The 1964 New York World’s Fair opened 50 years ago this week in what is now Flushing Meadow Corona Park in Queens. Its legacy lives on in family-friendly attractions NYCOTC is featuring throughout the anniversary week.
Today, the Queens Museum of Art, which is housed in a sprawling building that dates to the 1939 World’s Fair.
The focus is on New York City’s own art and history, including a new exhibit opening Sunday, April 27th, of posters by pop artist Andy Warhol depicting the city’s most-wanted criminals of the early 1960s. The posters were commissioned for the 1964 World’s Fair, but considered too controversial to be shown.
On permanent view is the museum’s most famous and popular display, Panorama of the City of New York, an accurate scale model that debuted at the ’64 fair. It includes nearly 900,000 brownstones, skyscrapers, bridges and subway stops, on a scale of 1 to 1,200. That makes Manhattan 70 feet long, and the Empire State Building a bit over a foot tall. The panorama is updated often to reflect changes in the NYC skyline.
Also on permanent display is a collection of Tiffany stained glass lamps and windows, many of which were manufactured nearby, in Corona, Queens.
Other exhibits include historic posters from both fairs, plus and a replica of Michelangelo’s “Pieta,” which was shown in the Vatican Pavilion during the ’64 fair.
A bit more history: The building was the temporary site for the United Nations General Assembly after World War II.
The Queens Museum of Art is a few minutes walk from the Willets Point stop on the No. 7 train. Open Wednesday-Sunday, noon to 6 p.m.; adults, $8, children under 12, free.