Blog

May 25 2:17 pm

L to R: Dr. Chris­t­ian V. Bra­ne­on and Tim Cawley

May­or Eric Adams and The Trust for Gov­er­nors Island announced today the appoint­ments of Dr. Chris­t­ian V. Bra­ne­on and Tim Caw­ley to their Board of Direc­tors. With lead­er­ship in cli­mate change research and the ener­gy sec­tor Dr. Bra­ne­on and Mr. Caw­ley each bring decades of expe­ri­ence and exper­tise to the Board of Direc­tors and will help over­see the Trust’s activ­i­ties in the plan­ning, oper­a­tions and devel­op­ment of Gov­er­nors Island’s forth­com­ing Cen­ter for Cli­mate Solutions. 

The Trust for Gov­er­nors Island is gov­erned by a 17-mem­ber Board of Direc­tors appoint­ed by the May­or of New York City, with rep­re­sen­ta­tives nom­i­nat­ed by the May­or, the Gov­er­nor of New York, state and city elect­ed offi­cials, and Man­hat­tan Com­mu­ni­ty Board 1. The pri­ma­ry respon­si­bil­i­ty of the Trust’s board is strate­gic over­sight, review­ing and approv­ing its oper­at­ing and cap­i­tal bud­gets, and autho­riz­ing sig­nif­i­cant contracts. 

“Gov­er­nors Island is set to play a mas­sive role in our city’s plan­ning for a future in the face of cli­mate change, and the suc­cess of that mis­sion requires strong lead­er­ship,” said May­or Eric Adams. ​“Chris­t­ian Bra­ne­on and Tim Caw­ley bring unique expe­ri­ence and per­spec­tives to the board of the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island. I am excit­ed to work with them and the entire board to strength­en the Trust as both a wel­com­ing des­ti­na­tion for vis­i­tors and the pre­mière cli­mate change research cen­ter the world has to offer.” 

“We are pleased to wel­come Chris­t­ian Bra­ne­on and Tim Caw­ley to our esteemed Board of Direc­tors,” said Clare New­man, CEO and Pres­i­dent of the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island. ​“I have the utmost con­fi­dence that they will pro­vide valu­able insight and offer a breadth of knowl­edge to help fur­ther guide and inform the Trust’s civic and envi­ron­men­tal stew­ard­ship of the Island. We look for­ward to work­ing with May­or Adams and our two newest board mem­bers to con­tin­ue to offer New York­ers a place of soli­tude and respite that is Gov­er­nors Island.” 

About Today’s Appointments:

Chris­t­ian V. Bra­ne­on, PhD

Dr. Chris­t­ian V. Bra­ne­on is Head of Cli­mate Jus­tice at Car­bon Direct. He leads the inte­gra­tion of envi­ron­men­tal and cli­mate jus­tice into Car­bon Direct’s cul­ture, oper­a­tions, and ser­vices across the car­bon man­age­ment indus­try. With Car­bon Direct, clients can set and equi­tably deliv­er on their cli­mate com­mit­ments, stream­line com­pli­ance, and man­age risk through trans­paren­cy and sci­en­tif­ic credibility.

Dr. Bra­ne­on also co-leads the Envi­ron­men­tal Jus­tice and Cli­mate Just Cities Net­work at Colum­bia University’s Earth Insti­tute and serves as Co-Chair of the New York City Pan­el on Cli­mate Change. He received an AXA Award for Cli­mate Sci­ence in 2021 for his con­tri­bu­tions to the under­stand­ing of cli­mate change and relat­ed adap­ta­tion strategies. 

Dr. Bra­ne­on pre­vi­ous­ly served as Co-Direc­tor of the Unit­ed States Envi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion Agency’s inau­gur­al Envi­ron­men­tal Jus­tice Acad­e­my for com­mu­ni­ty lead­ers. With NASA, as part of its part­ner­ship with Microsoft, he devel­oped nov­el appli­ca­tions of satel­lite data that aim to enhance resilience to urban heat stress. Dr. Bra­ne­on earned a B.S. in applied physics from More­house Col­lege as well as B.S., M.S., and PhD degrees in civ­il engi­neer­ing from Geor­gia Tech.

Tim Caw­ley

Tim Caw­ley over­sees the activ­i­ties of Con Edi­son, Inc, one of the largest U.S. ener­gy com­pa­nies, sup­ply­ing ener­gy to 10 mil­lion peo­ple in the New York City region and serv­ing as an anchor for the local econ­o­my. Con Edison’s resilient and flex­i­ble grid allows the com­pa­ny to deliv­er world-class reli­a­bil­i­ty. The com­pa­ny is mak­ing his­toric invest­ments in clean ener­gy tech­nolo­gies that will help New York meet our cli­mate goals and deliv­er 100 per­cent clean ener­gy by 2040.

Mr. Caw­ley serves as a direc­tor of the Edi­son Elec­tric Insti­tute and the Amer­i­can Gas Asso­ci­a­tion boards. He is a mem­ber of the exec­u­tive com­mit­tee for the Part­ner­ship for New York City.

Before becom­ing pres­i­dent of Con Edi­son, Mr. Caw­ley served as pres­i­dent and CEO of O&R. Ear­li­er, he held a series of increas­ing­ly impor­tant senior roles. He orig­i­nal­ly joined Con Edi­son in 1987. Mr. Caw­ley earned an M.B.A. from New York Uni­ver­si­ty and a bachelor’s degree in elec­tri­cal engi­neer­ing from Union College.

May 23 11:12 am

Film at Lin­coln Cen­ter, and Gov­er­nors Island Arts announce a pro­gram of free out­door film screen­ings for sum­mer 2023, open­ing a three-film series on June 9.

From June through August, Gov­er­nors Island Arts and Film at Lin­coln Cen­ter presents ​“Rule-Break­ers and Trou­ble­mak­ers,” a line­up of free out­door movie screen­ings for the 2023 sea­son. This year’s out­door film series will take place on the Island’s his­toric Parade Ground, an eight-acre lawn with expan­sive open views of Low­er Man­hat­tan. The series will be pro­duced by Rooftop Films.

This year’s Governor’s Island screen­ings will fea­ture a selec­tion of films that cel­e­brate relat­able, resilient pro­tag­o­nists who refuse to accept the con­straints that soci­ety has imposed on them. Films in this year’s line­up are F. Gary Gray’s Set It Off; Steven Soderbergh’s Out of Sight, and Gurinder Chadha’s Bend It Like Beck­ham.

Orga­nized by Made­line Whittle.

FILMS & DESCRIPTIONS

“Rule-Break­ers and Troublemakers”

Set It Off

F. Gary Gray, 1996, USA, 124m

For­mer bank teller Frankie (Vive­ca A. Fox) is strug­gling to make ends meet, work­ing a low-pay­ing job as a jan­i­tor along­side close friends Cleo (Queen Lat­i­fah), Stony (Jada Pin­kett Smith), and T.T. (Kim­ber­ly Elise) in mid-’90s Los Ange­les. When the four women, angered and demor­al­ized by the sta­tus quo of relent­less injus­tice that cur­tails and under­mines their aspi­ra­tions, set about sys­tem­at­i­cal­ly rob­bing banks around the city, com­pli­ca­tions soon arise in the dis­parate forms of their tyran­ni­cal boss (Thomas Jef­fer­son Byrd), an unsym­pa­thet­ic LAPD detec­tive (John C. McGin­ley), and a bud­ding romance between Stony and a charm­ing bank man­ag­er (Blair Under­wood). Direc­tor F. Gary Gray infus­es the heist genre with brac­ing emo­tion­al clar­i­ty, sen­si­tive­ly yet unsen­ti­men­tal­ly dra­ma­tiz­ing the chal­lenges faced by work­ing-class women of col­or who are forced to nav­i­gate an unac­cept­ably inhos­pitable socioe­co­nom­ic reality.

Fri­day, June 9 at 8:30pm

Out of Sight

Steven Soder­bergh, 1998, USA, 123m

Razor-sharp wit and expert­ly deployed star wattage — not to men­tion crack­ling sex­u­al chem­istry between the two leads — were in abun­dant sup­ply when Steven Soder­bergh burst into the main­stream, direct­ing Scott Frank’s ultra-cool adap­ta­tion of Elmore Leonard’s 1996 nov­el. George Clooney is Jack Foley, a career bank rob­ber on the run after break­ing out of a Flori­da pen­i­ten­tiary; Jen­nifer Lopez is U.S. Mar­shal Karen Sis­co, the no-non­sense law enforce­ment offi­cer who’s deter­mined to put Foley back behind bars. Along­side a stacked sup­port­ing cast that also includes Ving Rhames, Don Chea­dle, Albert Brooks, and Vio­la Davis in one of her ear­li­est film roles, Clooney and Lopez bring humor and heat to a sin­gu­lar­ly sexy game of cat-and-mouse as Foley makes his way to Detroit in pur­suit of a rumored stash of dia­monds, with Sis­co in hot pur­suit. Edit­ed with wry pre­ci­sion by the leg­endary Anne V. Coates, Soderbergh’s sev­enth fea­ture is a mas­ter class in smart, ensem­ble-dri­ven genre film­mak­ing, and remains a relent­less­ly enter­tain­ing crowd-pleas­er 25 years after its release.

Fri­day, July 7 at 8:30pm

Bend It Like Beckham

Gurinder Chad­ha, 2002, U.K./Germany/USA, 112m

Eng­lish, Pun­jabi, Hin­di, and Ger­man with Eng­lish subtitles

British Indi­an direc­tor Gurinder Chadha’s third fea­ture tells the sto­ry of teenag­er Jess Bham­ra (Par­min­der Nagra in a win­ning break­out per­for­mance), an avid soc­cer fan, dreams of liv­ing up to the exam­ple of her idol, star play­er David Beck­ham, against the wish­es of her cul­tur­al­ly con­ser­v­a­tive Pun­jabi elders. When new friend Jules (Keira Knight­ley) per­suades her to join the local women’s team with­out her par­ents’ knowl­edge, Jess quick­ly wins the accep­tance and respect of her team­mates and their coach (Jonathan Rhys Mey­ers), but must strug­gle to rec­on­cile her pas­sion for the game with her family’s expec­ta­tions. In the 21 years since its U.K. release, Chadha’s film — which remains the high­est-gross­ing soc­cer film of all time, and boasts scene-steal­ing sup­port­ing per­for­mances by Anu­pam Kher, Archie Pun­jabi, and Juli­et Steven­son — has con­tin­ued to be hailed as a lat­ter-day clas­sic of its inter­sect­ing gen­res, simul­ta­ne­ous­ly excelling as crowd-pleas­ing sports movie, win­ning roman­tic com­e­dy, and heart­felt cross-cul­tur­al com­ing-of-age fable.

Fri­day, August 11 at 8:30pm

GOV­ER­NORS ISLAND ARTS

Gov­er­nors Island Arts, the pub­lic arts and cul­tur­al pro­gram pre­sent­ed by the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island, cre­ates trans­for­ma­tive encoun­ters with art for all New York­ers, invit­ing artists and researchers to engage with the issues of our time in the con­text of the Island’s lay­ered his­to­ries, envi­ron­ments, and archi­tec­ture. Gov­er­nors Island Arts achieves this mis­sion through tem­po­rary and long-term pub­lic art com­mis­sions, an annu­al Orga­ni­za­tion in Res­i­dence pro­gram in the Island’s his­toric hous­es, and free pub­lic pro­grams and events in part­ner­ship with a wide range of cross-dis­ci­pli­nary NYC cul­tur­al orga­ni­za­tions. For more infor­ma­tion, vis­it www​.gov​is​land​.org/​g​iarts.

FILM AT LIN­COLN CENTER

Film at Lin­coln Cen­ter is ded­i­cat­ed to sup­port­ing the art and ele­vat­ing the craft of cin­e­ma and enrich­ing film culture.

Film at Lin­coln Cen­ter ful­fills its mis­sion through the pro­gram­ming of fes­ti­vals, series, ret­ro­spec­tives, and new releas­es; the pub­li­ca­tion of Film Com­ment; and the pre­sen­ta­tion of pod­casts, talks, spe­cial events, and artist ini­tia­tives. Since its found­ing in 1969, this non­prof­it orga­ni­za­tion has brought the cel­e­bra­tion of Amer­i­can and inter­na­tion­al film to the world-renowned Lin­coln Cen­ter arts com­plex, mak­ing the dis­cus­sion and appre­ci­a­tion of cin­e­ma acces­si­ble to a broad audi­ence and ensur­ing that it remains an essen­tial art form for years to come.

Film at Lin­coln Cen­ter receives gen­er­ous, year-round sup­port from the Nation­al Endow­ment for the Arts and the New York State Coun­cil on the Arts with the sup­port of the Office of the Gov­er­nor and the New York State Leg­is­la­ture. For more infor­ma­tion, vis­it www​.film​linc​.org and fol­low @filmlinc on Twit­ter and Insta­gram.

May 15 9:38 am

For the third straight year the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island is proud to wel­come a fam­i­ly of five sheep for their sum­mer land­scap­ing jobs. Hail­ing from Friends of Tivoli Lake Pre­serve and Farm in Albany these sheep will spend the next five months munch­ing away on mug­wort, phrag­mites and oth­er inva­sive species, free­ing up the Island’s hor­ti­cul­tur­al team to do more impor­tant work.

Three of the sheep — Evening, Chad, and Philip Aries – are return­ing to Gov­er­nors Island for their third sea­son and will spend anoth­er sum­mer eat­ing inva­sive plants in Ham­mock Grove. Two new sheep — Bowie, rec­og­niz­able by his dark brown wool coat, and Jupiter, rec­og­niz­able by the white spot on his nose — vis­it­ing the Island for the first time this year. 

“Ewe bet­ter believe we are excit­ed to wel­come baaaaack our flock of wooly friends to Gov­er­nors Island,” said Clare New­man, Pres­i­dent & CEO of the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island. ​“This inno­v­a­tive land­scap­ing pro­gram is not only a great ben­e­fit to our Island’s plants but to our vis­i­tors as well, who always enjoy see­ing the sheep in action. We are thrilled that two new faces are join­ing us this year but will note that Bowie and Jupiter are under pres­sure to live up to the work per­for­mance of their fam­i­ly, who have become land­scap­ing heroes and enjoy con­sid­er­able fame.”

