Looking for a fun new cultural activity but not sure what to check out next? We’ve rounded up some of the highlights that you can experience for free this month with Culture Pass, from new exhibition openings to limited-run live performances. Check back each month for a new set of recommendations!
You can learn more about individual exhibitions and events by clicking the links in the blurbs below, but if you want to book a Culture Pass, click here to return to the homepage and log in with your library card to make a reservation.
August 2026
All offers listed below are subject to availability.
EXHIBITION: Splash Around at the Children’s Museum of Manhattan
Date: All month (Weather-dependent)
At Dynamic H2O, children learn about New York City’s amazing water system and the importance of water to us all. With hands-on interactives and colorful graphics, the exhibit invites children to explore the role water plays in our local environment. Visit the Children’s Museum of Manhattan on August 6th for a special performance related to the exhibit by Latin Grammy nominee Flor Bromley. Inspired by her Pachamama album, this show invites families to explore the deep connection between water, nature, and our responsibility to protect them.
PERFORMANCE: Get Your Groove On at the Harlem Meer Performance Festival
Dates: 8/2, 8/9, 8/16, 8/23
Every Sunday in August at 2pm, bring your friends, family, and dance-moves to the Harlem Meer Performance Festival. Hosted by our friends at the Central Park Conservancy (which offers Culture Passes for their walking tours each month), this free public festival brings the best local talent to the stage each summer, filling Central Park’s north end with music and movement. Groove to Afro, Latin, world, hip-hop, gospel, jazz, and blues sounds in this dynamic, genre-spanning series.
EXHIBITION: Explore the Intersection Between Poetry and Sculpture at El Museo Del Barrio
Date: Opening 8/6
Visit El Museo del Barrio this month to see Octopus & Others: Acts of Collaboration & Poetics, a new exhibition inspired by a significant project from the museum’s history by the artist and poet Papo Colo. Octopus: An Act of Sculpture (1982)—an accordion-style outdoor book composed of eight-by-four-foot plywood panels—was first staged in El Museo’s courtyard in 1982. Presented here for the first time in more than four decades, Octopus & Others showcases the power of collaboration between artists and poets and of artworks that embrace and subvert the book form and its function.
PERFORMANCE: Watch Late Fame at Film Forum
Dates: 8/10, 8/11
Drop by Film Forum to see Willem Dafoe as Ed Saxberger, a postal worker whose former life as a downtown poet in late-70s New York is rediscovered by young admirers with a comically romanticized sense of the past. In the company of his new friends, including the mysterious and mercurial Gloria, Ed has the uncanny feeling of merging with his younger self. Directed by Kent Jones from a witty, razor-sharp script by Samy Burch, Late Fame is a funny, lively, poignant, and occasionally haunting New York story.
PERFORMANCE: Soak up the Sounds of Summer at Historic Richmond Town
Date: 8/13
Bring a blanket or lawn chair and enjoy live music under the summer sky at Historic Richmond Town, where history meets community. This free evening concert features The Dexters and The Bandulos. Part of the borough-wide Sounds of Summer concert series, this event brings the community together to celebrate local talent in a historic setting.
PERFORMANCE: Jam Out to Summer Jazz at the Brooklyn Museum
Dates: 8/16, 8/23
Swing by the Brooklyn Museum for performances by some of the city’s most acclaimed jazz musicians, whose creative styles incorporate blues, roots, and international sounds during the museum's Summer Jazz series. On August 16th, Brooklyn-based multi-instrumentalist and composer Peter Apfelbaum leads a special set with his genre-mashing big band Hieroglyphics. On August 23rd, listen in to a spirited performance led by Grammy-nominated percussionist Wilson “Chembo” Corniel, Jr.
EXHIBITION: Last Chance to Explore the Politics of Flowers at the Alice Austen House
Date: Closing 8/22
Flowers have always been political. From the 1637 tulip market crash to today’s environmental crises, flowers reflect urgent economic, social, and ecological concerns. Radical Botany, an exhibition at the Alice Austen House, showcases contemporary artists who use flowers as their primary subject to address pressing political issues affecting us all. By centering the flower, artists reveal how this seemingly delicate subject is never merely decorative but carries profound weight; across a range of media, the exhibition demonstrates that flowers are sites of labor, commodification, memory, and resistance.