Arts & Entertainment
New York City is ready to dazzle visitors again
New York City felt like it was almost its bustling self again.
New York City felt like it was almost its bustling self again as I walked through the streets enjoying the warm spring weather during a recent trip.
The city, like many others, is forever changed after more than two years of the COVID pandemic, but in true New York fashion, the Big Apple is coming back. It was my second trip within six months after about a two and a half year break.
New Yorkers rolled up their sleeves (more than 80% are vaccinated), masked up, and have done pretty much everything they can to get their groove back. However, COVID subvariants continue to emerge in the ongoing pandemic. Some venues are still enforcing proof of vaccination and masks. Face coverings are still required on all public transportation until further notice and in Broadway theaters at least until May 31.
Recently, COVID cases have been on the rise in New York due to the new highly contagious Omicron subvariant, BA.2.12.1. People planning to visit should check the city’s visitor site (under Basic Information) for the latest.
Some Broadway shows have canceled performances due to COVID. Other shows are taking place. New restaurants are opening, and reservations are harder to get than ever before. New museum exhibits are opening. Big events are coming back like New York Pride, which returns in-person June 26 with the theme “Unapologetically Us.”
“Our community has been through tremendous hardships over the past few years, beginning with the pandemic, and continuing with a reckoning with social justice, threats to our democracy, and more recently armed conflict overseas,” stated NYC Pride’s new executive director, Sandra Perez, in a March 25 news release. “Compounding these struggles is the onslaught of legislation around the country that directly targets LGBTQIA+ individuals.
“In spite of these challenges and attacks, we are here to tell the country and the world: we will not be erased,” Perez continued, stating that the community will stand together to face the attacks on the LGBTQ community across the country and around the world. “We will continue to love and live our truth and be our full and complete selves – and we are not going to apologize for it.”
NYC Pride board Co-Chair Sue Doster noted the importance of the annual celebration that attracts upward of two million people from across the United States and all over the world.
“We’re thrilled to be able to finally invite everyone back,” she stated.
Tourism officials said the city is rebounding.
“The city is as vibrant as ever,” said Chris Heywood, a gay man who’s executive vice president of global communication of NYC & Company, New York City’s destination marketing and convention and visitors bureau.
The pandemic did not completely stop New York from retrofitting, innovating, and building new hotels, spectacular sites, and opening new restaurants.
“That’s the beauty about New York,” Heywood continued. “Resilience is really our middle name. People are going to encounter a city that is continuing to come back.”
New attractions
Some of the new things to see in New York are Summit One Vanderbilt, the Moynihan Train Hall, and Little Island, the latest park near the Chelsea Piers.
The city’s newest vantage point is at Summit One Vanderbilt. The Summit is a 65,000 square foot space at the top of the 93-story office and residential building at One Vanderbilt adjacent to Grand Central Station.
The observatory deck opened in October 2021. It is much more than the highest view (for the moment) of New York City; it’s an experience with a view. Each room is an art installation accentuating the feeling of being high in the sky or in the clouds. At the very top are Apres and the Summit Terrace, where my girlfriend and I enjoyed a cocktail while admiring New York’s sparkling skyline under the night sky.
Tickets to catch the sunset view cost about an extra $16. The Summit does not itemize what the extra amount is at checkout, but it’s for experiencing the Summit at the golden hour, the optimal time of day.
It wouldn’t be New York City without the many opportunities to see art. This spring and summer visitors can catch the 80th edition of the Whitney Museum of American Art’s “Biennial 2022: Quiet As It’s Kept,” which opened April 6. The two-floor exhibit brings together a survey of 63 American artists exploring the darkness and disruption of 2020. The title is a colloquial phrase taken from the late novelist Toni Morrison. The show runs through September 5.
Henri Mattise lovers can take in a rare exhibit of the French artist’s early works that formed modern art at the Museum of Modern Art exhibition “Mattise: The Red Studio,” which opened May 1. The show runs through September 10.
The Brooklyn Museum is featuring “Andy Warhol: Revelation”, showing now through June 19.
Brooklyn Academy of Music is featuring the DanceAfrica Festival, which is celebrating its 45th anniversary through the end of this month.
