The Africa Center

1280 5th Avenue | East Harlem | built 2008

Open on the map7 entries

Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.

  1. 1984

    The museum that became the Africa Center is founded

    The institution now called the Africa Center was founded in 1984. By its own count it organized nearly 70 exhibitions that traveled to more than 143 venues in 17 countries. It was later renamed the Africa Center to reflect a wider mission of connecting Africa with the rest of the world, and it now occupies space at 1280 Fifth Avenue on Museum Mile, where general admission is free.

    Source: theafricacenter.org

  2. 2010

    Robert A.M. Stern's museum shell is finished but the interior stalls

    The building at Fifth Avenue and 110th Street, designed by Robert A.M. Stern for the Museum for African Art, was the first museum building on Museum Mile since the Guggenheim in 1959. Its outer shell was completed in 2010, but stalled fundraising and leadership changes delayed the interior. The plan called for about 90,000 square feet, including 16,000 square feet of galleries, a theater, library, classrooms, restaurant and shop.

    Source: Wikipedia

  3. 2012

    May

    The Museum for African Art delays opening its Fifth Avenue home for the fifth time in three years

    In May 2012 the New York Times reported that the Museum for African Art had pushed back, once again, the opening of its East Harlem home at the corner of 110th Street and Fifth Avenue while it worked to raise the money to complete it. President Elsie McCabe Thompson said the museum still needed $10 million, after raising $86.3 million as of the previous year. The museum and the 116-unit condominium building had broken ground in 2007, when the museum projected a late-2009 opening.

    Source: cityrealty.com

  4. 2013

    August

    The museum plans to reinvent itself as the New Africa Center, an Asia Society-style institute

    In August 2013 ArtsJournal relayed a report that the institution intended to become the New Africa Center, combining a museum, a policy institute and a members' club aimed at executives, cultural figures and policymakers focused on Africa. The plan came after longtime president Elsie McCabe Thompson departed in October. The headline likened the new model to the Asia Society.

    Source: artsjournal.org

  5. 2015

    Former ambassador Michelle Gavin is hired to run the unfinished Africa Center, and leaves the next year

    The Africa Center brought in Michelle D. Gavin, a former U.S. ambassador to Botswana and an Africa specialist, as managing director in 2015. She departed in late 2016. Until the building was finished, the plan was for the center to hold pop-up events inside its new space.

    Source: Wikipedia

  6. 2019

    Winter

    The Africa Center plans a $50 million redesign around a Central Park-facing atrium

    The Africa Center occupies the first three floors, about 70,000 square feet, of a Robert A.M. Stern building at Fifth Avenue and 110th Street. Caples Jefferson Architects designed a redesign centered on an atrium, with bridges linking program spaces to windows overlooking Central Park. Plans also called for rotating art installations, a cafe, galleries, a theater, and a dining room and demonstration kitchen with a terrace. Construction and part of the programming were expected to cost about $50 million, of which $25 million had been raised by winter 2019, with a completion target of fall 2021.

    Source: nyc.urbanize.city

  7. 2019

    February

    Terenga, a West African fast-casual restaurant, opens in the Africa Center

    In February 2019 a West African fast-casual restaurant called Terenga opened in the Africa Center's space at Fifth Avenue and 110th Street. The building, designed by Robert A.M. Stern, is the first museum building on Museum Mile since the Guggenheim was completed in 1959.

    Source: Wikipedia

Further reading

Nearby

All 38 buildings with stories in East Harlem