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Wallach Art Gallery

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Wallach Art Gallery

Columbia University's premier gallery. Free and open to the public. The Miriam and Ira D.

Wallach Art Gallery advances Columbia University's historical, critical, and creative engagement with the visual arts. Serving as both a laboratory and a forum, The Wallach Art Gallery offers opportunities for curatorial practice and discourse, while bridging the diverse approaches to the arts at the University with a welcome broader public. We present projects that meet one or more of the followi

ng criteria:

---Are organized by graduate students and faculty in Art History & Archaeology or by other Columbia scholars,
---Focus on the contemporary artists of our campus, or
---Present new scholarship on University special collections. Established in 1986, The Wallach Art Gallery is the University's premier visual arts space, presenting numerous critically acclaimed exhibitions, a dynamic range of programming, and publications that have made lasting contributions to scholarship. Since its beginning the gallery has presented exhibitions that examine a broad range of cultures, time periods, and styles, some of which have traveled to other national and international venues. The Wallach Art Gallery also presents projects that animate other university spaces as opportunity arises. The Wallach Art Gallery operates in close relationship to the Department of Art History and Archaeology, School of the Arts, and the university Libraries, particularly Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library.

06/22/2026

Children's Art Carnival: The Making of Contemporary Artists

06/17/2026

Please join us during Manhattanville Community Day on June 27, 2026, for an in-depth discussion of the Children’s Art Carnival in Harlem, the community art center at the heart of the current Wallach exhibition “Children’s Art Carnival in Harlem: The Making of Contemporary Artists” (June 26–September 13, 2026).

Exhibition curator Souleo, joins two current Carnival instructors, Michael A. Cummings and Tomo Mori, as well as the organization's co-chair of the Board of Directors, Michael Unthank, for a lively discussion of the impact the Children's Art Carnival has had on their own lives and careers. They will also offer perspectives on the qualities that have made the Carnival an important cultural resource since it originally opened in 1969 as an outreach program of the Museum of Modern Art.

Souleo is a curator, writer, impresario, consultant, and muse who documents and amplifies the stories of emerging and underrepresented artists and creative figures. Children’s Art Carnival in Harlem: The Making of Contemporary Artists is his most recent exhibition.

A Harlem resident for more than fifty years, Michael A. Cummings is a leading figure in contemporary quiltmaking, known for his vivid fabric collage compositions that celebrate the African American experience through historical, cultural, philosophical and mythical realms.

Tomo Mori is a Harlem-based painter and fiber artist. Currently a resident artist at the Children’s Art Carnival, her work has been shown at The Golden Thread 2025, Scope Miami, FiveMyles, and the Newark Museum.
Michael Unthank currently serves as co-chair of the Board of Directors for the Children’s Art Carnival. He has built a career in support of community based artistic expression and development.

Wallach Talks: “Perspectives on the Children's Art Carnival”
Saturday, June 27, 2026, 2–3 pm,
Wallach Art Gallery
Lenfest Center for the Arts | Sixth Floor
615 W 129th Street, New York

._cummings

06/10/2026

For the fourth iteration of its "Uptown Triennial" series, Wallach Art Gallery is pleased to present “The Children’s Art Carnival in Harlem: The Making of Contemporary Artists,” an exhibition of the work produced by artists affiliated with a community art center that emphasizes creative freedom, experimentation, and communal bonds.

Originally a program of the Museum of Modern Art, the Children's Art Carnival’s foray into Harlem was led by artist and art educator Betty Blayton-Taylor (1937-2016), who expanded the outreach program into an independent community art center in Central Harlem in 1974.

Blayton-Taylor shaped the Carnival's mission to foster self-expression and social awareness, creating a space where Black identity and culture were taught alongside technique. Together, students, interns, and instructors participated in art-making that centered personal discovery within a supportive creative environment.

Artists in the exhibition:

Armando Alleyne
Tomie Arai
Jean-Michel Basquiat
Milagros Batista
Betty Blayton
Brad Brewer
Lenore Browne
Élan Cadiz
Rocco Candela-Michelus
Carlos Corona
Michael A. Cummings
Carmen L. de Jesús
Jonathan Finlayson
Janet Olivia Henry
robin holder
Elisabeth Kley
Michael Macioce
Steve Mayo
Dindga McCannon
Tomo Mori
Sana Musasama
Senga Nengudi
Ademola Olugebefola
Dionis Ortiz
José Ortiz
Tschabalala Self
Beverly Semmes
Tamara Wasserman
Emmett Wigglesworth
Michael Kelly Williams

The Children’s Art Carnival (childrensartcarnival.org) continues to operate at 62 Hamilton Terrace in West Harlem.

