unique experience. Of note is a permanent video installation by Pippiloti Rist that’s been there for as long as we can remember—a must find!

‍The Metropolitan Museum of Art
‍The Met is an incredible institution. Among the massive collection of history and objects from around the world, the museum has always included digital and media art. In the early 2000s, they acquired Jennifer and Kevin McCoy’s iconic Every Shot, Every Episode, which was recently restored and exhibited. Wonderful curator Lauren Rosati, an expert in sound art and media, has been curating some ambitious and wonderful projects the past couple of years. Her programming includes a commission of multi-channel video work by Jacolby Satterwhite and a program of silent films from the museum’s collection accompanied by live music from experimental musicians such as Ben Vida and Lea Bertucci.

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Public Art

Midnight Moment, MTA Arts & Design

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Midnight Moment
‍Midnight Moment is the world's largest and longest-running digital public art program. Presented nightly to millions of viewers each year, Midnight Moment showcases the work of contemporary artists on one of the most iconic public canvases: the electronic billboards of Times Square. Synchronized nightly from 11:57 pm to midnight over 92 digital displays spanning 41st to 49th Streets, this program brings public art on a monumental scale to New Yorkers and visitors from all across the globe 364 nights a year (watch the ball for NYE). Presenting a new Midnight Moment each month, the program has featured the work of over 100 artists since 2012, including Yoshi Sodeoka, Chun Hua Catherine Dong, LuYang, Anna Ridler, Jeremy Couillard, Cory Arcangel, Zach Blas and many more. So if you’ve never been to New York and must see Times Square, go at midnight when you can bask in the glory of art on a massive scale instead of advertisements.

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Institutions and Festivals

Pioneer Works, BAM Next Wave, Harvestworks, Performa, PWA, Ende Tymes Festival, The Kitchen, EAI, Various/Artists, Rhizome, Eyebeam, Issue Project Room, Roulette, Anthology Film Archives, Artists Space, Canal Projects

‍Pioneer Works
‍Worth the trip (and included below in our Governors Island Art Walk 7)! This is a one-of-a-kind interdisciplinary art institution; check their schedule to see when they have open studios and what shows are on. They have facilities for resident artists who work with technology and science, making PW a rare art institution with a director of sciences, Janna Levin, a Columbia University professor of astrophysics. We can’t think of another art center where you can see Kim Gordon, Nobel Prize winner Venki Ramakrishnan and artist Yehwan Song in the same month. Begin Governors Island Art Walk 7 (below) at Pioneer Works before continuing to Governors Island and Manhattan.

‍Harvestworks Art and Technology Program on Governors Island
‍Speaking of Governors Island and our Governors Island Art Walk 7, Harvestworks is a New York staple. It has supported artists and musicians working with digital media since 1977 with residencies, grants and exhibitions. From spring through fall, their location on Governors Island is an essential visit. It’s a short ferry ride from Pioneer Works in Brooklyn or Manhattan. It’s a special adventure in the city, with several other arts organizations like LMCC and NADA hosting events, music, food, etc. Programming includes artists' open studios, experimental music performances, exhibitions of digital media art and more. Art Season runs from May 17 to November 2, 2025.

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Galleries (Digital Focus)

bitforms, Microscope, Bridget Donahue, Cristin Tierney Gallery, Higher Pictures, 47 Canal, RYAN LEE Windows, PICTURE THEORY, Blade Study, Management, Magenta Plains, 52 Walker, Lisson, Petzel, Green Naftali, Deitch Projects, Dunkunsthalle (appointment only), TIME TO BE HAPPY, Nguyen Wahed, Offline by SuperRare, HEFT, :iidrr, Foreign & Domestic

Visit many of these galleries as part of our Art Walks below.

‍Microscope
‍Part of the Chelsea Art Walk 1, Microscope grew out of the film and video sector of media arts in the New York art world with legends like Jonas Mekas. The gallery has an enviable roster of artists that work in various disciplines around—but not exclusively—the moving image, including Faith Holland, Lisa Gwilliam & Ray Sweeten, Peggy Ahwesh and Ben Coonley.