“This will be the third year the sheep will be com­ing down to help us mow mug­wort and phrag­mites,” said Leo Framp­ton, Gar­den­er and at the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island. ​“As always, these ani­mals will give me and my team more time to do what we love (gar­den­ing) by spend­ing each day doing what they love (eat­ing). They will help us max­i­mize the eco­log­i­cal ben­e­fits of Ham­mock Grove, as it con­tin­ues to grow into a ful­ly formed urban for­est that all New York­ers can escape to.”

“Baa! Baa! Baaaaa! Baaaaaaaaaaaaa!,” said Bowie and Jupiter in a joint state­ment when asked how excit­ed they was to spend this sum­mer on Gov­er­nors Island, one of the pre­mier New York City des­ti­na­tions for tourists and locals alike.

Mug­wort, phrag­mites (the sheep’s favorite) and oth­er inva­sive plant species have a com­pet­i­tive nature and crowd oth­er plant­i­ngs on Gov­er­nors Island, essen­tial­ly cre­at­ing a mono­cul­ture. The sheep eat­ing these herba­ceous plants helps to break down and weak­en them, pre­vent­ing them from flow­er­ing and the seeds spreading.

Recruit­ing a herd of sheep is extreme­ly ben­e­fi­cial to the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island’s efforts to care for the park, as it reduces the time spent on inva­sive species removal to less than 30 per­cent of hor­ti­cul­ture staff time. The sheep pro­vide eco-friend­ly land­scape care that ensures the area’s bio­di­ver­si­ty can thrive for years to come and allows the Trust’s hor­ti­cul­ture team to use their time and tal­ents to focus on cul­ti­vat­ing an immer­sive, cli­mate resilient, eco­log­i­cal­ly ben­e­fi­cial open space where all New York­ers are able to learn from and recon­nect with nature.

Sheep are also unique­ly suit­ed to the work on Gov­er­nors Island, more so than goats or oth­er ani­mals, since their culi­nary tastes do not include tree bark. The sheep will eat around the young trees in Ham­mock Grove and focus on phrag­mites and oth­er del­i­ca­cies, while goats would devour vir­tu­al­ly any plant life they could get their hooves on — inva­sive or not.

Sev­er­al sheep herd­ing demon­stra­tions will be held on Gov­er­nors Island in part­ner­ship with Friends of Tivoli Lake Pre­serve and Farm, fea­tur­ing live sheep herd­ing and hands-on wool activ­i­ties, with dates to be announced on www​.gov​is​land​.org/​t​h​i​n​g​s​-​to-do.

“We are excit­ed to be back on Gov­er­nors Island this year, intro­duc­ing new ani­mals to this amaz­ing place and expand­ing their graz­ing ser­vices,” said Kim Tateo, Exec­u­tive Direc­tor and Farm Man­ag­er of Friends of Tivoli Lake Pre­serve and Farm. ​“It’s been so great to see the how the sheep have helped to improve the plant diver­si­ty in Ham­mock Grove, and to con­nect that work with the rest of our flock upstate. We can’t wait for Island vis­i­tors to learn more about these ani­mals this sum­mer, and hope every­one will join our herd­ing demon­stra­tions — where vis­i­tors will be able to expe­ri­ence live sheep herd­ing and learn all about the impor­tance of their wool and its dif­fer­ent uses.” 

“The days are get­ting warmer, the flow­ers are bloom­ing, and the sheep are com­ing back to Ham­mock Grove! I applaud the team at Friends of Tivoli Lake Pre­serve for tak­ing good care of Evening, Chad, and Philip Aries this past win­ter, and the Gov­er­nors Island team for prepar­ing Ham­mock Grove for their return, and wel­com­ing Bowie and Jupiter into the fold. I’m glad New York has had the wool pulled from its eyes regard­ing just how help­ful the flock can be to decrease inva­sive species, and I look for­ward to vis­it­ing our sheep this sum­mer with my fam­i­ly,” said New York State Sen­a­tor Andrew Gounardes

“I was thrilled when I herd that Manhattan’s favorite sum­mer res­i­dents and nat­ur­al gar­den­ers were return­ing,” said Man­hat­tan Bor­ough Pres­i­dent Mark Levine. ​“The Gov­er­nors Island sheep are an inno­v­a­tive and beloved approach to sus­tain­able, zero-waste land­scap­ing. New York­ers: Ewe bet­ter stop by Ham­mock Grove to see these four-legged hor­ti­cul­tur­al­ists in action.”

May 5 11:18 am

The Trust for Gov­er­nors Island today announced a robust cal­en­dar of excit­ing and wide-rang­ing pro­grams on the Island for this sum­mer that promise to offer excit­ing expe­ri­ences for New York­ers of all ages and vis­i­tors from around the world. This year’s pro­gram­ming high­lights the breadth of activ­i­ties, events, and cul­tur­al expe­ri­ences that can be enjoyed dur­ing the warmer months on Gov­er­nors Island, includ­ing live music, food trucks, and pub­lic art installations.

“Gov­er­nors Island has estab­lished itself as a cul­tur­al, edu­ca­tion­al, and recre­ation­al stand­out,” said Deputy May­or for Eco­nom­ic and Work­force Devel­op­ment Maria Tor­res-Springer. ​“Thanks to the inge­nu­ity and diver­si­ty of this sum­mer’s pro­gram­ming — cou­pled with the increased fer­ry rides and access — we are espe­cial­ly excit­ed to wel­come New York­ers across the five bor­oughs to this amaz­ing resource in New York Harbor.” 

“Gov­er­nors Island con­tin­ues to grow as an acces­si­ble, year-round des­ti­na­tion — offer­ing unpar­al­leled open space, thought-pro­vok­ing arts and cul­tur­al expe­ri­ences, some of our city’s best culi­nary offer­ings, a diverse com­mu­ni­ty of ten­ants and ameni­ties, and more for our near­ly one mil­lion vis­i­tors,” said Clare New­man, Pres­i­dent and CEO of the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island. ​“With this summer’s expand­ed pub­lic access, increased acces­si­ble trans­porta­tion, and excit­ing cal­en­dar of events, we hope more New York­ers than ever before hop on the fer­ry and join us for some excel­lent sum­mer fun.” 

High­light­ed sum­mer pro­grams, activ­i­ties, and vis­i­tor ameni­ties announced today include:

VIS­I­TOR AMENI­TIES AND ATTRACTIONS

The Trust for Gov­er­nors Island will offer expand­ed oper­a­tions of the Island’s wheel­chair-acces­si­ble tram ser­vice, free and avail­able to all guests. These all-elec­tric acces­si­bil­i­ty vehi­cles will depart from Sois­sons Land­ing and Yan­kee Pier dai­ly from Memo­r­i­al Day through the end of Octo­ber, stop­ping at key loca­tions through­out the Island. 

The Urban Farm — home to GrowNYC’s teach­ing gar­den, Earth Mat­ter NY’s Com­post Learn­ing Cen­ter and Soil Start Farm, and the Bee Conservancy’s bee sanc­tu­ary — is open week­ends from 12 – 4pm with free tours the first Sat­ur­day of every month. Cir­cu­lar Econ­o­my Manufacturing’s Micro­Fac­to­ry, which turns post-con­sumer plas­tics into upcy­cled objects using only solar pow­er, is also open week­ends with free demon­stra­tions for vis­i­tors. play:groundNYC’s Adven­ture Play­ground, a unique kids-only space imag­i­na­tion and explo­ration, is open every week­end from 12 – 4pm. Gov­er­nors Island Nation­al Mon­u­ment, includ­ing Fort Jay and Cas­tle Williams, is open for self-guid­ed tours and infor­ma­tion on week­ends from 12 – 4pm start­ing Memo­r­i­al Day weekend. 

Low­er Man­hat­tan Cul­tur­al Council’s Arts Cen­ter at Gov­er­nors Island is open Fri­day-Sat­ur­day from 12 – 6pm through Octo­ber 1, with artist res­i­den­cies, pub­lic pro­grams, and three works cen­tered on the theme ​“time,” includ­ing an exhi­bi­tion by instal­la­tion artist Daniel Shieh, a film and video exhi­bi­tion curat­ed by Allies in Arts, and a new instal­la­tion by Rhon­da Wep­pler and Trevor Mahovsky. The Arts Cen­ter is free and open to all, with no pri­or reser­va­tions required. Col­lec­tive Retreats is open dai­ly for overnight stays, and QC NY is open dai­ly with two heat­ed out­door pools along­side saunas, steam rooms, relax­ation treat­ments, mas­sages, and a new bar and bistro. The Insti­tute for Pub­lic Archi­tec­ture and Shan­dak­en: Projects — year round Island ten­ants locat­ed in Nolan Park Build­ing 9 — will offer free events and exhi­bi­tions through­out the sum­mer months. 

OPEN SPACE AND RECREATION

Vis­i­tors can enjoy Gov­er­nors Island’s 120+ acres of open space dai­ly. The Island’s award-win­ning, cli­mate resilient park offers rolling lawns and plen­ty of room for New York­ers to spread out for pic­nick­ing and recre­ation, includ­ing over sev­en miles of car-free bike paths. Ham­mock Grove’s 40+ pub­lic ham­mocks and path­ways nes­tled into the foliage of this young urban for­est pro­vide a relax­ing retreat. The Hills fea­ture unpar­al­leled views of the har­bor and land­marks, like the Stat­ue of Lib­er­ty and the sur­round­ing Low­er Man­hat­tan and Brook­lyn skylines. 

Pop­u­lar year-round activ­i­ties — like bike rentals with Blaz­ing Sad­dles, includ­ing Free Bike Morn­ings every week­day between 10am-12pm and CitiBike; self-guid­ed dig­i­tal walk­ing tours with Urban Archive, Ges­so, and the Black Gotham Expe­ri­ence; and more — will con­tin­ue to be offered to Island vis­i­tors. Addi­tion­al­ly, climbers of all ages and skill lev­els can enjoy breath­tak­ing views from new heights at our Com­mu­ni­ty Climb­ing boul­der on the West­ern Prom­e­nade. More infor­ma­tion and updates on recre­ation activ­i­ties can be found on the Gov­er­nors Island website.

EVENTS

Gov­er­nors Island remains one of New York City’s most unique loca­tions for events of all kinds. See below for a selec­tion of upcom­ing events, with more to be announced through­out the sea­son. See a pre­view of event details below:

• NYCRUNS Sum­mer Lovin’ 5K & 10K – May 13
• Mov­ing Chains: Towards Abo­li­tion, a free day-long pro­gram build­ing upon Mov­ing Chains on Gov­er­nors Island pre­sent­ed by Cre­ative Time and Gov­er­nors Island Arts – May 20
• World Bee Day cel­e­bra­tion pre­sent­ed by The Bee Con­ser­van­cy – May 20
• Insti­tute for Pub­lic Archi­tec­ture sym­po­sium: BQE 2053, Towards a Decar­bonized Sus­tain­able Mul­ti-Modal Trans­porta­tion Net­work – May 20
• New York Har­bor Oys­ter Clas­sic 5K, sup­port­ing the Urban Assem­bly New York Har­bor School on Gov­er­nors Island – June 4
• Jazz Age Lawn Par­ty – June 10 – 11, August 12 – 13
• Low­er Man­hat­tan Cul­tur­al Council’s city­wide Riv­er to Riv­er Fes­ti­val – June 16 – 18
• Rite of Sum­mer Music Fes­ti­val – June 16, July 22, August 25
• Porch Stomp folk music fes­ti­val – June 17
• FAD Mar­ket month­ly pop-ups – June 17 – 18, July 15 – 16, August 19 – 20, Sep­tem­ber 16 – 17, Octo­ber 21 – 22
• NYCRUNS Father’s Day 5K & 10K – June 19
• NYCRUNS Fire­crack­er 5K & 10K – July 4 
• Out­door Films pre­sent­ed by Gov­er­nors Island Arts in part­ner­ship with Film at Lin­coln Cen­ter – June 9, July 7, August 11
• Crick­et Clas­sic – July 9
• NYC Poet­ry Fes­ti­val – July 29 – 30

FOOD VEN­DORS

Gov­er­nors Island is a true culi­nary des­ti­na­tion with a diverse mix of cuisines avail­able to vis­i­tors dai­ly. New ven­dors this year include Wheeler’s, Gov­er­nors Island’s first 100% solar pow­ered food ven­dor, locat­ed at and oper­at­ed by Pulse Grids in Colonels Row. 

Return­ing ven­dors includ­ing Joe Cof­fee Com­pa­ny, Lit­tle Eva’s, Taco Vista, Fauzia’s Heav­en­ly Delights, Island Oys­ter, Threes Brew­ing and the Meat Hook, Piz­za Yard, Sea Bis­cuit, Car­reau Club, Tokyo Drum­stick, La Newyork­i­na, the Real Moth­er Shuck­ers, and more. Pre­vi­ous Island ven­dor Mak­i­na Café is set to serve their Ethiopi­an and Eritre­an cui­sine out of a brand-new loca­tion in Colonels Row, and the Food­ie Spot — a part­ner­ship with the New York City Hous­ing Author­i­ty (NYCHA)’s Office of Res­i­dent Eco­nom­ic Empow­er­ment and Sus­tain­abil­i­ty — will return to Liggett Ter­race, spot­light­ing small busi­ness­es owned by grad­u­ates of NYCHA’s Food Busi­ness Path­ways pro­gram. Find a com­plete list of ven­dors and all oper­at­ing hours will be updat­ed reg­u­lar­ly at www.govisland.og/foods.

