Juneteenth, the federal vacation commemorating the top of slavery in america, rolls in tomorrow, as the talk over who will get to be a free American continues to unleash unfathomable cruelties. Under is a listing of art-oriented occasions celebrating Juneteenth — each on the day itself and thru the weekend — that domesticate connectivity, pleasure, and expression, fueling us by way of the toughest elements of the battle on at the present time of reflection and rejoice. —Rhea Nayyar
Thursday, June 19
Van Cortlandt Home Museum Juneteenth Celebration
Van Cortlandt Home Museum | Broadway at West 246th Avenue, Van Cortlandt Park, the Bronx | Thursday, June 19, 5:30–7:30pm
Drummers lead the procession to the Enslaved African Burial Floor at Van Cortlandt Park in reminiscence of those that had been enslaved for a earlier Juneteenth celebration. (picture courtesy the Van Cortlandt Park Alliance)
The Van Cortlandt Park Alliance and the Bronx Artwork Ensemble unite this Juneteenth to current spoken phrase and musical performances, a procession to the park’s Enslaved African Burial Floor, and a libation ceremony honoring the life and legacy of enslaved folks, preceded by dinner out there on the market from pan-African restaurant Voila Afrique.
Pleasure and Juneteenth at Youngsters’s Museum of Manhattan
Youngsters’s Museum of Manhattan | Tisch Constructing, 212 West 83rd Avenue, Higher West Facet, Manhattan| Thursday, June 19, 10:30am–4:15pm
A number of hands-on workshops on the Youngsters’s Museum of Manhattan have a good time Black pleasure. From murals impressed by up to date artists like Kerry James Marshall, Amy Sherald, and Derrick Adams, to a guided artwork zine session with instructing artist Lillian Younger, households can intertwine their very own futures with the legacy of highly effective folks from historical past, each previous and current.
The Household Reunion
Juneteenth in Queens | Roy Wilkins Park, Merrick Boulevard, Jamaica | Thursday, June 19, 12–7pm
Juneteenth in Queens returns with a brand new focus: honoring the Black household reunion. This occasion celebrates the approaching collectively of kin with performances, reside music, meals distributors, and a wide range of different actions — and it’s, as all the time, utterly free.
Juneteenth Late Shift on the Guggenheim
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum | 1071 Fifth Avenue, Higher East Facet, Manhattan | Thursday, June 19, 5:30–8pm
A birdseye view of Rashid Johnson’s A Poem for Deep Thinkers (2025) on the Guggenheim New York (picture courtesy Solomon R. Guggenheim Basis)
Course by way of Rashid Johnson’s solo exhibition all through the Guggenheim spiral after hours on Juneteenth, and improve the standard expertise with holiday-specific performances, poetry, and reflections. Anybody who can’t make it to this particular occasion ought to observe that the museum is now open by way of 8pm on Thursdays from June by way of July.
Commemorating Juneteenth with Inventive Outlet
Brooklyn Academy of Music | 30 Lafayette Ave, Fort Greene, Brooklyn | Thursday, June 19, 2pm + Friday, June 20, 7:30pm
The Jamel Gaines Inventive Outlet, a Black non-profit dance and theater firm recognized for performances rooted in historic narratives and social justice, celebrates its thirtieth anniversary this Juneteenth with a number of stagings of It’s In My DNA (2025), choreographed vignettes of Black historical past and perseverance in america and overseas.
Juneteenth 2025 on the Museum of the Shifting Picture
Museum of the Shifting Picture | 36-01 35 Ave, Astoria, Queens | Thursday, June 19, 12pm–5:30pm
The Museum of the Shifting Picture (MoMI) and the Louis Armstrong Home Museum (LAHM) come collectively to have a good time Juneteenth with a gallery scavenger hunt, musical and dance performances, a collage animation workshop, and a movie screening of Paris Blues (1961), adopted by a dialog with LAHM historian Hyland Harris.
Troy Anthony & The Fireplace Ensemble at Domino Sq.
Domino Park | 15 River Avenue, Williamsburg, Brooklyn | Thursday, June 19, 7pm
Who is able to increase their voice and sing? Impressed by Black church spirituals, inventive director Troy Anthony and the Fireplace Ensemble have created an uplifting efficiency that invokes collective liberation — no fainting obligatory. This non-religious live performance, half efficiency piece and half theatrical debut, features a particular handwashing ceremony and communal singing.
REPARATIONS! A Juneteenth Celebration of Black Improv
Caveat NYC | 21 A Clinton Avenue, Decrease East Facet, Manhattan | Thursday, June 19, 7pm
What’s pleasure with out humor? Everybody and their mom may use fun and a few levity proper now, and a jam-packed lineup of all-Black comedy teams hosted by Wild ‘N Out castmember Sydney Duncan is slated to take inventive liberty to a brand new stage with one tongue-in-cheek request: “40 acres and some improv!”
Saturday, June 21
Juneteenth Jubilee on the Brooklyn Museum
An artwork workshop on the Brooklyn Museum’s Juneteenth celebration (picture courtesy the Brooklyn Museum)
Brooklyn Museum | 200 Jap Parkway, Crown Heights, Brooklyn | Saturday, June 21, 1–5pm
Group-building and self-expression take middle stage within the Brooklyn Museum’s Juneteenth programming this yr. Kicking off with a guided walkthrough of late and tenacious Afro-Indigenous artist Nancy Elizabeth Prophet’s solo exhibition I Will Not Bend an Inch (2025), the museum’s Juneteenth Jubilee can also be infused with reside jazz music, a e-book swap and perusal house hosted by the Free Black Girls’s Library, artwork workshop and video games, and a poetry open mic, amongst different actions.
We Outdoors! A Brooklyn Juneteenth Vol. III
651 Arts and The Soapbox Presents | The Plaza at 300 Ashland Place, Fort Greene, Brooklyn | Saturday, June 21, 2–8pm
This free, family-friendly occasion on the intersection of Brooklyn’s bustling market district facilities Black tradition and creativity in all kinds. It’s going to embody a marching band, majorette squads, and stepping performances channeling the scholar traditions of traditionally Black faculties and universities; a market championing Black artisans and distributors; collaborative workshops underscoring private narratives, storytelling, and artistic expression; and naturally, meals vehicles to maintain the vitality going from afternoon to night.
A Union of Hope: 1869 Tour on the Tenement Museum
Tenement Museum | 103 Orchard Avenue, Decrease East Facet, Manhattan | Monday by way of Saturday, 11am–4pm
A view of Joseph and Rachel Moore’s shared bed room, restaged on the Tenement Museum by way of the everlasting exhibition A Union of Hope: 1869 (picture courtesy Tenement Museum)
Whereas this falls outdoors of designated Juneteenth programming, the Tenement Museum’s everlasting exhibition of a Nineteenth-century condominium that was residence to a free, working Black couple recounts forgotten truths about Black migration, survival, and discrimination in New York Metropolis. Study the story and influence of Joseph and Rachel Moore, who lived in a good Manhattan condominium amid the racial turbulence of the mid-to-late 1800s by way of a 75-minute guided tour inside their restaged quarters, bolstered by paperwork, information, and different materials ephemera archiving their lives.