‍RYAN LEE Windows
‍Also part of the Chelsea Art Walk 1, RYAN LEE primarily shows more traditional art (painting, photography, etc.) but in recent years has included a 24/7-running window projection featuring guest digital artists. The window is mostly visible from The High Line, a must see when visiting the city and also part of Chelsea Art Walk 1. Previously exhibited artists in their window program include Jennifer and Kevin McCoy, Jonas Lund, Laura Splan, Jen Stark, Daniel Temkin, Carla Gannis, Peter Burr and us (LoVid).
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Galleries (Non-Digital)

‍CANADA, Klaus Von Nichtssagend, Derek Eller, The Hole, Luhring Augustine, New Discretions, Ortuzar, PPOW, Asya Geisberg Gallery, James Cohan, Sargent’s Daughters, Perrotin, Marianne Boesky, Andrew Kreps, Situations, Paula Cooper, MILES McERNY, Tanya Bonakdar, Entrance

Because digital art exists in conversation with all art forms, above are galleries that traditionally show little to no digital programming. Visit and ask them about new media and digital art!

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Bonus

By Emily Edelman

‍Masstransiscope
‍This previously mentioned 1980 installation contains 220 hand-painted panels installed in a subway tunnel behind slits in a wall. The rider experiences an animation due to the motion of the train. The work is visible on the D train riding from DeKalb Av station (Brooklyn) to Grand St station in Manhattan. It’s a secret New York art moment if you happen to look up from your phone.

‍Wordhack
‍This monthly presentation series features artists working in art and tech, using old media in new ways or new media in creative ways—but always sharing projects and processes.

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4. Local Artists

One of the great treats of visiting a cultural capital like New York is the abundance of artists that call the city home. These artists represent the latest generation of a family tree stretching back to the birth of the country itself. Their predecessors had their fingerprints all over postwar art history, including the beginnings of Abstract Expressionism in the 1940s and 50s. The ‘60s then saw early digital experimentation and collaboration, Conceptualism and Minimalism, while the ‘70s and ‘80s included the rise of performance and video. From the ‘90s onwards, New York became a hub for emerging technologies in art, making its mark on net art, software, blockchain and AI.
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This curated selection of contemporary local artists below highlights names to keep an eye on for shows, speaking engagements and—if extremely lucky—studio visits in New York.

113, Laurie Anderson, Justin Aversano, Meriem Bennani, Tega Brain, Peter Burr, Dmitri Cherniak, Daniel Canogar, Jeremy Couillard, Eva Davidova, Damjanski, Chris Dorland, Mark Dorf, R. Luke DuBois, Emily Edelman, Ursula Endlicher, Kevin Esherick, Snow Yunxue Fu, Matthew D. Gantt, Carla Gannis, Cory Haber, Claudia Hart, Kurt Hentschlaeger, Faith Holland, Jason Isolini, Sophie Kahn, Victoria Keddie, Josh Kline, Austin Lee, Zach Lieberman, LoVid, Michael Mandiberg, Maya Man, matto, Jennifer and Kevin McCoy, LaJuné McMillian, Manfred Mohr, Luke Murphy, William Pappenheimer, Monica Panzarino, Sondra Perry, Steve Pikelny, John Provencher, Rachel Rossin, Rafaël Rozendaal, Jacolby Satterwhite, Luke Shannon, Yoshi Sodeoka, Molly Soda, Anne Spalter, Laura Splan, Daniel Temkin, Siebren Versteeg, Emily Weil, Emily Xie, Frank WANG Yefeng, Marina Zurkow

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5. Art Itineraries

You made it! You have a broad understanding of the city’s staggering art opportunities and who may be around. Now it’s time to tie those laces tight, get those feet moving, eyes staring and arms crossing.

Fit as much art into your stay as possible with these curated City Art Walks.
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‍1. Chelsea (3km)
Check the calendar for events at the iconic, Vasulka-founded The Kitchen, now temporarily located in West Village. Then visit the Whitney—making sure to catch Christiane Paul’s latest show—before a stroll down The High Line to New York’s modern gallery area. If you’ve come for Frieze, The Shed is just at the end of this walk.

2. SoHo (1km)
New York’s traditional gallery district from the ‘70s to the ‘90s, this walk takes you to a mix of galleries with a digital and non-digital focus.

3. Bowery (1km)
Take in the legendary Harvestworks studio—or reverse this walk and end here for an evening show—before a trip to contemporary gallery, The Hole. Once it reopens in Fall 2025, head to the New Museum and Rhizome before a trip to Cristin Tierney Gallery, specializing in video and conceptual art. Finish at TIME TO BE HAPPY, merging vintage IBM clocks with video art.

4. East Village & Lower East Side (2km)
This digital-focused walk takes you to some of the most emerging galleries in the city: Nguyen Wahed, HEFT and Offline by SuperRare. It also links the present with one of the world’s most important digital-born galleries, bitforms, open since 2001.

5. Chinatown (1km)
A walk through some of the city’s most renowned digitally focused contemporary galleries, from Bridget Donahue to Foreign & Domestic.

