Museum of Sex New York City.com : Profile

Arts & Attractions Museum of Sex

The mission of the Museum of Sex is to preserve and present the history, evolution, and cultural significance of human sexuality. In its exhibitions, programs and publications, The Museum of Sex is committed to open discourse and exchange, and to bringing to the public the best in current scholarship.

The Museum's exhibition schedule changes frequently, and we encourage you to visit their website for up-to-date information.

Aside from frequent exhibitions, the Museum is home to the Ralph Whittington Collection. Ralph Whittington, who recently retired as a curator at the Library of Congress after 38 years of service, was a major force in acquiring and documenting pornography since the 1970s. Since picking up a pocket-size magazine on a second-grade school trip to Baltimore, he has known of his interest in the subject, and 'came out' as a collector about twenty years ago. His collection, which includes more than four hundred 8-millimeter films, 700 videos, 1,500 magazines, 100 books, and artifacts such as blow-up dolls and bawdy house coins, has been recently acquired by the Museum of Sex.

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Upcoming Events

Sex Lives Of Animals

The Sex Lives of Animals is a celebration of the diversity of animal sexual behavior. This emergent research has resulted in new interpretations, delving into the possible evolutionary benefits of non-reproductive sex, for both individuals and social groups.

Set to debut in this exhibition are li... [ + ]fe-sized animal sculptures custom-made by Rune Olsen. Composed of the "social materials" of newspaper and tape, these pieces explore the physical world with the immediacy and expressiveness of hand drawing. Through the incorporation of human-like glass eyes, the distance between human and animal vanishes, seducing the viewer into a direct interaction with the gaze of the animal.

In this "new natural history" the Museum of Sex is presenting an uncensored story of the natural world, moving animal sexuality beyond the confines of reproduction and mating, towards discussions of orientation and cognition. By exploring the most intimate part of life, where it is often said we are most animal like, we can appreciate the significance of research on animal sexuality and, perhaps, extrapolate these concepts to larger issues regarding sexuality in general.

09/17/2019 11:00 AM

Tue, September 17

11:00AM

$17.50 – Before 1pm Monday – Friday
$20.50 – All other times

Get Tickets

Spotlight On The Permanent Collection

Our newly redesigned Spotlight Gallery allows our patrons to explore sexuality in a way that is personal and pertinent to their own experiences by presenting a wide array of sexual themes and concepts. This gallery offers a sampling of artifacts drawn from the Museum’s permanent collection of over 1... [ + ]5,000 objects, including works of art, clothing, technological inventions and historical ephemera.

The themes currently explored in the gallery are: sex education, sex in art, illustration, anime, kinks, modern commercialized design, photography, sex and technology, the medicialization of sex, representations of gender and identity, as well vibratorsas alternate interpretations of the human body. The exhibition includes works by well known artists such as Keith Haring, Pablo Picasso and Alexis Rockman. Due to popular demand, several key artifacts from the museum’s two most recent exhibitions, Sex in Design/Design in Sex, and Kink: Geography of the Erotic Imagination, are featured in this new space as well as provocative and through provoking installations such as Mike Sullivan’s Sex Lives of Robots and Timothy Archibald’s Sex Machines.

Highlights of the technology collection include Archibald’s portrayal of homemade sex machines constructed from everyday household materials as well as commercial devices registered with the U.S. Monkey RockerPatent Office that prevent, improve or enhance sexual function. The gallery also has an interactive feature where patrons can gently touch both male and female RealDoll torsos. RealDolls, created by Abyss Creations, have gained immense popularity in the media and have most recently been seen on the television show CSI: NY and in the film Lars and the Real Girl. As well as having RealDoll torsos to touch, the exhibition also features both a full length male and a female RealDoll on display.

With the revision of our Spotlight Gallery, we hope to touch on a broader spectrum of themes and present the very best of current sexual scholarship in a playful and educational way.

09/17/2019 11:00 AM

Tue, September 17

11:00AM

$17.50 – Before 1pm Monday – Friday
$20.50 – All other times

Get Tickets