I rarely leave New York without seeing at least one show on Broadway. Right now, it’s all about the classics and some new musicals (“Wicked,” “Chicago,” and “Funny Girl”) and plays (“Plaza Suite” and “To Kill A Mockingbird”).
Dining and drinking
Food draws my girlfriend and I to New York just as much as Broadway’s musicals. For this trip, I sought out restaurants that were old favorites that survived the pandemic, some that were reborn, and others that were new.
During the day we lunched at the fun, cheeky and very gay diner Cafeteria; a Chelsea neighborhood staple, Elmo; and famed chef and restaurateur David Chang’s Momofuku Noodle Bar.
At night we hit the town enjoying dishes crafted by some of New York’s finest lesbian chefs. Chef and restaurateur duo Rita Sodi and Jody Williams’ beloved Via Carota lived up to the hype. You can’t go wrong with pasta, but this is exceptional pasta. I also dined at the culinary couple’s newest venture The Commerce Inn. It veers away from the chefs’ usual turf, French and Italian cuisine, exploring and modernizing American Shaker dishes that hit the mark.
Lesbian executive chef Hillary Sterling crafted a distinctive Italian menu at Ci Siamo restaurateur Danny Meyer’s latest culinary venture. Lesbian executive chef Mary Attea at the Michelin-rated The Musket Room serves a revisioned world on your plate. There was no doubt that I wouldn’t enjoy chef and restaurateur Mark Strausman’s new restaurant Mark’s Off Madison, which has a warm atmosphere and incredible, flavorful comfort food.
Two unique restaurants that might signal a shift in the queer culinary scene in New York are Tagmo and Hags. Both restaurants are queer-owned and -operated. They actively hire LGBTQ staff and are deeply involved in the community.
Queer chef Surbhi Sahni is the heart behind Tagmo, an Indian restaurant that opened in Seaport, a small shopping and dining center near One World Trade Center, in September 2021. Tagmo is not your average Indian restaurant. Dining there is a gastronomic adventure through India with all its diverse cuisines.
The much-anticipated Hags is targeted to open just ahead of Memorial Day weekend, May 25. The Lower Eastside restaurant aims to be the first upscale queer restaurant, according to business and life partners Telly Justice, a transgender woman, and Camille Lindsley, a queer woman.
New York’s nightlife isn’t quite what it used to be like yet. My girlfriend and I enjoyed early nightcaps at Tiny’s & The Bar Upstairs in Tribeca, the historic Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village, and Bar Veloce in Chelsea.
Village lesbian bar mainstays – Henrietta Hudson and Cubbyhole – and Brooklyn’s Ginger’s Bar got makeovers during the pandemic and recently reopened. Catch roving lesbian events hosted by Dyke Beer and Dave’s Lesbian Bar on their websites or follow them on social media.
The boys are back in action from Midtown to Harlem with bars and nightclubs for every stripe in the rainbow flag. Check out Midtown’s swanky The Townhouse of New York. Head to the West Village’s Playhouse or get nostalgic at New York’s oldest gay bar Julius’ and the historic Stonewall Inn. Head uptown to Harlem for the last remaining Black-owned gay bar Alibi Lounge.
Where to stay
My girlfriend and I stayed at the Smyth Tribeca. The newly renovated modern 100-room hotel opened in September 2021. The hotel is comfortable, chic, and perfectly located on the corner of Chambers Street and West Broadway above the Westside’s 1 line. The subway line is a direct vein to Broadway, the Village, and many of New York’s most popular destinations.
Getting around
New York’s metro is going touchless with Omny, an app that allows riders to tag on and off the subway and buses with their smartphones and other smart devices. Riders can choose to use the Metro Card or the app to get around the city.
Galleries
BMA celebrates enduring influence of Henri Matisse
Exhibit features iconic works juxtaposed with gay artist’s paintings inspired by French legend
The Baltimore Museum of Art is on a roll.
After landing the coveted Amy Sherald “American Sublime” exhibit (through April 5) when the National Portrait Gallery attempted to censor her work, the BMA is debuting a breathtaking and thought-provoking new exhibit, “To See This Light Again” featuring master works by Henri Matisse paired with new paintings by Louis Fratino, who is inspired by the French modernist legend.
