The holiday season brings throngs of people out to museums, perhaps looking for a special way to close out the year on a high note. This year, New York City is a Mecca for art lovers, with many surprising shows on view. While many museums close their doors for New Years Day, a number of them remain open, including the American Museum of Natural History; the Whitney; MoMA; and the New-York Historical Society. This list is derived from artnet News, DART: Design Arts Daily, and the New York Times.

ART AND CHINA AFTER 1989: THEATER OF THE WORLD This massive 75-artist survey of post-Tiananmen-Square Massacre art, accompanied by a 10-week documentary film series, is on view through Jan. 7, 2018. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, guggenheim.org.

ART IN THE OPEN: 50 YEARS OF PUBLIC ART IN NEW YORK On the 40th anniversary of the Public Art Fund, renderings and models of public works by artists from Christo to Kara Walker. Through May 13, 2018. Museum of the City of New York, mcnyorg.

ARTHUR SZYK: SOLDIER IN ART The extravagantly colorful parade of Axis leadership in this Polish-Jewish illustrator’s 1942 “Satan Leads the Ball” includes Death in a German helmet and Mussolini with no pants. Through Jan. 21, New-York Historical Society, nyhistory.org.

BARBARA HAMMER: EVIDENTIARY BODIES A retrospective for the storied video artist will also include archival materials, works on paper and previously unseen film. Through Jan. 28. Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art, leslielohman.org.

BEYOND SUFFRAGE: A CENTURY OF NEW YORK WOMEN IN POLITICS A century of women’s activism from 1917, when they won the right to vote in New York State, to present. Through July 22, 2018 Museum of the City of New York, mcny.org. 

Right: © Carolee Schneeman, Portrait Partials, 1970; Artist Rights Society (ARS), New York

CAROLEE SCHNEEMANN: KINETIC PAINTING Beginning with the paintings she made in the early 1950s, Ms. Schneemann’s first American retrospective traces the development of her boldly personal and emphatically feminist performance and video work. Through March 11, 2018. MoMA PS1, Long Island City, Queens, momaps1.org.

DAVID HOCKNEY A major retrospective for the beloved British painter, organized by the Tate, the Pompidou and the Met, is now in New York. Nov. 27–Feb. 25, 2018. The Met Fifth Avenue, metmuseum.org / DART

DRAWN TO GREATNESS: MASTER DRAWINGS FROM THE THAW COLLECTION More than 150 drawings — by Rubens, Rembrandt, Pollock, Picasso and many more — offer a narrative of the evolution of draftsmanship as a complex technology. Through Jan. 7, 2018. Morgan Library and Museum, themorgan.org.

EDVARD MUNCH: BETWEEN THE CLOCK AND THE BED Reassessing Munch’s legacy with an emphasis on self-portraits and later paintings. Originally at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Through  Feb. 4, 2018. Met Breuer, metmuseum.org / DART

FICTIONS This latest of the museum’s regular surveys of emerging black artists highlights a resurgence of narrative in contemporary visual art. Through– Jan. 7, 2018. The Studio Museum in Harlem, studiomuseum.org.

GORDON MATTA-CLARK: ANARCHITECT The Cornell-trained architect and downtown Pied Piper, who produced a wide and exciting range of work before his untimely death at 35, made some of his early “cuts,” sections of wall and floor cut right out of usually derelict buildings in ornamental shapes, in the Bronx; this large show emphasizes gestures’ political critique. Through Apr. 8, 2018. Bronx Museum of the Arts, bronxmuseum.org.

JOSEF ALBERS IN MEXICO Photographs and collages from the Bauhaus artist and color theorist’s many trips to the country that he called “the promised land of abstract art.” Through Feb. 18, 2018. Guggenheim, guggenheim.org.

Laura Owens, three paintings from 2012; photo: Vincent Tullo/NY Times

LAURA OWENS A midcareer survey for the graphically expressive Los Angeles painter. Through Feb. 4, 2018. Whitney Museum of American Art, whitney.org.

LOUISE BOURGEOIS: AN UNFOLDING PORTRAIT Hundreds of the French sculptor’s prints and illustrated books, accompanied by a new online catalog. Through Jan. 28, 2018. Museum of Modern Art, moma.org.

MAX ERNST: BEYOND PAINTING A survey of the German-born Surrealist’s career focused on his formal innovations, from illustrated books to painted bronze. Through Jan. 1, 2018. Museum of Modern Art, moma.org.

MICHELANGELO: DIVINE DRAFTSMAN AND DESIGNER A huge show of more than 150 of Michelangelo’s supernaturally sensual drawings—as well as three marble sculptures, his earliest surviving painting, and the cartoon for his last Vatican fresco—borrowed from more than 50 institutions in Europe and the United States. Through Feb. 12, 2018. Metropolitan Museum of Art, metmuseum.org.

