The Alice Austen House occupies a singular position, both geographically and culturally—on the water’s edge of Staten Island’s North Shore. Once the home, studio, and muse of pioneering photographer Alice Austen, the house dates back to 1690 and is one of New York City’s historic homes. Yet it functions today not as a static historic site, but as a dynamic contemporary arts hub.
The museum celebrates queer and women’s history while breathing new life into Austen’s legacy by engaging with current artistic, social, and personal exploration. For Austen, this home, now a public park, was a radical retreat and safe haven for her and her largely queer circle of friends. That spirit of refuge and experimentation continues today. We activate the house and grounds through our Queer Ecologies Garden, deep community partnerships, and sustained support for artists, fostering the creation of new work that honors the past while speaking directly to the present.
The museum and public park have been a National LGBTQ+ landmark since 2017.
A Map of the World is a collaborative portrait project inspired by a short stretch of beach on Staten Island’s South Shore and the community drawn to it. Beginning two years after the deep isolation of the pandemic and amid a tense political climate in the United States, the project emerged from a desire to reconnect—with people, place, and shared space.
Learn MoreWhile frequently photographed, this body of work turns away from spectacle to focus on the cultural identity of Staten Island’s community. It is the people, passengers and crew alike, whose quiet perseverance imbues the crossing with meaning.
Learn MoreThis photographic series explores the subtle boundary between invitation and distance within domestic space. Most of the subjects are portrayed in their living rooms—the area traditionally reserved for receiving guests—positioning the viewer as a visitor momentarily welcomed into an intimate environment.
Learn MoreThe Bedroom Series considers the female bedroom as both refuge and record, a space that holds the emotional weight of becoming. Through light and shadow, each photograph reflects the tension between expectations of maturity and the persistence of innocence.
Learn MoreOver the past year, this project documents the ongoing repainting of the Verrazzano–Narrows Bridge, observing a familiar landmark in a prolonged state of transition.
Learn MoreI turn my lens toward Staten Island, a place that exists on the edge of New York City and yet feels worlds apart. The island’s contradictions fascinate me: its deep-rooted sense of community alongside political division, its suburban quiet against the backdrop of the city’s noise.
Learn MoreAn exhibition of Alice Austen’s nature photography from the Victorian era.
Learn MoreAn exhibition exploring Alice Austen’s intimate friendships.
Learn MoreA photographic celebration of the 40th anniversary of Alice Austen House Museum.
Learn MoreFrom the harbor views of Austen’s front doorstep to the international waters of her extensive travels, Picturing the Water explores Austen’s deep connection to waterways and the vessels that traverse them.
Learn MoreGrowing With the Landscape Side by Side, weaves a natural setting of hope and resilience to the local landscape of Staten Island, and its regrowth since the Clean Water Act of 1972.
Learn MoreNature Seen with Lifestyles For The Disabled. Highlights from the photography program.
Learn MoreDom Marker (b. Kharkiv, 1990) is a Ukranian-American artist. His emergent artistic practice is embedded in community activism and a post-documentary approach, focused on the war in Ukraine.
Learn MoreThe Alice Austen House education team worked with PS 60, The Alice Austen School 4th Grade students on a photographic unit inspired by Alice Austen and their own cultural heritage.
Learn More“Far Apart” is a photographic love letter to Shore Road Park, a narrow strip of playgrounds, wooded paths, and ball fields in Brooklyn that overlooks Staten Island and the Verrazano Narrows, the waterway that leads into New York Harbor.
Learn More“Brady’s Pond” is an ongoing collection of images made from recurring walks through Staten Island’s sliver of public access land along the pond’s northeast shore.
Learn MoreDocumentary photographs by Saskia Scheffer capturing the historic 1994 Lesbian Avengers protest at the Alice Austen Museum Park.
Learn MoreI discovered the waterfront in my early twenties when I moved to Brooklyn. At the time, much of it was abandoned and falling apart. Knowing it would vanish, I felt an urge, almost a duty, to document it.