Fratino, who’s gay, was born in Annapolis and studied at Baltimore’s Maryland Institute College of Art. As an art student, he found himself spending lots of time in the BMA’s Matisse galleries, the largest collection of his works in the world, encompassing more than 1,600 paintings, drawings, and illustrations. At just 33, Fratino has enjoyed a “meteoric” rise in the art world, according to BMA Director Asma Naeem, who introduced Fratino at an event previewing the exhibit last week. This is Fratino’s first major U.S. exhibition, but he was featured in the 2024 Venice Biennale and his paintings can be found at the Rhode Island School of Design Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and elsewhere.
The exhibit aims to explore Matisse’s lasting influence by juxtaposing his works with Fratino’s.
“It’s the idea that art manifests a kind of attention or a vision for your life, that it can be a beautiful life despite certain circumstances that may be happening around you,” Fratino said in a statement released by the BMA. “In Matisse’s case, he lived through the First and Second World Wars. Painting can confirm that life is beautiful and that it’s worth looking at.”
The influences are apparent, from the use of light and pattern to the choice to focus on everyday objects and subjects. And the exhibit is unabashedly queer with male couples depicted in a couple of paintings. Fratino told the Blade that as an out gay man, it was important to embrace that visibility.
He describes a “joy of looking” at the male form, just as Matisse portrayed female figures that often celebrated the tradition of painting nudes.
In “Tom,” Fratino captured his subject in casual repose that includes a bowl and spoon in the foreground. It is presented alongside Matisse’s iconic “Large Reclining Nude.” Tom’s checkered shirt echoes the blue and white grid background of the Matisse work and both figures are holding casual, relaxed poses.
“Fratino and Matisse: To See This Light Again” runs through Sept. 6 at the Baltimore Museum of Art (artbma.org.)
For Matisse lovers, the BMA has another exhibit debuting March 29 titled, “Matisse in Vence: The Stations of the Cross” featuring more than 80 drawings revealing how the artist “shaped his late‑career masterpiece, the Stations of the Cross mural, for the Chapel of the Rosary in Vence, France.”
Books
Laverne Cox, Liza Minnelli among authors with new books
A tome for every taste this reading season
Spring is a great time to think about vacations, spring break, lunch on the patio, or an afternoon in the park. You’ll want to bring one (or all!) of these great new books.
So let’s start here: What are you up for? How about a great new novel?
If you’re a mystery fan, you’ll want to make reservations to visit “Disaster Gay Detective Agency” by Lev AC Rosen (Poisoned Pen Press, June 2). It’s a whodunit featuring a group of gay roommates, one of whom is a swoony romantic. Add a mysterious man who disappears and a murder, of course, and you’ve got the novel you need for the beach.
Don’t discount young adult books, if you want something light to read this spring. “What Happened to Those Girls” by Carlyn Greenwald (Sourcebooks Fire, June 30) is a thriller about mean girls and a camping trip that goes terribly, bloodily wrong. Meant for teens ages 14 and up, young adult books are breezier and lighter fare for the busy grown-up reader.
If you loved “Boyfriend Material” and “Husband Material,” you’ll be eager for the next installment from author Alexis Hall. “Father Material” (Sourcebooks Casablanca, June 2) takes Luc and Oliver to the next step. First was dating. Then was marriage. Is it time for the sound of pitter-patter on the kitchen floor?
Maybe something even lighter? Then how about a book of essays – like “The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Gay” bycomedian and writer Eliot Glazer (Gallery Books, Aug. 11). It’s a book of essays on being gay today, the irritations, the joys, and fitting in. Be aware that these essays may contain a bit of spice – but isn’t that what you want for your reading pleasure anyhow, hmmm?
But okay, let’s say you want something with a little more heft to it. How about a biography?
Look for “Transcendant” by Laverne Cox (Gallery Books, June 9), or “Kids, Wait Till You Hear This” by Liza Minnelli (Grand Central Publishing, March 10), and “Every Inch a Lady” by Audrey Smaltz with Alina Mitchell (Amistad, July 14). Keep your eyes open for “Without Prejudice: My Life as a Gay Judge” by Harvey Brownstone (ECW Press, May 26) or “The Double Dutch Fuss” by Phill Branch (Amistad, June 2).