Left: Amedeo Modigliani, c. 1912, photo courtesy PVDE / Bridgeman Images, New York

MODIGLIANI UNMASKED Early drawings never before shown in America are featured in this 150-work exploration of the Italian painter and sculptor Amedeo Modigliani’s Jewish and global influences. Through Feb. 4, 2018. The Jewish Museum, thejewishmuseum.org.

POSING MODERNITY: THE BLACK MODEL FROM MANET TO MATISSE AND BEYOND A study of portrayals of black female models, including the woman who sat for the maid in Manet’s “Olympia.” Through Feb. 10, 2018. Wallach Art Gallery at Columbia University, Lenfest Center for the Arts, columbia.edu/cu/wallach.

Proof: Francisco Goya, Sergei Eisenstein, and Robert Longo Organized by the Garage Museum of Contemporary Art, Moscow, this show juxtaposes black-and-white etching, film, and charcoal drawings by three artists across time. Through January 7, 2018. The Brooklyn Museum. 

RODIN In honor of the 100th anniversary of the death of Auguste Rodin (1840–1917), the Met will showcase nearly 50 marble, plaster, bronze, and terracotta sculptures, acquired by the museum over the course of the century, Through Jan. 15, 2018.  The Met Fifth Avenue, metmuseum.org More information at rodin100.org/en.

SOULFUL CREATURES: ANIMAL MUMMIES IN ANCIENT EGYPT The Egyptians mummified tens of millions of dogs, monkeys, ibises and other animals; there are 30 in this show, all drawn from the museum’s permanent collection. Through Jan. 21, 2018. Brooklyn Museum, brooklynmuseum.org.

TOYIN OJIH ODUTOLA In her first solo New York museum show, the young Nigerian artist presents fictional portraits of two aristocratic families. Through February 25, 2018.  Whitney Museum of American Art, whitney.org.

TRIGGER: GENDER AS A TOOL AND A WEAPON More than 40 featured artists explore the concept of gender fluidity, and how gender intersects with race, class, sexuality, and other power structures. Through January 21, 2018. The New Museum. 

WAR AND PIECED: THE ANNETTE GERO COLLECTION OF QUILTS FROM MILITARY FABRICS 

Twenty-nine rare examples of what used to be called “convalescent quilts,” made mostly by 19th-century British soldiers in their downtime. Through Jan. 7, 2018. American Folk Art Museum, folkartmuseum.org.

WIENER WERKSTÄTTE, 1903-1932: THE LUXURY OF BEAUTYSome 200 objects displayed in rooms with period interiors. Through Jan. 29, 2018. Neue Galerie, neuegalerie.org.

© Stephen Shore. Beverly Boulevard and La Brea Avenue, Los Angeles, California, June 21, 1975. The Museum of Modern Art, New York. 

Photography and lens-based media

AHMED MATER The Saudi photographer’s “Desert of Pharan” series documents the rapidly changing holy city of Mecca, perpetually under construction. Dec. 1–Apr. 8, Brooklyn Museum, brooklynmuseum.org.

Club 57: Film, Performance, and Art in the East Village, 1978–1983. Alternative arts space of 1970s and ’80s East Village alternative arts examines the art, performance, fashion, film, photography, and zines that grew out of the seminal counter-cultural venue. Through April 1, 2018. Museum of Modern Art https://www.moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/3824?

THE EXPERIMENTAL SELF: EDVARD MUNCH’S PHOTOGRAPHY This exhibition includes Munch’s experimental portraiture of friends and family as well as his self-portraiture, staged between 1902 and 1908. It coincides with the exhibition Edvard Munch: Between the Clock and the Bed, on view at the Met Breuer. Through March 5, 2018. Scandinavia House http://www.scandinaviahouse.org/events/the-experimental-self/ / DART

GENERATION WEALTH BY LAUREN GREENFIELD For her first major retrospective, Ms. Greenfield, a photographer and documentarian, organizeD 25 years’ worth of her anthropologically tinted investigations of money culture into a single SHOW. Sept. 20–Jan. 7, ICP Museum, icp.org.

HIROSHI SUGIMOTO: GATES OF PARADISE Pairing Mr. Sugimoto’s new black and white photographs of European art with traditional Japanese artworks. Oct. 20–Jan. 7, Japan Society, japansociety.org.

MODERNISM ON THE GANGES: RAGHUBIR SINGH PHOTOGRAPHS Color photography of Calcutta, Bombay and more from the ‘60s to the ‘90s from the Rajasthani self-taught photographer. Oct. 11–Jan. 2, The Met Breuer, metmuseum.org.

QUICKSILVER BRILLIANCE: ADOLF DE MEYER PHOTOGRAPHS Baron Adolf de Meyer, Vogue’s first full-time staff photographer, took snapshots in Japan, made a photo book of Nijinsky’s ballet “L’Après-midi d’un faune” and captured Josephine Baker in an extravagant string of pearls. Dec. 4–Mar. 18, The Met Fifth Avenue, metmuseum.org.

STEPHEN SHORE A major retrospective of the precocious and prolific American photographer. Nov. 19–May 28, Museum of Modern Art, moma.org / DART