6. Brooklyn Bridge (3.5km)
If you’re here for May 2025, start at Rhizome World (161 Water St). Then make an appointment to visit the artist-run Dunkunsthalle in a converted Dunkin' Donuts in the Financial District before crossing the Brooklyn Bridge and finishing at Higher Pictures, a contemporary photography and video gallery. Optionally reverse this walk and continue to Downtown East.

7. Governors Island (4km)
Start in Brooklyn at Pioneer Works, the legendary art and technology non-profit cultural center. Then take a short ferry to Gov­er­nors Island, with art season launch­ing May 17 and ending November 2. Then, see art on a metropolitan scale with another ferry—now to Manhattan—followed by a walk along The Battery to former on-chain gallery Yeche Lange (skip the front desk and use elevator code 17408 to access the 15th floor). Optionally, reverse this course to finish in Brooklyn, especially if there’s an evening event at Roulette Intermedium.

8. Museum Mile (3km)
Almost a religious route, akin to Spain’s Camino de Santiago, this walk—more like a week—covers hallowed ground from MoMA to the Met and Guggenheim via Central Park.

9. Queens (5km)
Get those feet moving from MoMA’s PS1 to the Museum of the Moving Image with an optional extension to Noguchi and Socrates.

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6. Resources

‍Historical shows
‍18 Happenings in 6 Parts (1959)
16 Americans (1959)
Bread & AG Present Literary Evenings (1961)
Computer Generated Pictures (1965), Howard Wise Gallery
Electronic Art (1965)
The Responsive Eye (1965), MoMA
9 Evenings: Theatre and Engineering (1966), 69th Regiment Armory
Systemic Painting (1966)
The machine, as seen at the end of the mechanical age (1968), MoMA
Some More Beginnings (1968)
TV as a Creative Medium (1969)
Software (1970)
Information (1970)
The First International Festival of Computer Art (1973), The Kitchen
Computer Video (1975), MoMA curated by Barbara London
Emerging Expressions (1985), Bronx Museum
Digital Visions (1987)
The Second Emerging Expression Biennial: The Artist and Computer (1987), Bronx Museum
Computers and Art (1988), IBM Gallery of Science and Art
Data Dynamics (2001), Whitney
Inaugural Exhibition (2001), bitforms
BitStreams (2001), Whitney
Ghosts in the Machine (2012), New Museum
Thinking Machines: Art and Design in the Computer Age, 1959–1989 (2017), MoMA
Rare Digital Art Festival (2018)
CADAF (2019)
Harold Cohen: AARON (2024), Whitney
Garden Lobby featuring Refik Anadol and Rafaël Rozendaal (2022–2025), MoMA


‍Labs, universities and more
‍SVA
Columbia Sound Art + Studio Art MFA Departments
NYU ITP
NYU IDM
Parsons (New School)
Pratt
Hunter College MFA
Onassis ONX
School for Poetic Computation (SFPC)
New Museum’s New Inc.


‍To follow
‍NYFA.org
Franklin Furnace mailing list
‍Artforum critics' pick
See/Saw app
‍Observer
Brooklyn Rail
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Art in the Greater New York area
‍Storm King Art Center
Magazzino Italian Art: museum and research center
Opus 40: earthwork sculpture and museum
Dia Beacon
Emerson Kaleidoscopes: world’s largest kaleidoscope—uses screens!—with shows, a kaleidoscope museum and incredible gift shop



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LoVid is one half native New Yorker and one half international transplant; one half color blind and one half tetrachromat. LoVid has been working in interdisciplinary, experimental media, digital, textile, performance, music, and video art for over two decades, primarily in NYC and across NY state. LoVid have exhibited and presented at Nantes Museum of Art, Buffalo AKG, Enter Art Fair Copenhagen, Museum of the Moving Image, Art Blocks Curated, Postmasters Gallery, Honor Fraser Gallery,  And/Or Gallery, Klaus von Nichtssagend, The Jewish Museum, MoMA, The Kitchen and many more. LoVid’s newest textile works can be seen this Spring in NYC’s PICTURE THEORY Gallery viewing room (Chelsea) and mold-processed photography project is up through May at Various/Artists Gallery (Lower East Side). An upcoming generative music 7” record in collaboration with the group MSHR will be released on Various/Artists record label this Spring as well.
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Emily Edelman is an artist, who is deep in the world of algorithmic art, as well as a designer, maker, people gatherer and deck builder.

Josh Yakov is a cultural host focused on art at Tribute Labs and based in New York City.
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‍‍Peter Bauman (Monk Antony) is Le Random's editor in chief.