Open Dai­ly

• Gitano Island – Lunch week­days from 12 – 4pm, din­ner Mon­day-Wednes­day from 4 – 10pm and Thurs­day-Sun­day from 4 – 11pm, brunch week­ends from 11am-3pm, Sois­sons Landing
• Island Oys­ter – Dai­ly, 12 – 6pm, Sois­sons Landing
• Joe Cof­fee Com­pa­ny in the Bat­tery Mar­itime Build­ing fer­ry ter­mi­nal – Dai­ly, 7am-4pm
• Joe Cof­fee Com­pa­ny at Liggett Ter­race – Week­ends May 6 – 28, 10am-5pm; Dai­ly May 29-Sep­tem­ber 4, 10am-7pm
• Lit­tle Eva’s – Dai­ly, 11am-5pm, Liggett Terrace
• Taco Vista – Dai­ly, 12 – 6pm, Sois­sons Landing
• Three Peaks Lodge at Col­lec­tive Retreats – Dai­ly for break­fast, lunch, Hap­py Hour, din­ner, and bar ser­vice, West­ern Promenade

Open Week­ends and Select Weekdays

• Car­reau Club – Fri­day-Sun­day, 11am-6pm, King Ave
• Fauzia’s Heav­en­ly Delights – Fri­day-Sun­day, 11am-6pm, Liggett Terrace
• The Food­ie Spot – Fri­day-Sun­day, 11am-5pm, Liggett Terrace
• La Newyork­i­na – Week­ends start­ing Memo­r­i­al Day Week­end, 12 – 5 pm, Colonels Row 
• Mak­i­na Café – Fri­day-Sun­day start­ing Memo­r­i­al Day Week­end, 11am-6pm, Colonels Row
• New York Food Truck Asso­ci­a­tion food trucks – Week­ends, 11am-5pm, Liggett Terrace
• Piz­za Yard – Fri­day-Sun­day, 12 – 5pm, Colonels Row
• The Real Moth­er Shuck­ers – Week­ends start­ing in July, mobile ven­dor trav­el­ing around the Island
• Sea Bis­cuit – Week­ends start­ing Memo­r­i­al Day Week­end, 10am-6pm, West­ern Promenade
• Threes Brew­ing & The Meat Hook – Week­ends, 12 – 6pm, Liggett Terrace
• Tokyo Drum­stick – Fri­day-Sun­day, 11am-4pm, Liggett Terrace
• Wheeler’s – Fri­day-Sun­day start­ing late May, 12 – 6pm, Colonels Row

GOV­ER­NORS ISLAND ARTS

Through pub­lic art com­mis­sions, the annu­al Orga­ni­za­tions in Res­i­dence pro­gram, and pub­lic events and pro­grams, Gov­er­nors Island Arts — the arts and cul­tur­al pro­gram pre­sent­ed by the Trust — cre­ates trans­for­ma­tive encoun­ters with art for all New York­ers, invit­ing artists and researchers to engage with the Island’s lay­ered his­to­ries, envi­ron­ments, and archi­tec­ture. Vis­it www​.gov​is​land​.org/​g​iarts to view the program’s pre­vi­ous­ly announced sum­mer sea­son of free cul­tur­al offerings. 

VIS­I­TOR INFOR­MA­TION

Gov­er­nors Island will debut new pub­lic hours this sum­mer, expand­ing access to the Island for all New York­ers into the evening. From Memo­r­i­al Day through Labor Day, the Island will remain open until 10pm Sun­day-Thurs­day and 11pm Fri­day-Sat­ur­day (with the South Island Park clos­ing at 6pm). From Labor Day through Memo­r­i­al Day, the Island is open dai­ly from 7am to 6pm. 

Trust for Gov­er­nors Island-oper­at­ed fer­ries run dai­ly between the Bat­tery Mar­itime Build­ing at 10 South Street in Low­er Man­hat­tan and Sois­sons Land­ing on the Island. Trust-oper­at­ed fer­ries also serve two Brook­lyn loca­tions dur­ing the sum­mer months — Pier Six in Brook­lyn Bridge Park and Atlantic Basin in Red Hook. These routes run direct­ly to Yan­kee Pier on Gov­er­nors Island from each loca­tion every Sat­ur­day, Sun­day, and hol­i­day Mon­day from May 27 through Octo­ber 29. For sched­ules and tick­et­ing infor­ma­tion, vis­it the Gov­er­nors Island website.

Vis­i­tors are encour­aged to reserve fer­ry tick­ets in advance of their trip on the Gov­er­nors Island web­site. Round-trip fer­ry tick­ets cost $4 for adults. Fer­ries oper­at­ed by the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island are always free for chil­dren 12 and under, old­er adults 65 and up, res­i­dents of NYCHA, IDNYC hold­ers, cur­rent and for­mer mil­i­tary ser­vice mem­bers, and Gov­er­nors Island mem­bers. Fer­ries before noon on Sat­ur­days and Sun­days are free for all. There is no sur­charge for bicy­cles or strollers on Trust-oper­at­ed fer­ries at any time.

The Trust also offers free fer­ry fares for non­prof­it com­mu­ni­ty-based orga­ni­za­tions, youth camps, and senior cen­ters through­out New York City. To inquire about group vis­its, orga­ni­za­tions may email groupvisits@​govisland.​org.

NYC Fer­ry ser­vice to Gov­er­nors Island on the South Brook­lyn route oper­ates week­days and non-sum­mer week­ends. On sum­mer week­ends dur­ing the high­est rid­er­ship sea­son, NYC Fer­ry will con­tin­ue to oper­ate its ded­i­cat­ed sea­son­al shut­tle from Pier 11/​Wall Street in Low­er Man­hat­tan. NYC Fer­ry rid­ers may take any route to Pier 11 and trans­fer to the shut­tle for free, or NYC Fer­ry rid­ers may trans­fer for free at either Atlantic Ave/​Pier 6 or Red Hook/​Atlantic Basin to Trust-oper­at­ed Brook­lyn fer­ries. For tick­et­ing infor­ma­tion and full sched­ules for NYC Fer­ry, vis­it the NYC Fer­ry web­site, www.ferry.nyc.

“Sum­mer is near­ly here and on top of some great weath­er, New York­ers also have an incred­i­ble slate of free events and pro­gram­ming dur­ing Gov­er­nors Island Sum­mer Sea­son to look for­ward to. I’m excit­ed to see my neigh­bors out and about and enjoy­ing all that Gov­er­nors Island has to offer,” said Con­gress­man Daniel S. Gold­man (NY-10).

“With its offer­ings from its bee sanc­tu­ary to its urban for­est and its pub­lic art to its incred­i­ble food options, what Gov­er­nors Island offers New York­ers is unpar­al­leled. I con­grat­u­late all who worked hard to pre­pare the Island for its expand­ed pub­lic access this sum­mer, and I look for­ward to tak­ing the fer­ry from Brook­lyn and mak­ing the most of all its incred­i­ble resources with my own fam­i­ly in the com­ing months,” said New York State Sen­a­tor Andrew Gounardes

“This sum­mer, our Red Hook fam­i­lies will have access to free fer­ry ser­vice in order to enjoy a wide array of fam­i­ly activ­i­ties on Gov­er­nors Island,” said New York City Coun­cil Mem­ber Alexa Avilés. ​“With the clo­sure of our neigh­bor­hood library, chil­dren will need more oppor­tu­ni­ties, like the ones offered through this pro­gram, in order to con­tin­ue to explore the world around them through­out the sum­mer months. I am delight­ed that the work of our neigh­bors and CBO part­ners will be high­light­ed through part­ner­ships with the NYCHA Food Busi­ness Path­way Pro­gram as well as GrowNYC. I look for­ward to see­ing my neigh­bors at Gov­er­nors Island this summer.”

“Gov­er­nors Island is the per­fect warm-weath­er escape for New York­ers and tourists – there’s more than 120 acres of open space, recre­ation­al activ­i­ties, arts and cul­ture, fam­i­ly pro­gram­ming, and local his­to­ry,” said Man­hat­tan Bor­ough Pres­i­dent Mark Levine. ​“I encour­age every­one to take advan­tage of this unique escape and bask in all that Gov­er­nors Island has to offer.”

“All of us at the Friends of Gov­er­nors are thrilled to wel­come vis­i­tors from across the five bor­oughs and around the world to this mag­i­cal des­ti­na­tion in the heart of New York Har­bor,” said Pat­ti Davis, Inter­im Exec­u­tive Direc­tor at the Friends of Gov­er­nors Island. ​“Tru­ly there is some­thing here for every­one – 120 acres of lush open space, dozens of his­toric build­ings, a vast array of free pub­lic pro­grams, inno­v­a­tive arts and cul­ture, miles of car-free bike paths, and a vari­ety of din­ing options — all with breath­tak­ing water­front views of New York Har­bor and the Stat­ue of Lib­er­ty. Bring your friends and fam­i­ly and plan to stay all day!” 

“I’m pleased to wel­come vis­i­tors back to Gov­er­nors Island Nation­al Mon­u­ment start­ing Memo­r­i­al Day Week­end,” said Shirley McK­in­ney, Man­hat­tan sites super­in­ten­dent, Nation­al Park Ser­vice. ​“This year, we will con­tin­ue to offer self-guid­ed pub­lic tours of the his­toric forts, with our park rangers on site to answer ques­tions and pro­vide infor­ma­tion on the Island’s unique his­to­ry to our visitors.”

Gov­er­nors Island has under­gone a tremen­dous trans­for­ma­tion over the last decade, includ­ing the cre­ation of a resilient 43-acre park, a grow­ing arts and cul­tur­al pro­gram, year-round pub­lic access, and remark­able growth in audi­ence. The Island is home to a diverse num­ber of year-round ten­ants, includ­ing the Urban Assem­bly New York Har­bor School, the Low­er Man­hat­tan Cul­tur­al Coun­cil, the Bil­lion Oys­ter Project, Shan­dak­en Projects, Beam Cen­ter, the Insti­tute for Pub­lic Archi­tec­ture, and QC NY Spa, as well as the soon-to-open But­ter­milk Labs — a new mul­ti-ten­ant hub for coastal cli­mate solu­tions sched­uled to open in 2024. 

In April, New York City May­or Eric Adams, the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island, and State Uni­ver­si­ty of New York (SUNY) Stony Brook Uni­ver­si­ty unveiled the ​“New York Cli­mate Exchange,” a trans­for­ma­tive vision for a first-in-the-nation cli­mate research, edu­ca­tion, and jobs hub on Gov­er­nors Island that will cre­ate thou­sands of per­ma­nent jobs and $1 bil­lion in eco­nom­ic impact for the city. A cross-sec­tor con­sor­tium led by Stony Brook, the Exchange will cre­ate a state-of-the-art, $700-mil­lion, a 400,000-square-foot cam­pus ded­i­cat­ed to research­ing and devel­op­ing inno­v­a­tive cli­mate solu­tions that will be scaled across New York City and the world and will equip New York­ers to hold the green jobs of the future.

The cul­mi­na­tion of a two-year, com­pet­i­tive request for pro­pos­al process, the selec­tion of the New York Cli­mate Exchange rep­re­sents a major mile­stone in the city’s ground­break­ing Cen­ter for Cli­mate Solu­tions ini­tia­tive — a key piece of May­or Adams’ ​“Rebuild, Renew, Rein­vent A Blue­print for New York City’s Eco­nom­ic Recov­ery” — which will cre­ate 7,000 per­ma­nent jobs and a bil­lion dol­lars in eco­nom­ic impact, while expand­ing and enhanc­ing pub­lic access to Gov­er­nors Island. The Exchange alone will cre­ate over 2,200 100-per­cent union jobs, includ­ing for con­struc­tion and build­ing ser­vices, with a com­mit­ment to hir­ing all con­struc­tion and build­ing ser­vice work­ers at pre­vail­ing wage and a goal of 35 per­cent minor­i­ty- and women-owned busi­ness enter­prise (M/WBE) par­tic­i­pa­tion in construction.

May 2 12:30 pm

Gov­er­nors Island Arts today announced a sched­ule of pro­gram­ming and exhi­bi­tions for the Island’s peak sum­mer sea­son, includ­ing a range of events for locals and vis­i­tors of all ages to enjoy. This season’s line­up includes art exhibits, edu­ca­tion­al work­shops, the return of out­door films on the Parade Ground, pub­lic art instal­la­tions, and the annu­al Orga­ni­za­tions in Res­i­dence pro­gram — where 24+ NYC-based non­prof­its will high­light arts, cul­ture, envi­ron­men­tal­ism, and edu­ca­tion through exhi­bi­tions, talks, screen­ings, res­i­den­cies, and work­shops in the his­toric for­mer mil­i­tary hous­es in Nolan Park and Colonels Row.

“Gov­er­nors Island has grown into one of our city’s pre­mière arts and cul­ture des­ti­na­tions, and our 2023 Sum­mer Sea­son offer­ings show­case just how vital the arts com­mu­ni­ty is to the ongo­ing suc­cess of our island,” said Clare New­man, Pres­i­dent & CEO of the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island. ​“Some of the most com­pelling arts instal­la­tions in the world make their home on Gov­er­nors Island, and we encour­age vis­i­tors to join us on the Island, enjoy the excel­lent weath­er and take in the amaz­ing free arts and cul­ture offer­ings we are proud to present this season.”

“This year we are thrilled to wel­come myr­i­ad tal­ent­ed artists and cre­ators to the Island for a sea­son full of cul­tur­al pro­gram­ming unlike any oth­er,” said Mered­ith John­son, VP of Art and Cul­ture at the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island. ​“As we con­tin­ue to expand pub­lic access to the Island, Gov­er­nors Island Arts is proud to offer inter­ac­tive and engag­ing edu­ca­tion­al pro­gram­ming that is free for all vis­i­tors to enjoy and to con­tin­ue to grow the cul­tur­al com­mu­ni­ty that has long thrived on Gov­er­nors Island.” 

PUB­LIC ART COMMISSIONS

The Amer­i­can Man­i­fest Chap­ter Two: Mov­ing Chains, by Charles Gaines will reopen in sum­mer 2023. Gov­er­nors Island Arts and Cre­ative Time will host a free con­ven­ing event in response to this work on Sat­ur­day, May 20, 2023. Mov­ing Chains: Toward Abo­li­tion will bring togeth­er an inter­dis­ci­pli­nary group of artists, schol­ars, and edu­ca­tors work­ing on strate­gies for abo­li­tion with­in art, law, edu­ca­tion, and polit­i­cal action. The event con­tin­ues a crit­i­cal dia­logue exam­in­ing the Amer­i­can ori­gin sto­ry, ini­ti­at­ed by Charles Gaines last sum­mer with the launch of his mul­ti-year, mul­ti-site pub­lic art project anchored by Mov­ing Chains, which will be acti­vat­ed dur­ing the event and reopens for reg­u­lar pub­lic hours this sum­mer on Gov­er­nors Island.