Then again, maybe you want some history, or something different.
So here: look for “Queer Saints: A Radical Guide to Magic, Miracles, and Modern Intercession” by Antonio Pagliarulo (Weiser, June 1) for a little bit of faith-based gay. Music lovers will want “Mighty Real: A History of LGBTQ Music, 1969-2000” by Barry Walters (Viking, May 12). Activists will want “In the Arms of Mountains: A Memoir of Land, Love, and Queer Resistance in Red America” byformer Idaho state Sen. Cole Nicole LeFavour (Beacon Press, May 26).
And if these books aren’t enough, then be sure to check with your favorite bookseller or librarian. They’ll have exactly what you’re in the mood to read. They’ll find what you need for that patio, beach towel, or easy chair.
Music & Concerts
Gaga, Cardi B, and more to grace D.C. stages this spring
Shake off your winter doldrums at a local concert
D.C. shakes off its winter blues this spring as the music scene pops off. We all know the big star is coming: Lady Gaga will perform at Capital One Arena on March 23. But plenty of other stars, big and small, will grace D.C. stages, including many LGBTQ and ally artists.
March
3/15, 9:30 Club, St. Lucia – Indie electronic music project known for its synth-pop sound, which blends ‘80s influences with electronic and indie rock elements.
3/31, Lincoln Theatre, Perfume Genius – Indie/pop singer/songwriter Mike Hadreas, also known as Perfume Genius, has toured with a full band, but he is stripping things back for this tour.
April
4/8, Capital One, Cardi B. Cardi B, from New York, unapologetic and proud, is the first solo female artist to win the Grammy Award for Best Rap Album. This year, she’s on her Little Miss Drama Tour, in support of her second studio album, “Am I the Drama?”
4/13, Lincoln Theatre, The Naked Magicians. Australia’s The Naked Magicians are two performers who deliver live magic and laughs while wearing nothing but a top hat and a smile.
4/18, Capital One, Florence and the Machine. Longstanding indie rock back from Great Britain, much-loved for lead singer Florence’s powerful vocals. On their Everybody Scream Tour.
4/16, Capital One, Demi Lovato. Singer/songwriter from Texas, who came out as nonbinary, is traveling on her “It’s Not That Deep Tour.”
4/21, The Anthem, Calum Scott. Platinum-selling gay singer/songwriter Calum Scott released his latest project, Avenoir, last year. Scott rose to fame in 2015 after competing on Britain’s Got Talent, where he performed a cover of Robyn’s hit “Dancing on My Own“.
4/26, Atlantis, Caroline Kingsbury. American queer pop musician from Los Angeles. She released her debut album in 2021, and has two additional EPs. She’s played Lollapalooza 2025 and All Things Go 2025, as well as gone on a co-headlining U.S. tour with MARIS. Shock Treatment is her latest EP.
4/26, Anthem, Raye. This bisexual artist, known for her current chart-topping “”Where Is My Husband!” single, blends pop, jazz, R&B, and more.
4/30, Union Stage, Daya. This bisexual singer/songwriter is on her “Til Every Petal Drops Tour,” touring the album of the same name that was released last year.
May
5/1, The Anthem, Joost Klein. Eurovision comes to D.C. in Joost Klein: Originally a Youtuber, he was selected to represent the Netherlands at Eurovision in 2024 with his song “Europapa.” He released a new album on New Year’s Day.
5/1, Fillmore, MIKA. MIKA is on his Spinning Out Tour. Born in Beirut and raised in both Paris and London, MIKA sings in multiple languages and has co-hosted Eurovision.
5/7, 9:30 Club, COBRAH. Clara Christensen, is a Swedish singer, songwriter, record producer, and club queen, making electronic dance music.
5/19, Atlantis, Grace Ives. New York-born singer/songwriter, known for her high-energy synth/electronic, bedroom-pop-style music.
June
6/2, The Anthem, James Blake. English crooner got big from his self-titled debut album in 2011. He won two Grammys and just released his 7th album,Trying Times, in March.
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