Exhibitions - “The Panorama” on its 60th Anniversary
“The Panorama” on its 60th Anniversary
03.16.25 – 10.05.25
Image: Film still, "Restoration of The Panorama of the City of New York," 2025. Video, digitized U-Matic. Time: 12 min 10 sec. Edited by Adam Abada. Original video footage created by Crosswalks Television, NYC (1992, 1993); Linda Simidian, Producer; Michael Miscione, Assistant Producer. Donated by Michael Miscione, New York, 2025.
This year, the Museum celebrates The Panorama of the City of New York alongside the #WF60 anniversary of the 1964–1965 New York World’s Fair. To mark this milestone, the Museum is dedicating a gallery to the model and its history. This gallery presents archival film footage commemorating the most recent renovation of The Panorama, which opened to the public in 1994.
The Panorama of the City of New York was updated yearly after the 1964–1965 New York World’s Fair until New York City’s fiscal crisis began in the mid-1970s. Between 1992 and 1994, The Panorama underwent its first major renovation. The restoration was newsworthy and prompted a segment on Crosswalks Television Network, a city-owned station. The film contains additional footage captured by the Crosswalks team as an ode to this significant milestone in The Panorama’s legacy. Behind-the-scenes footage of the restoration and interviews with staff at the Queens Museum and Lester Associates, the firm responsible for the creation and update of the model, provide unprecedented insight into the building and maintenance of this remarkable object.
Supporters
The Queens Museum would like to thank Battery Park City Authority, Brooklyn Bridge Park Corporation, Jack and Dorothy Kupferberg Family Foundation, New York City Department of Environmental Protection, Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York City, New York Mets Foundation, Radii Inc., and the hundreds of donors to the Adopt-A-Building Program for their support of the ongoing care and maintenance of the Panorama. Major funding for the 2017 relighting of The Panorama of the City of New York was generously provided by Amazon Studios, the New York City Department of Citywide Administrative Services, with additional in-kind support provided by Crystal Window and Door Systems and Knight Electrical Services Corp. Thank you to the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) for funding current conservation efforts (“Save America’s Treasures” grant program).
Publication of The Panorama of the City of New York is made possible by the generosity of Steven M. Polan, a generous grant from the Robert David Lion Gardiner Foundation of New York, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