Sam Van Aken’s mon­u­men­tal The Open Orchard, on view in the Island’s award-win­ning, cli­mate-resilient park, wel­comes vis­i­tors year-round to expe­ri­ence the chang­ing sea­sons in this orchard com­prised of 102 fruit trees that acts as a liv­ing archive for antique and heir­loom vari­eties that were grown in and around New York City in the past 400 years but have most­ly dis­ap­peared due to cli­mate change and the indus­tri­al­iza­tion of agri­cul­ture. Addi­tion­al long-term pub­lic art instal­la­tions—includ­ing Rachel Whiteread’s Cab­in, Mark Handforth’s Yan­kee Hang­er, Duke Riley’s Not for Nutten, and Mark Dion’s The Field Sta­tion of the Melan­choly Marine Biol­o­gist—remain on view daily. 

ORGA­NI­ZA­TIONS IN RESIDENCE

Two dozen arts, cul­ture, edu­ca­tion­al, and envi­ron­men­tal non­prof­its uti­lize space inside the his­toric hous­es of Nolan Park and Colonels Row to present a robust cal­en­dar of free pub­lic pro­grams, host artist res­i­den­cies, and engage vis­i­tors in spe­cial activ­i­ties for all ages through­out the sum­mer months. Orga­ni­za­tions in Res­i­dence are open every Fri­day, Sat­ur­day, and Sun­day from 11am to 5pm from May 5 through Octo­ber 29.

This year’s line­up fea­tures a wide array of pro­gram­ming span­ning dis­ci­plines — includ­ing dance class­es and oth­er per­for­mance-based works, out­door sculp­tures, envi­ron­men­tal edu­ca­tion­al activ­i­ties, youth pro­gram­ming, and film instal­la­tions, and explores themes includ­ing def­i­n­i­tions of home, the inter­con­nect­ed­ness of soil ecosys­tem health, mem­o­ry and fam­i­ly his­to­ries, the idea of the mater­nal with­in the African dias­po­ra, the inter­sec­tion of envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice and art, and much more. Pro­grams from this year’s Orga­ni­za­tions in Res­i­dence will include the fol­low­ing, with more to be announced:

Amer­i­can Indi­an Com­mu­ni­ty House (AICH) Man­hat­tan

Nolan Park Build­ing 15

AICH has a long tra­di­tion of sup­port­ing indige­nous per­form­ers through its ​“Indi­an Sum­mer” per­form­ing arts, visu­al arts, and writ­ten word pro­grams. This sum­mer, these artists will plan and enact arts pro­grams for the pub­lic while using space on Gov­er­nors Island to cre­ate new works. 

Art­Crawl Harlem Man­hat­tan

Colonels Row Build­ing 406B

Art­Crawl Harlem will ush­er in their fourth sea­son on Gov­er­nors Island with the annu­al Bound­aries and Con­nec­tions artist res­i­den­cy pro­gram, fea­tur­ing Daquane Cher­ry, Court­ney Minor, and Mar­tyryce Roach, and their first-ever Lit­er­ary Artist in Res­i­dence Mis­sy Burton. 

ArtsCon­nec­tion Man­hat­tan*

Colonels Row Build­ing 408B

ArtsCon­nec­tion will kick off their Gov­er­nors Island res­i­den­cy with a cal­en­dar of arts an cul­tur­al offer­ings includ­ing: free sum­mer pro­gram­ing through Map Free City sum­mer inten­sive, ArtsConnection’s Teens Pro­gram Finale Event on Sat­ur­day, May 20, a Teens Curate Teens Art Exhi­bi­tion, and artist res­i­den­cies invit­ing 15 pro­fes­sion­al artists from ArtsConnection’s teach­ing artist roster. 

BronxArt­Space The Bronx

Colonels Row Build­ing 407A

BronxArts­Space will host 12 Bronx-based artists in res­i­dence on Gov­er­nors Island this sum­mer with sev­er­al free open stu­dios and oth­er events. Fea­tured artists include Eugene Blu­ford, Andrea Resendiz Gomez, Alex­is Mon­toya, Dau­ris Mar­tinez, Alexan­der Rubil­do, Deb­o­rah Yasin­sky, and more. 

Bil­lion Oys­ter Project Man­hat­tan

Nolan Park Build­ing 16

Bil­lion Oys­ter Project’s house will hold an oys­ter dis­play, invit­ing vis­i­tors to learn more about ecosys­tems and these engi­neers, their impor­tance to New York Har­bor, and how every­one can get involved. 

Escap­ing Time: Art from U.S. Pris­ons Man­hat­tan

Nolan Park Build­ing 8B 

Escap­ing Time show­cas­es art­work cre­at­ed by indi­vid­u­als who have expe­ri­enced or are cur­rent­ly expe­ri­enc­ing incar­cer­a­tion in the Unit­ed States. In addi­tion to week­ly exhi­bi­tions, Escap­ing Time will also hold sev­er­al events and work­shops — includ­ing a work­shop on cre­at­ing art in prison and a dis­cus­sion explor­ing the evo­lu­tion of plan­ta­tions into pris­ons across the Unit­ed States. 

Flux Fac­to­ry Queens

Colonels Row Build­ing 404A

Flux Fac­to­ry will host Flux Sat­ur­days on the last Sat­ur­day each month from May through Octo­ber. Orga­nized by dif­fer­ent artists each month, the pro­gram will take many forms includ­ing pop-up exhi­bi­tions, per­for­mances, work­shops, screen­ings, artist pre­sen­ta­tions and more.

KODA Brook­lyn

Colonels Row Build­ing 404B

KODA will present a solo exhi­bi­tion and three-month res­i­den­cy with Queens-born mul­ti­me­dia artist Sa’dia Rehman. Rehman’s solo show, titled Desire Lin­ies, will fea­ture a video, works on paper, and an evolv­ing installation.

Foun­tain House Gallery Man­hat­tan*

Colonels Row Build­ing 410A

Foun­tain House Gallery will hold month­ly artist res­i­den­cies with par­tic­i­pat­ing artists Michal Behar, Guiomar Giral­do-Baron, Rene San­ti­a­go, Roger Jones, Ray Lopez, Mary Minty, Eva Tor­to­ra, Nan­cy Caton, Je’Jae Mizrahi (aka mx.enigma), ver­mil­ion, Guiomar Giral­do-Baron, Aracelis Rivera, Boo Lynn Walsh, Ker­ry Kennedy, and Valerie Kerr. 

Har­vest­works Man­hat­tan

Nolan Park Build­ing 10A

Har­vest­works and social group/​artist col­lec­tive LiveCode_​NYC will co-present Regen Cir­cuit, an arts and tech exhi­bi­tion that will also fea­ture per­for­mances, work­shops and pre­sen­ta­tions, and oth­er installations.

The Low­er East­side Girls Club Man­hat­tan*

Colonels Row Build­ing 408A

The Low­erEast­Side Girls Club will bring Mem­o­ry Lab to Gov­er­nors Island. Show­cas­ing a cul­mi­na­tion of stu­dent work along with inter­ac­tive rooms, this exhib­it explores the inner work­ings of nos­tal­gia and cel­e­brates fam­i­ly his­to­ries through sto­ry­telling while seek­ing to evoke col­lec­tive mem­o­ry through sto­ry shar­ing, pho­tog­ra­phy, sound, child­hood games, archival tex­tiles, and media.

The Muse­um of Con­tem­po­rary African Dias­po­ran Arts (MoCA­DA) Brook­lyn

Nolan Park Build­ing 7A

MoCA­DA will present The M’Dear Project, a mul­ti­me­dia exhi­bi­tion fea­tur­ing ris­ing women-iden­ti­fied artists that hon­ors the pow­er of the ever-present fem­i­nine prin­ci­ple cen­tered promi­nent­ly through­out the African dias­po­ra, and the Ban­dung Res­i­den­cy, a res­i­den­cy pro­gram pre­sent­ed by the Asian Amer­i­can Arts Alliance (A4) in col­lab­o­ra­tion with MoCA­DA designed to uplift the work of orga­niz­ers, artists, and edu­ca­tors whose prac­tice is intend­ed to fos­ter sol­i­dar­i­ty between Asian American/​Pacific Islander (AAPI) and Black communities.

New Art Deal­ers Alliance (NADA) Man­hat­tan

Nolan Park Build­ing 18

The New Art Deal­ers Alliance will present the fifth edi­tion of NADA House, a col­lab­o­ra­tive pub­lic exhi­bi­tion fea­tur­ing gal­leries, non-prof­its, and artist-run spaces pre­sent­ing artists in the his­toric spaces in Nolan Park.

New York Latin Amer­i­can Art Tri­en­ni­al (NYLAAT) Man­hat­tan

Colonels Row Build­ing 405B

NYLAAT will present The Earth is Blue, an exhi­bi­tion of recent draw­ings by Nel­son Avarez that explores the inter­con­nect­ed­ness of our plan­et’s ecosys­tems and the frag­ile bal­ance that exists with­in them, along with an artist res­i­den­cy pro­gram fea­tur­ing Car­los Llo­bet, Maria Ele­na Pom­bo, Miguel Braceli Sier­ra, Mil­dor Cheva­lier and Yohan­na Roa. 

NYC Audubon Man­hat­tan

Nolan Park Build­ing 17

NYC Audubon will hold week­ly bird­ing work­shops and events along with an Artist in Res­i­dence (AiR) pro­gram that offers three local artists an oppor­tu­ni­ty to inves­ti­gate birds and wildlife con­ser­va­tion in the con­text of urban nat­ur­al space and pub­lic engage­ment. The 2023 AiR cohort, made up of Den­nis Red­Moon Dar­k­eem, Dario Mohr, and Car­olyn Mon­stra, will exhib­it works devel­oped dur­ing the res­i­den­cy peri­od through­out August to the end of October.

Oye Group Brook­lyn*

Nolan Park Build­ing 18

Dive into the Mer­cedes sto­ry, inspired by Modesto ​“Flako” Jimenez’s grand­moth­er and the lega­cy of Latine indi­vid­u­als she helped migrate to the coun­try and gain their foot­ing in Brook­lyn. Inte­grat­ing inter­ac­tive aug­ment­ed real­i­ty, video, audio, pho­tog­ra­phy, and fam­i­ly heir­looms, learn about Mer­cedes’ jour­ney to the Unit­ed States and her bat­tle with demen­tia. Vis­i­tors may also par­tic­i­pate in the Mer­cedes Heal­ing Room Work­shop Series — free, 2‑hour art work­shops for com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers with demen­tia and their care­givers. Led by var­i­ous artists, this pro­gram will pro­vide a relaxed atmos­phere to engage in self-care and cre­ative self-expression.

Pratt School of Archi­tec­ture Brook­lyn

Nolan Park Build­ing 14

Project Bring It Home/​The Stars of Tomor­row Project, Inc. Man­hat­tan*

Nolan Park Build­ing 8B

Project Bring It Home/​The Stars of Tomor­row Project, Inc. will hold youth devel­op­ment pro­grams and activ­i­ties that use the per­form­ing arts to help young peo­ple dis­cov­er the world and how to nav­i­gate it. 

Res­i­den­cy Unlim­it­ed (RU) Brook­lyn

Colonels Row Build­ing 404B

RU res­i­dent artists will present exhi­bi­tions and per­for­mances through­out the sum­mer, begin­ning in May with work by Ahmet Civelek, Agri­na Vllasal­iu, Alma Gacanin, Glo­ri­ja Lizde, Veroni­ka Mol­nar, and Sha. 

Stat­en Island Urban Cen­ter Stat­en Island*

Nolan Park Build­ing 5B

Stat­en Island Urban Cen­ter will show­case Envi­ron­men­tal Jus­tice Art and Action, a pub­lic mul­ti­me­dia art expe­ri­ence that cen­ters on Stat­en Island’s water­front as a place in pur­suit of social change and envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice. The exhib­it presents art, music, and oppor­tu­ni­ties for vis­i­tors to exam­ine the strug­gle, poten­tial, cre­ativ­i­ty, and beau­ty of water­front neigh­bor­hoods when com­mu­ni­ty voic­es are at the cen­ter, fight­ing for envi­ron­men­tal and social justice. 

Swale Brook­lyn

Nolan Park Build­ing 11

Swale, Urban Solis Insti­tute, and Crea­ture Con­serve are part­ner­ing to present Re-imag­in­ing Con­ser­va­tion: From the Ground Up, and exhi­bi­tion that includes works from 23 artists and 10 writ­ers from five dif­fer­ent coun­tries and focus­es on the role healthy soil plays in sup­port­ing a healthy ecosys­tem. The art­works includ­ed in this exhi­bi­tion present mul­ti­ple lens­es of view­ing rela­tion­ships with soils, and prompt view­ers to ask: What if peo­ple imag­ine human-ani­mal-soil inter­ac­tions in ways that sup­port health­i­er lives for all species?

Syra­cuse Uni­ver­si­ty Stu­dio Art M.F.A. Syra­cuse, NY

Colonels Row Build­ing 403

Syra­cuse will hold a grad­u­ate stu­dent artist res­i­den­cy, fea­tur­ing Jared leClaire, Declan Yert, and Markus Denil.

Tai­wanese Amer­i­can Arts Coun­cil Queens*

Nolan Park Build­ing 7B

Tai­wanese Amer­i­can Arts Coun­cil will present exhi­bi­tions, host artist res­i­den­cies, and hold sev­er­al out­door per­for­mances and pub­lic pro­grams dur­ing their res­i­den­cy on Gov­er­nors Island. Fea­tured artists will include Ming-Jer Kuo, Sarah Walko, Poyen Wang, Huan-yu Pan, Lulu Meng, Chenyi Wu, and Julia Hsia.

Trans­Bor­der Art Queens*

Colonels Row Build­ing 405A

Trans­bor­der Art will host 23 artists and five cura­tors, cre­at­ing works inspired by New York City’s nat­ur­al ecosys­tems. The res­i­den­cy’s mis­sion is a twofold learn­ing expe­ri­ence: engag­ing the pub­lic vis­it­ing the Island through enjoy­ment and par­tic­i­pa­tion in artist work­shops along with allow­ing the artists to inter­act with the com­mu­ni­ty and enrich their work. 