“Uptown Triennial 2026 | The Children’s Art Carnival in Harlem: The Making of Contemporary Artists” runs from June 26–September 13, 2025, at Wallach Art Gallery at Columbia University, which is on the 6th floor of the Lenfest Center for the Arts. More info: wallach.columbia.edu

05/20/2026

Final week of the Class of 2026 MFA Thesis Exhibition at the Wallach Art Gallery!

Installation images from the Class of 2026 MFA Thesis Exhibition at the Wallach Art Gallery at the Lenfest Center for the Arts, on view from April 26 through May 24, 2026.

Curated by Amal Issa.

Wallach Art Gallery hours: Wednesday–Sunday, 12–6pm.

Artists in order by installation images: Arel Lisette, AKIRA KAWAHATA, Yuyu He, Michael Igwe, iris wu, Rafael Rodriguez Gárciga, Jasphy Zheng, Asalaus, Francisco Javier Ramirez, Sarah Huffard.

Columbia University School of the Arts

05/18/2026

Harlem-based artist Michael Cummings developed an appreciation for “the natural visual language and creative instincts of children” while working as an instructor at the Children's Art Carnival, a community arts center that has been a cultural force in Harlem for more than half a century.

Three of Cummings's distinctive quilts are included in the upcoming Wallach Art Gallery exhibition “Children’s Art Carnival in Harlem: The Making of Contemporary Artists” (June 26–September 13, 2026), curated by Souleo.

Cummings's years at the Children’s Art Carnival reinforced his use of bold cutout layers in his textile artwork, which has informed his new public-art project in metal.

The MTA just unveiled a series of stainless-steel panels at the 148th Street station on the 3 line — a project titled “Harlem Reflections” — which depicts historical narratives in the cutout style Cummings is known for in his quilting.

“Through these panels I weave together stories reflecting Harlem’s cultural history, community spirit, and evolving identity,” Cummings said.

See Cummings work in the upcoming Wallach Art Gallery exhibition “Children’s Art Carnival in Harlem: The Making of Contemporary Artists.”

Free and open to the public, Wednesday–Sunday, 12–6 pm, June 26–September 13, 2026.

The Wallach Art Gallery is on the 6th floor of the Lenfest Art Center, 615 W 129th Street, New York, NY 10027

More information: wallach.columbia.edu

Installation images courtesy of MTA Arts & Design and Michael A. Cummings.

Textile work: Michael A. Cummings, "Pathway to Eternity," 1977. Fabric collage and mixed media, 53 x 49 inches

05/14/2026

Installation images from the Class of 2026 MFA Thesis Exhibition at the Wallach Art Gallery at the Lenfest Center for the Arts, on view from April 26 through May 24, 2026.

Curated by Amal Issa.

Wallach Art Gallery hours: Wednesday–Sunday, 12–6pm.

Artists in order by installation images: Timothy Bair, Alejandro Valencia, Maximiliano Rosiles, AKIRA KAWAHATA, Cloris D**g, Miguel Gallego, Harold Garcia (El Quinto), Christine Miller, Jeannie Rhyu, Youkyoung Cho.

Columbia University School of the Arts

05/07/2026

Installation images from the Class of 2026 MFA Thesis Exhibition at the Wallach Art Gallery at the Lenfest Center for the Arts, on view from April 26 through May 24, 2026.

Curated by Amal Issa.

Wallach Art Gallery hours: Wednesday–Sunday, 12–6pm.

Artists in order by installation images: darylina powderface, Eugene Jung, Jenny Williams, Alek Green, Yeji Cho, Soomin Kang, Yshao Lin, CR4CKROCK, Ashley Mclean, Yehwan Song.

Columbia University School of the Arts

04/29/2026

Mark your weekend calendars!

Souleo, who's curating the fourth edition of Wallach's "Uptown Triennial" with the exhibition "Children's Art Carnival in Harlem: The Making of Contemporary Artists," is co-curator of the 2026 People's Ball taking place this Sunday, May 3 at Brooklyn Central Library's main branch on the eve of the Met Gala.