Learn MoreGerard Franciosa (b.Queens, NY 1967) has been photographing for over 30 years. He is drawn to particular places, landscapes that reveal a personality and emit a force that excites him, scares him or gives him solace. His photographs index disturbances, both visual and perceived, caused by light, form and the geometry of chaos and stillness.
Learn MoreNathan Kensinger’s work explores hidden urban landscapes, post-industrial ecologies, forgotten waterways, environmental contamination, and coastal communities endangered by sea level rise and climate change. His work encompasses photography, film, installation, curation and writing.
Learn MoreThe images are part of a series of photographs that I have taken over the past two years at various beaches and state parks in Staten Island. Utilizing black and white, I was able to create wistful and romantic images that capture the essence of the environment, and the ambiguity that lies ahead.
Learn MoreAll the Dreamers is a collection of candid portraits made on board the Staten Island Ferry between 2014 to 2022. Its images depict ferry riders in moments of repose and respite during an anxious time for the city, nation and world
Learn MoreJade Doskowʼs large-scale photographs of the iconic New York landfill-turned-park Freshkills make clear itsʼ paradoxical, ethereal beauty, while creating an important archive of a major chapter within the story of New York Cityʼs infrastructure.
Learn MoreThe images that I make are drawn from my daily experiences and made in an intuitive and spontaneous manner. I am drawn to personal portraits, evocative gestures, and the small details in someone or something that I can use to make a visual statement on the world-at-large.
Learn MorePresented by The Alice Austen House and NYC Parks
Having grown up on Staten Island, David Lê uses its urban fabric as a backdrop for his Maiden Name Spring-Summer 2022 lookbook.
Learn MorePresented by The Alice Austen House and NYC Parks
A group exhibition of eight Staten Island-based photographers curated by the Alice Austen House.
Learn MorePresented by The Alice Austen House and NYC Parks
Thomas Giarraffa tells stories with his photography, creating surreal environments to comment on his past and the world he inhabits.
Learn MorePresented by The Alice Austen House and NYC Parks
Samuel Partal makes photographs of the post-natural landscape. He lives and works in Staten Island, New York.
Learn MorePresented by The Alice Austen House with Photoville and NYC Parks
During the beginning of the pandemic, a photography project across the country was born called the Front Porch Project. In early April 2020, Christine Kenworthy launched her own Front Porch Project in Staten Island.
Learn MorePresented by The Alice Austen House with Photoville and NYC Parks
The Alice Austen House presents Staten Island photographer Jahtiek Long’s photography, showcasing the places and experiences that may be at times overlooked, but deserving of representation and the opportunity to be a part of the narrative of Staten Island, New York.
Learn MoreAlice Austen House presents Gale Wisdom, botanical photograms.
Learn MoreThe Alice Austen House presents New York City-based Mexican-American photographer Irma Bohórquez-Geisler’s series documenting the daily life within the local Mexican-American and Mexican-immigrant communities from within New York City—with a focus on Staten Island.
Learn MoreAlice Austen House presents Saved by Grace, an ongoing project by Nataki Hewling documenting senior Black men. This visual story sends the message that our communities need Black male elders to nourish our ecosystems. We need to go the distance to protect their lives.
Learn MoreThe Alice Austen House fosters creative expression, explores personal identity, and educates and inspires the public through the interpretation of the photographs, life, and historic home of pioneering American photographer, Alice Austen (1866-1952).
A personal approach to street photography by Staten Island-based artist Olga Ginzburg.
It is a part of New York City that is seldom seen, but the North Shore of Staten Island is a microcosm of contemporary life in the United States. In this age of isolationism, it is also a borderland – a place where the culture wars of our decade play out in the everyday lives of residents.
Learn MoreJoin the Staten Island Photoville photographers for a pannel discussion and exhibition walkthrough!
Featuring: David Lê, Gabrielle Bass, Thomas Giarraffa, Christine Kenworthy, Samuel Patel, Gillian Ricci, Jahtiek Long, and Jess Gianna.
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