West Harlem Art Fund Man­hat­tan

Nolan Park Build­ing 10B

The West Harlem Art Fund will present quilt artists, work by an array of inter­na­tion­al stu­dents from City Col­lege, his­tor­i­cal nar­ra­tives and pub­lic art that speaks to the heart and hon­ors Black alche­my, lega­cy, and folklore.

In addi­tion to those list­ed above, sev­er­al orga­ni­za­tions will pro­duce out­door works and oth­er events through­out the sum­mer. These include: 

NYU Gal­latin Wet­Lab Manhattan

Cumbe: Cen­ter for African and Dias­po­ra Dance Brook­lyn*

Out­side Colonels Row Build­ing 405

Cumbe will offer free dance and drum class­es on select Sat­ur­days and oth­er dates through­out the sea­son. Class­es include Con­golese, Sam­ba, Hait­ian, ASA Fit­ness, Hula, Moroc­can Chaabi, Afro-Fusion, and more, reflect­ing their vision to bring ashé — the West African prin­ci­ple rec­og­niz­ing the pow­er and author­i­ty of all liv­ing things to pro­duce pro­found change — into our every­day lives.

caribBE­ING Brook­lyn*

Colonels Row

caribBE­ING brings their unique and inspired solar-pow­ered mobile art + cul­tur­al + mar­ket space reflect­ing the cul­tur­al her­itage of Brooklyn’s Caribbean Dias­po­ra to Colonels Row on Gov­er­nors Island this sum­mer. Exhi­bi­tions include Life with Basquiat, a col­lec­tion of pho­tos by Alex­is Adler, the Works from Grena­da Art Res­i­den­cy (pre­sent­ed in part­ner­ship with Cal­abar Gallery), and Curren$ea, an artist res­i­den­cy pro­gram explor­ing the full scope of Caribbean cul­tur­al, geopo­lit­i­cal, and eco­nom­i­cal iden­ti­ty from the time of pre-col­o­niza­tion to the Transat­lantic Slave Trade to the present. 

* Denotes a first-time mem­ber of the Orga­ni­za­tions in Res­i­dence program

EVENTS & PROGRAMS

Free events and pro­grams will con­tin­ue to be announced through­out the sea­son, includ­ing the return of out­door films on the Parade Ground in part­ner­ship with Film at Lin­coln Cen­ter and Rooftop Films on June 9, July 7, August 11, 2023, with films to be announced, the sec­ond annu­al House Fest — a three-day cel­e­bra­tion of the Orga­ni­za­tions in Res­i­dence in Nolan Park and Colonels Row — in late sum­mer, and more.

This sum­mer, Bloomberg Con­nects — a free app focused on arts and cul­ture — will also include an exten­sive guide for the pub­lic art on view and oth­er key aspects of the Gov­er­nors Island expe­ri­ence. The guide will pro­vide infor­ma­tion for vis­i­tors onsite and will be acces­si­ble from any­where in the world.

Gov­er­nors Island Arts was a key com­mit­ment in New York City May­or Eric Adams’ Blue­print for New York City’s Eco­nom­ic Recov­ery, with today’s announce­ment marks the sec­ond set of new initiatives. 

Apr 27 3:01 pm

Cre­ative Time and Gov­er­nors Island Arts announce a day of dynam­ic new dis­cus­sions and spe­cial events in response to artist Charles Gaines’ mon­u­men­tal pub­lic art­work Mov­ing Chains. Host­ed on Gov­er­nors Island on Sat­ur­day, May 20^th, 2023, Mov­ing Chains: Toward Abo­li­tion will bring togeth­er an inter­dis­ci­pli­nary group of artists, schol­ars, and edu­ca­tors work­ing on strate­gies for abo­li­tion with­in art, law, edu­ca­tion, and polit­i­cal action. The event con­tin­ues a crit­i­cal dia­logue exam­in­ing the Amer­i­can ori­gin sto­ry, ini­ti­at­ed by Charles Gaines last sum­mer with the launch of his mul­ti-year, mul­ti-site pub­lic art project anchored by Mov­ing Chains, which will be acti­vat­ed dur­ing the event and reopens for reg­u­lar pub­lic hours this sum­mer on Gov­er­nors Island.

Mov­ing Chains is the sec­ond chap­ter of Charles Gaines’ The Amer­i­can Man­i­fest, which launched in Times Square in July 2022 with per­for­mances of Man­i­festos 4: The Dred and Har­ri­et Scott Deci­sion and Roots. The 110-foot kinet­ic sculp­ture acti­vat­ed by colos­sal chains rotat­ing over­head anchors a pub­lic art project that address­es the real­i­ty of sys­temic racism in the Unit­ed States of Amer­i­ca through embod­ied and visu­al expe­ri­ence, and pro­vides crit­i­cal his­tor­i­cal con­text on our extra­or­di­nary polit­i­cal divi­sion today. The Amer­i­can Man­i­fest is the first major pub­lic art com­mis­sion by Charles Gaines, a laud­ed con­cep­tu­al artist rec­og­nized for his near­ly 50-year career exam­in­ing the nature of per­cep­tion, social sys­tems, and abstraction. 

The day-long con­ven­ing will take place in Cas­tle Williams, a site locat­ed with­in the Gov­er­nors Island Nation­al Mon­u­ment near Mov­ing Chains. A his­toric fort that for­mer­ly served as a jail for Con­fed­er­ate sol­diers dur­ing the Civ­il War, the loca­tion under­scores the rehash­ing of Amer­i­can his­to­ry cur­rent­ly gal­va­niz­ing the polit­i­cal land­scape today. 

Mov­ing Chains: Toward Abo­li­tion is orga­nized by Diya Vij, Cura­tor at Cre­ative Time, with Che Gos­sett, schol­ar of abo­li­tion and con­tem­po­rary Black art, co-orga­niz­ing the ses­sion pan­els; and artist and edu­ca­tor Tiffany Lenoi Jones, co-orga­niz­ing the drop-in workshops. 

FULL SCHED­ULE & EVENT REGISTRATION

MOV­ING CHAINS: TOWARD ABO­LI­TION PRO­GRAM HIGHLIGHTS

Black Gotham Expe­ri­ence Walk­ing Tour

10am — 10:45am | Leaves from Gov­er­nors Island fer­ry landing

Join founder of Black Gotham Expe­ri­ence, Kamau Ware, for an in-per­son guid­ed tour of Riv­er Years.. The path­way cho­sen by Ware explores the colo­nial pat­terns that have informed a cen­­turies-long rela­tion­ship with what are known today as the East Riv­er, the Hud­son Riv­er, and New York Harbor. 

Abo­li­tion and the Law

Pan­elists: Amer­i­can Artist, Kamee­lah Janan Rasheed, and Albert Fox Cahn, mod­er­at­ed by Che Gossett 

12pm | Cas­tle Williams, Gov­er­nors Island

The pan­el ​“Abo­li­tion and the Law” brings togeth­er artists Amer­i­can Artist and Keemalah Janan Rasheed in con­ver­sa­tion with lawyer Albert Fox Cahn, Founder and Exec­u­tive Direc­tor of Sur­veil­lance Over­sight Tech­nol­o­gy Project (S.T.O.P.), mod­er­at­ed by Che Gos­sett. Togeth­er, the pan­elists will dis­cuss the inter­sec­tion of art, law, sur­veil­lance, and abo­li­tion. How do redac­tion, brack­et­ing, and con­straint exist with­in the con­text of sur­veil­lance and the legal sys­tem? How might art become a vehi­cle for expos­ing, nego­ti­at­ing, and mov­ing past the struc­ture of the law and towards new pos­si­bil­i­ties for abolition? 

Drop-In Work­shops

12 — 3pm | Colonels Row, Gov­er­nors Island

Drop into multi­gen­er­a­tional art­mak­ing work­shops and gath­er­ings to col­lec­tive­ly imag­ine free­dom while learn­ing about the pos­si­bil­i­ty, neces­si­ty, and stakes of teach­ing abo­li­tion today. This pro­gram is orga­nized by Tiffany Lenoi Jones with Akiea ​“Ki” Gross and Noor Jones-Bey, grantees of the Abo­li­tion­ist Teach­ing Network. 

Archi­tec­tures of Freedom

Pan­elists: Tork­wase Dyson, Saidiya Hart­man, and Rinal­do Walcott 

2:30pm | Cas­tle Williams, Gov­er­nors Island

Schol­ars Saidiya Hart­man and Rinal­do Wal­cott will think along­side and in con­cert with artist Tork­wase Dyson about how free­dom might be actu­al­ized and spa­tial­ized, the places free­dom inhab­its and takes. What are the archi­tec­tures and infra­struc­tures of free­dom? How might free­dom be shared, rather than mon­e­tized, pri­va­tized and racial­ized as prop­er­ty? What is the role of art in mak­ing freedom(s) pos­si­ble in the midst of slavery’s glob­al social and aes­thet­ic afterlives?

In Con­ver­sa­tion: Charles Gaines and Christi­na Sharpe

4:00pm | Cas­tle Williams, Gov­er­nors Island

Join artist Charles Gaines and schol­ar Christi­na Sharpe in an inti­mate con­ver­sa­tion on Gaines’ mon­u­men­tal work Mov­ing Chains through the lens of Sharpe’s ground­break­ing frame­work of ​“wake work,” intro­duced in her sem­i­nal book In the Wake: On Black­ness and Being (Duke Uni­ver­si­ty Press, 2016) and con­tin­ued through­out her work, most recent­ly in Ordi­nary Notes (Far­rar, Straus and Giroux, 2023), a med­i­ta­tion in words and images on the con­tours of Black life that emerge in the wake. The two will dis­cuss aes­thet­ic strate­gies to address race and pow­er in order to reori­ent our ways of see­ing and being and doing in the after­lives of slav­ery and the Unit­ed States project.

FULL PAR­TIC­I­PANTS

Kamau Ware, Black Gotham Expe­ri­ence | Tali Keren and Alex Stra­da, 28^th Amend­ment Project | Amer­i­can Artist | Kamee­lah Janan Rasheed | Albert Fox Cahn, Esq., Sur­veil­lance Tech­nol­o­gy Over­sight Project | Sarah Abde­laz­iz, Abo­li­tion­ist Teach­ing Net­work | Rus­sell Craig, Right of Return | Tork­wase Dyson | Saidiya Hart­man | Rinal­do Wal­cott | Charles Gaines | Christi­na Sharpe

Apr 24 8:57 am

Aer­i­al view of The Exchange, show­ing the icon­ic forms designed to evoke the dra­mat­ic land­scapes and hills of Gov­er­nors Island. © SOM | Miysis

New York City May­or Eric Adams, Trust for Gov­er­nors Island Pres­i­dent and CEO Clare New­man, and State Uni­ver­si­ty of New York (SUNY) Stony Brook Uni­ver­si­ty Pres­i­dent Mau­rie McIn­nis today unveiled the ​“New York Cli­mate Exchange,” a trans­for­ma­tive vision for a first-in-the-nation cli­mate research, edu­ca­tion, and jobs hub on Gov­er­nors Island that will cre­ate thou­sands of per­ma­nent jobs and $1 bil­lion in eco­nom­ic impact for the city. A cross-sec­tor con­sor­tium led by Stony Brook, the Exchange will cre­ate a state-of-the-art, $700-mil­lion, 400,000-square-foot cam­pus ded­i­cat­ed to research­ing and devel­op­ing inno­v­a­tive cli­mate solu­tions that will be scaled across New York City and the world and that will equip New York­ers to hold the green jobs of the future.

“Today, here in the heart of New York Har­bor, we are tak­ing a giant leap toward a clean­er, green­er, more pros­per­ous future for every New York­er with the ​‘New York Cli­mate Exchange,’” said May­or Adams. ​“This first-of-its-kind project will make New York City a glob­al leader in devel­op­ing solu­tions for cli­mate change while cre­at­ing thou­sands of good-pay­ing green jobs for New York­ers and infus­ing $1 bil­lion into our city’s econ­o­my. Where some peo­ple see chal­lenges, New York­ers see oppor­tu­ni­ties, and this team and this project are lead­ing the charge.”

The cul­mi­na­tion of a two-year, com­pet­i­tive request for pro­pos­al process, the selec­tion of the New York Cli­mate Exchange rep­re­sents a major mile­stone in the city’s ground­break­ing Cen­ter for Cli­mate Solu­tions ini­tia­tive — a key piece of May­or Adams’ ​“Rebuild, Renew, Rein­vent: A Blue­print for New York City’s Eco­nom­ic Recov­ery” — which will cre­ate 7,000 per­ma­nent jobs and a bil­lion dol­lars in eco­nom­ic impact, while expand­ing and enhanc­ing pub­lic access to Gov­er­nors Island. The Exchange alone will cre­ate over 2,200 100-per­cent union jobs, includ­ing for con­struc­tion and build­ing ser­vices, with a com­mit­ment to hire all con­struc­tion and build­ing ser­vice work­ers at pre­vail­ing wage and a goal of 35 per­cent minor­i­ty- and women-owned busi­ness enter­prise (M/WBE) par­tic­i­pa­tion in construction.

Once ful­ly oper­a­tional, the cam­pus is expect­ed to serve 600 post­sec­ondary stu­dents, 4,500 K‑12 stu­dents, 6,000 work­force trainees, and 250 fac­ul­ty and researchers every year while sup­port­ing up to 30 busi­ness­es annu­al­ly through its incu­ba­tor pro­gram. The cam­pus will be fund­ed in part with sig­nif­i­cant gifts of $100 mil­lion from the Simons Foun­da­tion and $50 mil­lion from Bloomberg Philanthropies.

“New York City still remains the glob­al hub for inno­va­tion — and the invest­ment in Gov­er­nors Island is anoth­er exam­ple of the for­ward-think­ing vision our city can deliv­er on,” said First Deputy May­or Sheena Wright. ​“From a state-of-the-art edu­ca­tion hub to cre­at­ing thou­sands of jobs across emerg­ing sec­tors, the Adams admin­is­tra­tion is writ­ing a new, excit­ing chap­ter in our city’s his­to­ry. I applaud all of the part­ners, the cross-sec­tor col­lab­o­ra­tion, and lead­er­ship across mul­ti­ple may­ors that made this announce­ment possible.”

