Scenes of New York City: The Elie and Sarah Hirschfeld Collection

This collection exudes New York. Elie and Sarah Hirschfeld have amassed a stunning array of works honoring their hometown, from its bustling harbors to its Harlem diners, Village speakeasies, sleek skyscrapers, and gritty streetscapes. Their promised gift to the New-York Historical Society invigorates the Museum’s 20th- and 21st-century holdings and amplifies the story of a place at once enthralling, mystifying, and inspiring.

Art by Keith Haring, Jacob Lawrence, Andy Warhol, Giorgio de Chirico, and Georgia O’Keeffe, among others, brings the city to life. The 130 paintings, sculptures, prints, and drawings in the collection spotlight New York-centric movements like Abstract Expressionism and Pop, probe Gotham’s layered past, and trace the rhythms of the metropolis and its daily life.

To match the multiple facets captured in this portrait of the city, the New-York Historical Society invited multiple New Yorkers to respond to select objects in the collection. Their commentaries appear under the heading “COMMUNITY VOICE.”