An alternative to the exclusive Uptown Manhattan event, The People's Ball is entirely free, open to all, and celebrates the diverse styles that turn out each year at Brooklyn Library's main branch, which sets up a runway in its iconic lobby.

Opening June 26 and running through September 13 at the Wallach is "Children's Art Carnival”—a group exhibition of 30 artists tracing how a community art center in Harlem became a seminal cultural force in the Uptown Black community.

Originally a 1969 initiative of the Museum of Modern Art, the Carnival grew under the leadership of visionary educator and artist Betty Blayton-Taylor to become an independent nonprofit—a place of creativity and learning where social history, especially Black identity and culture, has been taught alongside art-making techniques.

Work by students, interns, and instructors such as Amando Alleyne, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Janet Olivia Henry, Dindga McCannon, Senga Nengudi, Tshabalala Self, and Emmett Wigglesworth tells the story of a thriving creative community where cross-pollination and artist freedom converge.

Uptown Triennial 2026 | Children's Art Carnival in Harlem:
The Making of Contemporary Artists

June 26–September 13, 2026

Wallach Art Gallery
Lenfest Center of the Arts
615 W 129th Street | Sixth Floor
New York, NY 10027

IMAGES: Souleo at the microphone, scenes from the 2025 and 2024 events.

04/22/2026

Top curators at The Frick Collection, The Met, MoMA, Studio Museum of Harlem, and the Whitney were featured in the Spring 2026 edition of Columbia Magazine.

Two of these Columbia grads created exhibitions at the Wallach Art Gallery early in their careers.

In 2018, The Met's Merryl H. and James S. Tisch Curator at Large Denise Murrell curated Posing Modernity: The Black Model from Manet and Matisse to Today, which was first organized by Wallach Art Gallery, where it was on view from October 24, 2018 through February 10, 2019, before it traveled to the Musée d'Orsay in Paris as Le Modèle noir, de Géricault à Matisse.

Murrell developed the exhibition as a post-doctoral fellow at Wallach Art Gallery.

Co-curator of the 2026 Whitney Biennial Drew Sawyer, who is the museum's Sondra Gilman Curator of Photography, organized Social Forces Visualized: Photography and Scientific Charity, 1900–1920 at Wallach Art Gallery in 2011, when he was a PhD student at Columbia's Art History and Archaeology Department.

Sawyer collaborated with fellow student Huffa Frobes-Cross on the exhibition.

These are just two of the many PhD students the Wallach Art Gallery has mentored early on in their careers.

04/10/2026

The upcoming weekend will be the final opportunity to see “Mapping Otherwise,” curated by Katherine Duxiaole Zhang as part of the 2026 “MODA Curates” series at the Wallach Art Gallery.

Through their respective work, artists Zarina Hashmi (b. Aligarh, India, 1937–2020) and Naiza Khan (b. Bahawalpur, Pakistan, 1968) revisit the historic 1947 Partition, which split British India into the nation states of India and Pakistan.

“Mapping Otherwise” revisits this historical event and its aftermath: new borders, divided land, disrupted lives, longings, hopes, dreams... It explores the “line etched on the heart,” a phrase used by the artist Zarina to describe the violent engraving of a border onto an undivided landscape.

Using a range of media from woodcuts to films, Zarina and Naiza Khan reclaim cartography from geopolitical interests, transforming it into a language of personal and collective memory.

“Mapping Otherwise” is part of the annual “MODA Curates” series at Wallach Art Gallery, where two outstanding proposals from the Columbia University MA in Modern and Contemporary Art: Critical and Curatorial Studies program are selected for exhibition.

“Mapping Otherwise”
Curated by Katherine Duxiaole Zhang
March 29–April 12, 2026
Wed-Sun, 12-6 PM

Wallach Art Gallery
Lenfest Center for the Arts | 6th Floor
615 W 129th St
New York, NY 10029

More info: wallach.columbia.edu

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Address

615 West 129th Street
New York, NY
10027

Opening Hours

Wednesday	12pm - 6pm
Thursday	12pm - 6pm
Friday	12pm - 6pm
Saturday	12pm - 6pm
Sunday	12pm - 6pm

Telephone

+12128546800

Website

https://wallach.columbia.edu/

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