“Today, New York City estab­lish­es itself as a pace­set­ter in the fight to com­bat the cli­mate cri­sis. Through this trans­for­ma­tion­al ini­tia­tive, we will lead the way in cli­mate research and edu­ca­tion while cre­at­ing a first-of-its kind jobs hub for New York­ers to ben­e­fit from the new green econ­o­my,” said Deputy May­or for Eco­nom­ic and Work­force Devel­op­ment Maria Tor­res-Springer. ​“The Trust for Gov­er­nors Island set an inspired process for bold, solu­tions-ori­ent­ed respons­es to cli­mate change, the great­est threat of our time, right in the mid­dle of New York Har­bor. I am excit­ed to see the New York Cli­mate Exchange led by Stony Brook exe­cute upon this vision with a state-of-the-art, 400,000-square-foot cam­pus open to the pub­lic, 7,000 per­ma­nent jobs on the island, 2,000 con­struc­tion jobs in the com­ing years, and a cur­ricu­lum that will make New York City the undis­put­ed leader in address­ing the cri­sis of our time.”

“The future of cli­mate jobs and lead­er­ship is bright,” said Deputy May­or for Oper­a­tions Meera Joshi. ​“The New York Cli­mate Exchange will pro­vide trans­for­ma­tion­al ben­e­fits for green job train­ing and increased access and open space in one of New York’s most beloved parks. Togeth­er with the recent­ly released PlaNYC, we have the blue­print and invest­ment to exe­cute on the cli­mate action New York­ers need.” 

“With today’s announce­ment, Gov­er­nors Island’s role as a his­toric gate­way to New York City enters a new chap­ter, as a place where ideas come to life and hope­ful solu­tions to the cli­mate cri­sis become real­i­ty,” said Trust for Gov­er­nors Island Pres­i­dent and CEO Clare New­man. ​“We are hon­ored to select Stony Brook Uni­ver­si­ty and the New York Cli­mate Exchange to anchor the Cen­ter for Cli­mate Solu­tions here on Gov­er­nors Island, cre­at­ing a glob­al hub for edu­ca­tion, research, job train­ing, and pub­lic engage­ment on cli­mate solu­tions for cities. Thank you to May­or Adams, Deputy May­or Tor­res-Springer, May­or Bloomberg, and May­or de Bla­sio for your com­mit­ment to the future of the Island, and thank you to Pres­i­dent McIn­nis and the entire Exchange team for answer­ing our call.”

“We are hon­ored, excit­ed, and proud to part­ner with the City of New York to build this his­toric cen­ter that will cement New York City as the world leader on cli­mate change, the most press­ing issue of our time,” said Mau­rie McIn­nis, pres­i­dent, Stony Brook Uni­ver­si­ty. ​“Up until now, the devel­op­ment of cli­mate solu­tions has been siloed, with world lead­ers sep­a­rate from expert sci­en­tists sep­a­rate from the on-the-ground green work­force. As an inter­na­tion­al leader on cli­mate and as the lead­ing pub­lic research insti­tu­tion in New York, Stony Brook Uni­ver­si­ty will bring stake­hold­ers togeth­er from the aca­d­e­m­ic, gov­ern­ment, and busi­ness com­mu­ni­ties to make the Cli­mate Exchange the cen­ter of research, inno­va­tion, edu­ca­tion, and col­lab­o­ra­tion to address this glob­al crisis.”

“We are hon­ored to part­ner with Stony Brook and the Exchange,” said David Spergel, pres­i­dent, Simons Foun­da­tion. ​“Our part­ner­ship with Stony Brook goes back many years, and togeth­er, we’ve made great progress in both basic and health sci­ences. This endur­ing rela­tion­ship is a source of great pride for all of us at the Simons Foun­da­tion. Stony Brook has cat­a­pult­ed to the fore­front of high­er edu­ca­tion through its remark­able strengths as a research insti­tu­tion and its unequaled focus on equi­ty and access. I can­not think of a more qual­i­fied insti­tu­tion to lead this his­toric fight against cli­mate change — a fight that must be met with inno­va­tion, intel­lect, and tenacity.”

“This great news is 22 years in the mak­ing,” said Michael R. Bloomberg, 108^th may­or of New York City, and founder, Bloomberg Phil­an­thropies and Bloomberg LP. ​“As a can­di­date for may­or in 2001, I pro­posed trans­form­ing Gov­er­nors Island into a park and uni­ver­si­ty cam­pus, and the next year, Gov­er­nor Pata­ki and I worked with Pres­i­dent Bush to return the island to the city and state for $1. Our admin­is­tra­tion opened a pub­lic school on the island and began build­ing an extra­or­di­nary pub­lic park, but over time it became clear that the city need­ed greater con­trol of its devel­op­ment. In 2010, we worked with Gov­er­nor Pater­son to cede the island to the city, which allowed us to lay the foun­da­tion for ful­fill­ing our orig­i­nal vision of a year-round des­ti­na­tion with a uni­ver­si­ty pres­ence that would bring new life and jobs. Now, thanks to May­or Adams’ lead­er­ship, that vision is being ful­filled through a ground­break­ing part­ner­ship with Stony Brook Uni­ver­si­ty that holds so much poten­tial, the Cli­mate Exchange. Bloomberg Phil­an­thropies is glad to join Jim and Mar­i­lyn Simons and oth­ers in sup­port­ing it, as part of our glob­al efforts to help cities lead the way in tack­ling cli­mate change. This is a great day for the island, for New York City’s future, and for the fight against cli­mate change.”

Led by Stony Brook Uni­ver­si­ty, the New York Cli­mate Exchange will be a first-of-its-kind, cross-sec­tor non­prof­it orga­ni­za­tion ded­i­cat­ed to cli­mate research, solu­tion devel­op­ment, edu­ca­tion, work­force train­ing, and pub­lic pro­grams on Gov­er­nors Island. The con­sor­tium will func­tion as a hub for edu­ca­tion and train­ing to grow green jobs for New York­ers and includes 15 mem­bers rep­re­sent­ing lead­ing uni­ver­si­ties from around the world, as well as busi­ness and non­prof­it orga­ni­za­tions ded­i­cat­ed to devel­op­ing and deploy­ing solu­tions to the glob­al cli­mate cri­sis. High-res­o­lu­tion ren­der­ings of the Exchange cam­pus are avail­able to down­load online.

The New York Cli­mate Exchange pro­pos­al presents a unique com­bi­na­tion of scale, vision, and impact; a wide range of pro­posed edu­ca­tion­al activ­i­ties for New York­ers of all ages; a focus on devel­op­ing, imple­ment­ing, and scal­ing cli­mate solu­tions; a broad coali­tion of part­ners with proven track records of deliv­er­ing ground­break­ing research; and a demon­strat­ed capa­bil­i­ty to deliv­er the pro­posed project. In addi­tion to Stony Brook, a flag­ship of the SUNY sys­tem, the con­sor­tium includes the fol­low­ing core partners:

• Geor­gia Insti­tute of Tech­nol­o­gy (Atlanta, GA)
• Pace Uni­ver­si­ty (New York, NY)
• Pratt Insti­tute (New York, NY)
• Uni­ver­si­ty of Wash­ing­ton (Seat­tle, WA)
• Boston Con­sult­ing Group (BCG) (New York, NY)
• Good Old Low­er East Side (GOLES) (New York, NY)
• IBM (Armonk, NY)

The Exchange will offer an ambi­tious range of acces­si­ble and free edu­ca­tion­al and job train­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties to pre­pare New York­ers and stu­dents at every lev­el for careers focused on devel­op­ing solu­tions to cli­mate change.

A new cli­mate solu­tions semes­ter abroad pro­gram will launch for under­grad­u­ate stu­dents enrolled at insti­tu­tions rep­re­sent­ed in the Exchange con­sor­tium, fea­tur­ing course­work in cli­mate sci­ence, pol­i­cy, and envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice; a grad­u­ate-lev­el fel­low­ship pro­gram offer­ing train­ing and research space to stu­dents; intern­ship and fel­low­ship pro­grams; and con­tin­u­ing education.

The Exchange has also com­mit­ted to expand­ing a New York State Path­ways in Tech­nol­o­gy (NYS P‑Tech) pro­gram with the Urban Assem­bly New York Har­bor School, a pub­lic high school locat­ed on Gov­er­nors Island, as well as SUNY Mar­itime Col­lege to offer skills-based job train­ing in addi­tion­al career path­ways and through col­lege-lev­el course­work relat­ed to cli­mate solu­tions. Expand­ed learn­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties will be offered to chil­dren through field trip pro­grams and a sum­mer camp inten­sive program.

In col­lab­o­ra­tion with local part­ners, the Exchange will host a wide range of work­force devel­op­ment and train­ing pro­grams geared towards pro­vid­ing acces­si­ble oppor­tu­ni­ties for New York­ers to gain skills in career fields relat­ed to New York City’s grow­ing green jobs sec­tor. Train­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties will be deliv­ered in part­ner­ship with local orga­ni­za­tions, includ­ing Green City Force, New York City Employ­ment and Train­ing Coali­tion, Non­tra­di­tion­al Employ­ment for Women, and SolarOne, and will work with the New York State Build­ing Trades and Con­struc­tion Coun­cil to devel­op con­struc­tion trade train­ing pro­grams focused on cli­mate resilient and sus­tain­able build­ing technologies.

Research and edu­ca­tion­al oppor­tu­ni­ties at the Exchange will be orga­nized around the themes of envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice and inclu­sion; the impacts of use of food, water, and ener­gy on cli­mate change; and sus­tain­able and resilient cities. The cam­pus will host a Research and Tech­nol­o­gy Accel­er­a­tor, which will com­pet­i­tive­ly award lab­o­ra­to­ry and demon­stra­tion space to aca­d­e­m­ic, com­mu­ni­ty-based, and entre­pre­neur­ial teams work­ing on research ini­tia­tives and cli­mate solu­tions that deliv­er imme­di­ate sup­port to impact­ed com­mu­ni­ties, along with a Cli­mate Tech Incu­ba­tor that will pri­or­i­tize M/​WBEs and draw upon the exper­tise of busi­ness part­ners, includ­ing IBM and Boston Con­sult­ing Group.

Addi­tion­al research activ­i­ties host­ed through the Exchange will offer grant oppor­tu­ni­ties for com­mu­ni­ty-based orga­ni­za­tions, as well as free exhibits, activ­i­ties, and hands-on learn­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties for Gov­er­nors Island vis­i­tors to engage with and pro­vide input towards projects in development.

The Exchange is slat­ed to begin con­struc­tion in 2025 and open in 2028. As part of the his­toric part­ner­ship announced today, the Exchange will have the option to con­struct a sec­ond phase, includ­ing com­plet­ing the ren­o­va­tion of Liggett Hall and devel­op­ing addi­tion­al facil­i­ties on three acres of the east­ern devel­op­ment zone. Thanks to his­toric lev­els of invest­ment in Gov­er­nors Island gen­er­at­ed from the project, the Trust will deliv­er fer­ry ser­vice every 15 min­utes as part of the project, with a new, hybrid fer­ry set to begin trans­port­ing pas­sen­gers in sum­mer 2024.

Affil­i­ate part­ners rep­re­sent­ed in the con­sor­tium include the City Uni­ver­si­ty of New York, Duke Uni­ver­si­ty, SUNY Mar­itime Col­lege, Moody’s, New York Uni­ver­si­ty, the Uni­ver­si­ty of Oxford, and Rochester Insti­tute of Tech­nol­o­gy. Advi­so­ry part­ners to the con­sor­tium include Brookhaven Nation­al Lab­o­ra­to­ry and urbs.

The Exchange team also includes an unprece­dent­ed group of over 30 non­prof­it and com­mu­ni­ty part­ners with exper­tise in envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice, arts, work­force devel­op­ment, edu­ca­tion, and labor. Part­ners include the Amer­i­can Muse­um of Nat­ur­al His­to­ry, Water­front Alliance, WE ACT for Envi­ron­men­tal Jus­tice, The Build­ing and Con­struc­tion Trades Coun­cil of Greater New York, Ser­vice Employ­ees Inter­na­tion­al Union Local 32BJ, and The Point Com­mu­ni­ty Devel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion. The full list of part­ners is avail­able online.

The Exchange’s 400,000-square-foot cam­pus will include class­rooms, lab­o­ra­to­ries, research labs, pub­lic exhi­bi­tion space, stu­dent and fac­ul­ty hous­ing, uni­ver­si­ty hotel rooms, and an audi­to­ri­um space. The cam­pus will include two new­ly con­struct­ed class­room and research build­ings on three acres of the Island’s east­ern devel­op­ment zone, as well as the restora­tion of over 170,000 square feet of space with­in his­toric build­ings, includ­ing Liggett Hall and the Fort Jay Theater.

In addi­tion, the Exchange will deliv­er 4.5 acres of new open space in its Phase 1 plan, adding to the Island’s exist­ing 120 acres of open space across the His­toric Dis­trict and South Island park. Con­struc­tion of the cam­pus will expand and enhance access to the Island’s exist­ing 43-acre park and its cul­tur­al and his­toric attractions.

The cam­pus will serve as a liv­ing lab­o­ra­to­ry, show­cas­ing inno­v­a­tive approach­es to sus­tain­able and resilient design, including:

• An all-elec­tric cam­pus with 100 per­cent of ener­gy needs gen­er­at­ed onsite;
• The first aca­d­e­m­ic cam­pus in New York City to meet Liv­ing Build­ing Chal­lenge stan­dards, includ­ing ren­o­vat­ed his­toric build­ings and new con­struc­tion with­in the campus;
• New York City’s first com­mer­cial build­ings uti­liz­ing mass timber;
• One of the first cam­pus­es in New York City to receive True Zero Waste cer­ti­fi­ca­tion, with 95 per­cent of waste gen­er­at­ed on cam­pus divert­ed from landfill;
• Cli­mate-resilient build­ings achiev­ing Water­front Edge Design Guide­lines certification;
• 100 per­cent of non-potable water demand met with rain­wa­ter or treat­ed wastewater;
• A dis­trict geot­her­mal and heat pump HVAC net­work serv­ing the entire cam­pus, pro­duc­ing an esti­mat­ed 70-per­cent reduc­tion in ener­gy use com­pared to facil­i­ties of a sim­i­lar size; and
• No red-list chem­i­cals uti­lized dur­ing construction.

