If you are looking for a good excuse to get outside of New York City this fall, then check out one of the world’s leading sculpture parks, Storm King Art Center. Walking through this giant picturesque playground was perfect weekend activity. We are excited to share our “wonderfall” day trip with you.
Located 90 minutes north of New York City in Mountainville, New York, Storm King mixes art with nature. This historic open air museum features over 100 modern sculptures. The installations are spaciously distributed over the property’s lush 500 acres. The property, named after Storm King Mountain, opened in 1960. The museum is open from April to December.
Storm King is easily accessible by train from NYC. Take MetroNorth for 90 minutes to Beacon station, which is 13 miles away from the park, and then hop into an Uber or Lyft. We took a yellow taxi to the park, and were charged $10 per person ($50 in total), but the Lyft ride back was about half that.
Entrance fees are listed below:
$18 – Adults
$15 – Seniors (65+ with valid ID)
$ 8 – Ages 5–18 and Students (with valid ID)
Free – Children under 4 and Members
Storm King acquires and borrows modern and contemporary art and scatters the installations throughout the museum park. This layout creates a unique art in nature experience. We recommend beginning with a tram ride. Tram tours run continuously throughout the day and can be boarded at ten designated stops. They start at 11AM and end about 90 minutes before the grounds close. The trams run on the hour on weekdays and every 20 or 30 minutes on the weekends. We departed the tram and walked through the rolling hills of Maya Lin’s gently monumental Storm King Wakefield. We also saw Alexander Calder’s The Arch, one of his last of the monumental works before his death in 1976. This impressive, multi-layered steel sculpture is displayed in a field of tall native grasses. We also saw many of Mark di Suvero’s industrial steel sculptures, including Mozart’s Birthday from 1989.
We playfully swung on Mark di Suvero’s She, an interactive sculpture with a swinging bed and a hanging oil drum.
Archana and Theresa got inside the art installation. Next we visited the Fence of Mirrors created by artist Alyson Shotz.
We loved posing with Menashe Kadishman’s Suspended. This 1977 installation makes for a great photo op.
Zhang Huan’s Three Legged Buddha, a twenty-eight foot copper and steel sculpture, is modeled after the Buddha sculptures that the artist encountered on a trip to Tibet in 2005. The sculpture’s face is a self-portrait.
Next we posed with Mark di Suvero’s The Pyramidian and Alexander Calder’s Gui (Mistletoe). We also walked by Calder’s Black Flag and Kenneth Nelson’s Free Ride Home.
Here’s us by another beautiful fire red steel sculpture, Figolu by Mark di Suvero.
You can spend the entire weekend at the park, and not see everything. We recommend mapping out your installation itinerary for the day. In November, the weather was crisp, but got chilly when we departed around 4:30pm. The last sculpture we saw was Isamu Noguchi’s Momo Taro, a nine-part, forty-ton granite sculpture that is anchored to a concrete base underground. Visitors are allowed to enter and sit on the work.
We highly recommend visiting Storm King during its peak fall season. In late September and early November, you will see the fall foliage surrounding the gorgeous fields, hills and woodlands. Exploring the grounds is a unique mix of leisurely hiking and visiting a museum.
“Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it – Michelangelo
Beautiful photos!
Thank you.
I have wanted to visit Storm King for the longest time. Looks like you guys had fun!
Such a beautiful place, I’d love to visit
oh wow I had not heard of this place before! It sure does look like a fantastic place to explore with very cool sculptures
This looks like such a great place to go to so that you can look at different types of art sculptures and even take photos. I definitely need to visit here soon.
I really love art installations like this! SUPER cool.
Such a cool place!