Pri­or to open­ing, the Exchange will launch advi­so­ry coun­cils to guide the work of the insti­tu­tion; launch a new seed grant pro­gram to sup­port the design of new work­force, edu­ca­tion­al, and cul­tur­al pro­gram­ming; and engage with com­mu­ni­ty stake­hold­ers to con­tin­ue the design process for the campus.

The cam­pus is expect­ed to cost approx­i­mate­ly $700 mil­lion in total, with $150 mil­lion com­ing in pre­vi­ous­ly allo­cat­ed city cap­i­tal fund­ing, $100 mil­lion from the Simons Foun­da­tion, and $50 mil­lion from Bloomberg Phil­an­thropies. The Exchange con­sor­tium will raise funds to sup­port the remain­ing devel­op­ment and oper­a­tional costs.

Pro­pos­als for the Cen­ter for Cli­mate Solu­tions anchor insti­tu­tion were eval­u­at­ed based on cri­te­ria devel­oped by the Trust and the city, in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Gov­er­nors Island Com­mu­ni­ty Advi­so­ry Coun­cil. The pro­pos­als were reviewed and scored by a selec­tion com­mit­tee made up of rep­re­sen­ta­tives from the Trust, the Mayor’s Office of Cli­mate and Envi­ron­men­tal Jus­tice, the Mayor’s Office of Equi­ty, and the New York City Depart­ment of City Plan­ning. Addi­tion­al input was pro­vid­ed to the selec­tion com­mit­tee by the city’s Cli­mate Advi­so­ry Com­mit­tee and through pub­lic input ses­sions attend­ed by more than 200 par­tic­i­pants held in Octo­ber and Novem­ber 2022.

The Cen­ter for Cli­mate Solu­tions pro­pos­al was first pre­sent­ed pub­licly in 2020. An ini­tial request for expres­sions of inter­est for the center’s anchor insti­tu­tion was released in June 2021. Fol­low­ing the release of May­or Adams’ ​“Rebuild, Renew, Rein­vent” eco­nom­ic recov­ery blue­print in March 2022, the city and the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island iden­ti­fied four teams in April 2022 to respond to a tar­get­ed request for pro­pos­als. May­or Adams and the Trust announced the three final­ist pro­pos­als in Octo­ber 2022.

For more infor­ma­tion on the project, includ­ing future pub­lic meet­ings and progress updates, please vis­it gov​is​land​.org.

Stony Brook University’s School of Marine and Atmos­pher­ic Sci­ences has been a leader in severe storm research, weath­er pre­dic­tion, cli­mate change research and mit­i­ga­tion efforts, and edu­ca­tion­al and research efforts to restore and pro­tect water qual­i­ty, includ­ing in the Long Island Sound, Shin­necock Bay, and oth­er bod­ies of water on Long Island. The school SoMAS also hous­es broad­er sus­tain­abil­i­ty-relat­ed and atmos­pher­ic research with the goal of improv­ing pre­dictabil­i­ty about weath­er-relat­ed risks and build­ing resilience against severe storms, storm surge and coastal flood­ing, and ero­sion prob­lems. More infor­ma­tion about Stony Brook University’s School of Marine and Atmos­pher­ic Sci­ences is avail­able online.

“With an all-elec­tric cam­pus, a True Zero Waste cer­ti­fi­ca­tion, and a dis­trict heat pump net­work that will serve the entire cam­pus, the New York Cli­mate Exchange will simul­ta­ne­ous­ly serve as a place of research and learn­ing as well as a one-of-a-kind sus­tain­abil­i­ty exam­ple for New York City and the world,” said Chief Cli­mate Offi­cer and New York City Depart­ment of Envi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion Com­mis­sion­er Rohit T. Aggar­wala. ​“Fur­ther, because it is based on Gov­er­nors Island, the Exchange will be able to uti­lize New York Har­bor and its amaz­ing come­back as a resource for demon­strat­ing how our envi­ron­ment can recov­er if we make smart and sus­tained investments.”

“With the advance­ment of the Cen­ter for Cli­mate Solu­tions, the world should take note of New York’s com­mit­ment to going green,” said New York City Depart­ment of City Plan­ning Direc­tor and City Plan­ning Com­mis­sion Chair Dan Gar­o­d­nick. ​“Gov­er­nors Island is com­bin­ing a spec­tac­u­lar new park, improved pub­lic access, and, in part­ner­ship with Stony Brook Uni­ver­si­ty, a cut­ting-edge research and edu­ca­tion­al facil­i­ty. The Cen­ter for Cli­mate Solu­tions on Gov­er­nors Island is a huge win and will help New York con­tin­ue to be a glob­al leader in com­bat­ting cli­mate change.”

“I am thrilled to have been part of the selec­tion com­mit­tee for the anchor insti­tu­tion of the Cen­ter for Cli­mate Solu­tions ini­tia­tive,” said Mayor’s Office of Cli­mate & Envi­ron­men­tal Jus­tice Exec­u­tive Direc­tor Kizzy Charles-Guz­man. ​“The New York Cli­mate Exchange will advance sci­ence, cen­ter envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice learn­ing, cre­ate a new gen­er­a­tion of inno­va­tors in sus­tain­abil­i­ty and resilience, and expand New York­ers’ already vibrant rela­tion­ship with Gov­er­nors Island. Our beloved island will be a cli­mate hub for the world, and I can think of no bet­ter pair­ing of place and purpose.”

“The New York Cli­mate Exchange will incu­bate the action­able, inno­v­a­tive research need­ed to address our glob­al cli­mate cri­sis,” said Mayor’s Office of Equi­ty Com­mis­sion­er Sideya Sher­man. ​“With an incred­i­ble con­sor­tium of part­ners, the Exchange will cre­ate inclu­sive oppor­tu­ni­ties for New York­ers to con­vene, learn, work, and grow their busi­ness­es while advanc­ing cru­cial envi­ron­men­tal and sus­tain­abil­i­ty goals. We applaud the Trust and all part­ners who have come togeth­er to advance this ambi­tious plan, which will have a last­ing impact on our city and glob­al community.”

“The world’s great­est chal­lenges require imag­i­na­tion, courage, and col­lab­o­ra­tion that breaks down silos, and today’s announce­ment of the New York Cli­mate Exchange as the new anchor insti­tu­tion for the Cen­ter for Cli­mate Solu­tions on Gov­er­nors Island answers that call,” said Ali­cia Glen, chair, board of direc­tors, Trust for Gov­er­nors Island. ​“Gov­er­nors Island is one of New York City’s great trans­for­ma­tion sto­ries, and I’m immense­ly proud of near­ly two decades of invest­ment across the lead­er­ship of mul­ti­ple may­oral admin­is­tra­tions that have led to this his­toric moment. Lead­ers around the world will always look to New York City as a cen­ter of inno­va­tion and lead­er­ship, and I could not think of a bet­ter part­ner than Stony Brook Uni­ver­si­ty and its coali­tion of glob­al lead­ers and advo­cates to stew­ard this project.”

“Cli­mate change rep­re­sents an exis­ten­tial chal­lenge, and SUNY is at the fore­front of the sus­tain­abil­i­ty, research, and work­force devel­op­ment solu­tions that will change the world for the bet­ter,” said SUNY Chan­cel­lor John B. King. Jr. ​“Under the lead­er­ship of Pres­i­dent Mau­rie N. McIn­nis, Stony Brook Uni­ver­si­ty is the nat­ur­al choice to lead the New York Cli­mate Exchange and is per­fect­ly posi­tioned to seize this moment for New York and the nation. Our thanks to May­or Eric Adams, the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island, the Simons Foun­da­tion, and for­mer May­or Michael Bloomberg for sup­port­ing this once-in-a-gen­er­a­tion opportunity.”

“In the New York Cli­mate Exchange, Stony Brook Uni­ver­si­ty will bring togeth­er aca­d­e­m­ic, cor­po­rate, phil­an­thropic, and com­mu­ni­ty part­ners to pio­neer an inno­v­a­tive, col­lab­o­ra­tive approach to devis­ing action­able cli­mate solu­tions,” said Kevin S. Law, chair­man, Stony Brook University’s Stony Brook Coun­cil; and chair, board of direc­tors, Empire State Devel­op­ment. ​“The Exchange will incor­po­rate cut­ting-edge research, crit­i­cal input from affect­ed com­mu­ni­ties, and the prac­ti­cal expe­ri­ence of com­mit­ted cor­po­rate part­ners to bring these solu­tions to mar­ket, demon­strat­ing that address­ing our ener­gy and cli­mate chal­lenges can gen­er­ate eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment opportunities.”

“The cli­mate issues of today are urgent. And envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice and eco­log­i­cal sus­tain­abil­i­ty neces­si­tate action from lead­ers across the world,” said Chaou­ki Abdal­lah, exec­u­tive vice pres­i­dent for research, Geor­gia Insti­tute of Tech­nol­o­gy. ​“As a core part­ner of the Exchange, Geor­gia Tech will pro­vide research exper­tise in the areas of ener­gy, urban plan­ning, bio­log­i­cal ecosys­tems, pub­lic pol­i­cy, and more, and we look for­ward to play­ing an instru­men­tal role in bring­ing its mis­sion to fruition.”

“At Pace Uni­ver­si­ty, our stu­dents, fac­ul­ty, and staff walk the walk of sus­tain­abil­i­ty every day, and we are thrilled to bring our exper­tise to the New York Cli­mate Exchange,” said Mar­vin Krislov, pres­i­dent, Pace Uni­ver­si­ty. ​“As home to the nation’s num­ber-one-ranked envi­ron­men­tal law pro­gram — and our exper­tise in land use, cli­mate jus­tice, ESG, and region­al clean water ini­tia­tives — we are eager to work col­lab­o­ra­tive­ly and bring an inter­dis­ci­pli­nary approach to cli­mate actions that forge a more resilient future for New York City and com­mu­ni­ties world­wide. Our exper­tise, vast stu­dent and alum­ni net­work, and loca­tion in Low­er Man­hat­tan pro­vide the per­fect spring­board for cre­at­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties in the green econ­o­my and engage­ment on Gov­er­nors Island.”

“We are so excit­ed to be part of the New York Cli­mate Exchange, an ini­tia­tive that res­onates deeply with Pratt Insti­tute and our long­stand­ing part­ner­ing with local com­mu­ni­ties to address the crit­i­cal issues fac­ing us today and tomor­row,” said Frances Bronet, pres­i­dent, Pratt Insti­tute. ​“Pratt is one of the pre­mier schools of cre­ative inquiry, art, archi­tec­ture, plan­ning, and design in the world. As a world-renowned aca­d­e­m­ic and cul­tur­al insti­tu­tion com­mit­ted to civic engage­ment and advanc­ing envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice, we prob­lem-solve through an inclu­sive design process that brings deep tech­ni­cal exper­tise togeth­er with the expe­ri­en­tial exper­tise of com­mu­ni­ty part­ners, which over time has built an exten­sive net­work of trust­ed com­mu­ni­ty and indus­try part­ners. Pratt brings both this unique net­work plus research in crit­i­cal areas, from devel­op­ing green build­ings, pol­i­cy, prod­ucts, and infra­struc­ture to resilient streetscapes, envi­ron­men­tal sen­sors, and sus­tain­able mate­ri­als. For years, we have been lead­ing research on Gov­er­nors Island and are look­ing for­ward to expand­ing our scope as part of the Exchange’s net­work of com­mu­ni­ty and indus­try collaborators.”

“We are very proud to bring our university’s deep and diverse strengths in cli­mate and clean ener­gy research and inno­va­tion to the New York Cli­mate Exchange,” said Ana Mari Cauce, pres­i­dent, Uni­ver­si­ty of Wash­ing­ton. ​“As the only core part­ner on the west coast, we are excit­ed to lever­age our region­al and glob­al rela­tion­ships to accel­er­ate efforts to address and adapt to the impacts of cli­mate change. This work is vital and urgent for the health and sur­vival of our peo­ple and our world.”

“GOLES is proud to be a part of this thought­ful­ly put-togeth­er ini­tia­tive to address issues around cli­mate jus­tice and resilien­cy,” said Damaris Reyes, exec­u­tive direc­tor, GOLES. ​“The Exchange is the result of inten­tion­al­ly built part­ner­ships between com­mu­ni­ty, aca­d­e­mics, advo­cates, and oth­er stake­hold­ers, and we look for­ward to all that we can achieve together.”

“From our van­tage as an advi­sor to a diverse set of clients in New York City and across the globe, we believe that the Exchange has a unique and vital role to play in accel­er­at­ing and scal­ing sus­tain­able cli­mate solu­tions,” said Gio­van­ni Fas­sio, prin­ci­pal, tech­nol­o­gy prac­tice, BCG. ​“We are proud to sup­port the New York Cli­mate Exchange in build­ing a ​‘first-of-its-kind’ liv­ing lab­o­ra­to­ry and in incu­bat­ing the most impact­ful cli­mate solu­tions to save the plan­et and to join ranks with a group of part­ners unit­ed by a shared mis­sion to advance cli­mate solu­tions that make the world a bet­ter and safer place.”

“IBM is hon­ored and look­ing for­ward to being part of this trail­blaz­ing ini­tia­tive by col­lab­o­rat­ing on tech-dri­ven social impact and inno­va­tion efforts with Stony Brook Uni­ver­si­ty and the City of New York,” said Justi­na Nixon-Sain­til, chief impact offi­cer, IBM. ​“The New York Cli­mate Exchange project will allow us to con­tribute tech­nol­o­gy, skills, and research capa­bil­i­ties need­ed to help find cli­mate solu­tions that put jus­tice and equi­ty at the center.”

“It is a tremen­dous hon­or to design a new kind of cam­pus: One that not only sets the stage for our post-car­bon world but also cen­ters a com­pelling new pub­lic realm for all New York­ers,” said Col­in Koop, design­er part­ner, Skid­more, Owings & Mer­rill. ​“Our design embod­ies this stew­ard­ship by weav­ing sin­u­ous mass tim­ber pavil­ions through the rolling land­scape of the park and reusing the his­toric build­ing fab­ric of Gov­er­nors Island. Togeth­er, these spaces will cul­ti­vate advances in cli­mate research and pilot new tech­nolo­gies that can be deployed across the city and even­tu­al­ly the world. We look for­ward to work­ing with the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island, Stony Brook Uni­ver­si­ty, and our team of design and engi­neer­ing col­lab­o­ra­tors to bring this impor­tant project to life.”

“CUNY is pleased to sup­port and par­tic­i­pate in the New York Cli­mate Exchange, a cross-insti­tu­tion­al, cross-dis­ci­pli­nary col­lab­o­ra­tive mod­el that has the strength and flex­i­bil­i­ty to address the exis­ten­tial cli­mate cri­sis,” said City Uni­ver­si­ty of New York (CUNY) Chan­cel­lor Félix V. Matos Rodríguez. ​“This work on Gov­er­nors Island in New York City will allow our researchers and stu­dents to address cut­ting-edge cli­mate ques­tions, build a more sus­tain­able and equi­table city, and pro­vide a mod­el for high­er edu­ca­tion insti­tu­tions and cli­mate-focused schol­ars every­where to work togeth­er in pur­suit of research solu­tions to envi­ron­men­tal jus­tice and relat­ed concerns.”

“Brookhaven Lab researchers have played key roles in design­ing and con­duct­ing land­mark cli­mate stud­ies from the Arc­tic to the Ama­zon for the U.S. Depart­ment of Ener­gy,” said Jack Ander­son, inter­im direc­tor, Brookhaven Nation­al Lab­o­ra­to­ry. ​“We’re excit­ed at the prospect of col­lab­o­rat­ing with oth­er researchers through the New York Cli­mate Exchange as part of this new, impor­tant ini­tia­tive focused on devel­op­ing the next gen­er­a­tion of cli­mate experts and cre­at­ing equi­table cli­mate solutions.”

“The Urban Assem­bly New York Har­bor School com­mu­ni­ty is thrilled to wel­come the New York Cli­mate Exchange and ready to col­lab­o­rate with the con­sor­tium of edu­ca­tion­al insti­tu­tions in estab­lish­ing New York City’s Cli­mate Cen­ter on Gov­er­nors Island,” said Jef­frey Che­tirko, prin­ci­pal, Urban Assem­bly New York Har­bor School. ​“This excit­ing announce­ment not only ben­e­fits all New York City pub­lic school stu­dents, but also pro­motes diver­si­ty in the mar­itime indus­try, marine fields, cli­mate research, and sus­tain­able devel­op­ment. By pro­vid­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties for all New York City stu­dents to engage with­in these fields, New York City is break­ing down bar­ri­ers and paving the way for a more inclu­sive and sus­tain­able future.”

Mar 28 8:52 pm

Mar 28 9:10 am

The Trust for Gov­er­nors Island and the Friends of Gov­er­nors Island today announced the Island’s sec­ond annu­al Earth Day cel­e­bra­tion, offer­ing a day of free pro­gram­ming cel­e­brat­ing our shared con­nec­tion with nature. New York­ers are invit­ed to spend the day on Gov­er­nors Island and enjoy free edu­ca­tion­al activ­i­ties and work­shops for all ages, guid­ed tours through the Island’s open space, and live per­for­mances inspired by ecol­o­gy and the envi­ron­ment. The fes­tiv­i­ties will take place on Earth Day, April 22, 2023, from 10am to 3pm. 

“Gov­er­nors Island is an eco­log­i­cal resource for New York City, and we’re com­mit­ted to show­cas­ing how New York­ers can engage with solu­tions to bet­ter care for our plan­et to com­bat a chang­ing cli­mate,” said Clare New­man, Pres­i­dent & CEO of the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island. ​“This year we invite New York­ers and vis­i­tors from all over the world to join us for a free day of pro­gram­ming that not only high­lights the nat­ur­al beau­ty of our Island but also teach­es us how we can all assist in the crit­i­cal fight for a bet­ter Earth.”

Earth Day on Gov­er­nors Island will fea­ture vol­un­teer stew­ard­ship projects, free envi­ron­men­tal edu­ca­tion activ­i­ties for all ages, guid­ed tours of the Island’s cli­mate-resilient land­scapes and unique Urban Farm, a bird walk focused on ear­ly migra­to­ry birds pass­ing through Gov­er­nors Island, a hands-on work­shop on mak­ing your own seed balls with the Trust’s hor­ti­cul­ture team, insect ecol­o­gy activ­i­ties, free bike lessons with Bike New York, an immer­sive per­for­mance by artist Seung Taek-Lee, and more activ­i­ties to be announced. For more infor­ma­tion and a full sched­ule of the day’s events, vis­it www​.gov​is​land​.org/​e​a​r​t​h-day.

“There’s no bet­ter place in New York City to immerse your­self in nature and cel­e­brate Earth Day than Gov­er­nors Island! From Ham­mock Grove to Nolan Park, the Island’s green spaces will be in their full splen­dor on Earth Day,” said Pat­ti Davis, Inter­im Exec­u­tive Direc­tor of the Friends of Gov­er­nors Island. ​“Bring your friends and fam­i­ly to spend the day explor­ing and learn­ing about the cut­ting-edge envi­ron­men­tal and con­ser­va­tion activ­i­ties tak­ing place here all year round.” 

EVENT SCHED­ULE Events will take place at Colonels Row unless oth­er­wise noted.

• 10am-12:30pm: Island-wide vol­un­teer projects (check in at Colonels Row)
• 1pm: Com­mu­ni­ty Cel­e­bra­tion with give­aways, per­for­mances, food trucks, and more
• 1pm: Urban Farm Tour with Earth Mat­ter NY
• 1 – 3pm: Learn to Ride kids bike class with Bike New York at the Oval
• 1:30pm: Seed­ing Your Way to a Native Habi­tat seed ball work­shop at the Urban Farm
• 2pm: The Earth Per­for­mance: Reen­act­ment by Seung Taek-Lee/­Canal Projects on the Parade Ground
• 2pm: Ear­ly Migra­tion Bird Walk with NYC Audubon
• 2pm: Intro­duc­tion to the Cir­cu­lar Econ­o­my with Cir­cu­lar Econ­o­my Manufacturing
• 2pm: Insect Ecol­o­gy Walk 
• 2:30pm: Guid­ed land­scape tour of The Hills

Earth Day on Gov­er­nors Island is co-pre­sent­ed by the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island and the Friends of Gov­er­nors Island, with pro­gram­ming sup­port from NYC Audubon, Bil­lion Oys­ter Project, Cir­cu­lar Econ­o­my Man­u­fac­tur­ing, Wind Sup­port, Earth Mat­ter NY, the Nation­al Park Ser­vice, Bee Con­ser­van­cy, Bike New York, and Canal Projects.

Gov­er­nors Island’s award-win­ning park is open to the pub­lic every day, along with recre­ation activ­i­ties like bike rentals, a Com­mu­ni­ty Climb­ing Boul­der, Ham­mock Grove, The Hills, Pic­nic Point, and more. Gov­er­nors Island Arts pub­lic art com­mis­sions, includ­ing work from Duke Riley, Rachel Whiteread, Mark Dion, and Mark Hand­forth are also cur­rent­ly on view through­out the Island. Charles Gaines’s The Amer­i­can Man­i­fest Chap­ter Two: Mov­ing Chains will reopen on Gov­er­nors Island lat­er this spring. 

QC NY is open dai­ly on Gov­er­nors Island, with two heat­ed out­door pools along­side saunas, steam rooms, relax­ation treat­ments, mas­sages, and a new bar and bistro. This win­ter also marks the return of Win­ter Dog Days, where dogs are allowed on Gov­er­nors Island on Sat­ur­days and Sun­days through­out the end of April. Dogs must be leashed while on Gov­er­nors Island except for in the Week­end Win­ter Dog Park, locat­ed adja­cent to Liggett Ter­race. The Trust and the Friends will also hold New York City’s largest egg hunt on Sat­ur­day, April 8, free and open to all.

Mar 9 9:24 am

The Trust for Gov­er­nors Island and the Friends of Gov­er­nors Island today announced the launch of an eggs-cep­tion­al event, the Gov­er­nors Island Egg Hunt, a new spring­time cel­e­bra­tion to be held for the first time on April 8, 2023, from 10:oo a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Par­tic­i­pants will scram­ble to find the 10,000 wood­en paint­ed eggs hid­den in areas through­out the Island’s 172 acres, with Island-spe­cif­ic prizes and give­aways for the most hard-boiled egg hunters. 

The Gov­er­nors Island Egg Hunt is free for all participants…no need to shell out big bucks for a day of eggs-cel­lent fam­i­ly-friend­ly free-range fun. 

“Since open­ing to the pub­lic year-round in 2021, Gov­er­nors Island has cement­ed itself as an unmatched des­ti­na­tion for acces­si­ble all-sea­son out­door fun, and we are thrilled to con­tin­ue to expand our free year-round pro­gram­ming with the Island’s first pub­lic egg hunt,” said Clare New­man, Pres­i­dent and CEO of the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island. ​“Togeth­er with the Friends of Gov­er­nors Island, we hope you’ll hop on the fer­ry and join us for a one-of-a-kind spring­time cel­e­bra­tion in the heart of New York Harbor.”

This new event includes sev­er­al lev­els of egg hunts tai­lored to spe­cif­ic age groups, along with an Island-wide scav­enger hunt that every­one can take a crack at. The day-long cel­e­bra­tion at the Parade Ground will also include per­for­mances from Won­der­spark Pup­pets, Brook­lyn Mag­ic Shop, and more to be announced. Spring-themed arts and crafts will be fea­tured all day, and food will be avail­able for pur­chase onsite from Gov­er­nors Island ven­dors along with a beer gar­den from Gov­er­nors Island Beer Co. Vis­i­tors will also have the oppor­tu­ni­ty to meet and take pic­tures with the East­er Bun­ny and enjoy the hijinx of Looney Tooney the Clown. 

“The Friends of Gov­er­nors Island is thrilled to be co-host­ing New York City’s largest egg hunt on Gov­er­nors Island this spring,” said Pat­ti Davis, Inter­im Exec­u­tive Direc­tor of the Friends of Gov­er­nors Island. ​“As our first free pub­lic pro­gram of the spring sea­son, the Egg Hunt will fea­ture activ­i­ties for all ages through­out the His­toric Dis­trict and beyond, extend­ing across our beau­ti­ful open space. The Egg Hunt is a won­der­ful oppor­tu­ni­ty to intro­duce new vis­i­tors and wel­come back old friends as we kick off a won­der­ful spring sea­son on Gov­er­nors Island.”

EVENT SCHED­ULE Events will take place on the Parade Ground unless oth­er­wise not­ed. All egg hunts are as sup­plies last. 

• 10am-4pm: Reg­is­tra­tion and giveaways 
• 10am-3pm: Island-wide scav­enger hunt
• 10am-3pm: Bub­bles with Looney Tooney the Clown
• 11am-2pm: Meet the East­er Bunny
• 11am-3pm: Arts & Crafts
• 11am & 1pm: Egg Hunt A, Parade Ground (ages 2 – 4)
• 11am & 1pm: Egg Hunt B, Parade Ground (ages 5 – 8)
• 11:30am: Won­der­spark Pup­pets pup­pet show
• 12pm: Egg Hunt C, Colonels Row (ages 9 – 13)
• 12:15 & 1:45pm: Brook­lyn Mag­ic Shop mag­ic show

The Gov­er­nors Island Egg Hunt is co-pre­sent­ed by the Trust for Gov­er­nors Island and the Friends of Gov­er­nors Island. 

Gov­er­nors Island’s award-win­ning park is open to the pub­lic every day, along with recre­ation activ­i­ties like bike rentals, a Com­mu­ni­ty Climb­ing Boul­der, Ham­mock Grove, The Hills, Pic­nic Point, and more. Gov­er­nors Island Arts pub­lic art com­mis­sions, includ­ing work from Duke Riley, Rachel Whiteread, Mark Dion, and Mark Hand­forth are also cur­rent­ly on view through­out the Island. Charles Gaines’s The Amer­i­can Man­i­fest Chap­ter Two: Mov­ing Chains will reopen on Gov­er­nors Island lat­er this spring.

QC NY is open dai­ly on Gov­er­nors Island, with two heat­ed out­door pools along­side saunas, steam rooms, relax­ation treat­ments, mas­sages, and a new bar and bistro. This win­ter also marks the return of Win­ter Dog Days, where dogs are allowed on Gov­er­nors Island on Sat­ur­days and Sun­days through­out the end of April. Dogs must be leashed while on Gov­er­nors Island except for in the Week­end Win­ter Dog Park, locat­ed adja­cent to Liggett Terrace. 

Gov­er­nors Island is open to the pub­lic dai­ly from 7am to 6pm. Trust for Gov­er­nors Island-oper­at­ed fer­ries run dai­ly between the Bat­tery Mar­itime Build­ing at 10 South Street in Low­er Man­hat­tan and Sois­sons Land­ing on the Island. For sched­ules and tick­et­ing infor­ma­tion, click here. Trust-oper­at­ed sea­son­al week­end Brook­lyn fer­ry ser­vice will return this summer.

Round-trip fer­ry tick­ets cost $4 for adults. Gov­er­nors Island fer­ries are always free for chil­dren 12 and under, old­er adults ages 65 and up, res­i­dents of NYCHA, IDNYC hold­ers, cur­rent and for­mer mil­i­tary ser­vice mem­bers, and Friends of Gov­er­nors Island mem­bers. Fer­ries before noon on Sat­ur­days and Sun­days are free for all. There is no sur­charge for bicy­cles or strollers at any time.

NYC Fer­ry also serves Gov­er­nors Island dai­ly on the South Brook­lyn route, with stops in Low­er Man­hat­tan and along the Brook­lyn water­front. For tick­et­ing infor­ma­tion and full sched­ules for NYC Fer­ry, vis­it www.ferry.nyc.