New York Live Arts 2025 Gala

We are delighted to invite you to New York Live Arts Gala: A Space to Dream, Imagine, Discover, and Create.

This year’s gala, A Space to Dream, Imagine, Discover, and Create, highlights the vital need to preserve space for artists, even in times of political strife. As the stenographers of culture, artists capture our histories, challenge our present, and shape our future. The women to be honored bring life to these actions, fortifying lines among our shared experience and uplifting the necessity of imagination and big thought.

The annual celebration features a night full of performances, honorees and Live Arts artist spotlights, a delicious vegetarian dinner by one-of-a-kind BITE Catering, and an auction featuring exclusive art and experiences.

AWARDS WILL BE PRESENTED TO:

Wangechi Mutu’s work deals with the very idea of human representation; how we perceive and reproduce images of what we believe we are, how we view others and create images of what we think of them. In her ongoing conversations with figuration, what Mutu’s work looks at our value systems in Art and beyond, that either obscure or elevate our image. and reflections. 

Internationally renowned for a practice that encompasses various techniques and mediums including sculpture, painting, film, installation and collages, Wangechi Mutu’s work features female hybrid creatures and vivid dystopiandreamscapes.

Mutu has participated in several major solo exhibitions in institutions worldwide, most recently, “Wangechi Mutu: Intertwined” at both the New Museum and New Orleans Museum of Art; “Thinking Historically in the Present” at the Sharjah Biennial; “Wangechi Mutu” at Storm King Art Center; “The Façade Commission: Wangechi Mutu, The NewOnes, will free Us” at The Metropolitan Museum Art; and “Wangechi Mutu: I Am Speaking, Are You listening?” at The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco Legion of Honor Museum.

Gloria Steinem is a writer, lecturer, political activist, and feminist organizer. She has spent decades traveling in this and other countries as an organizer and lecturer and is a frequent media spokeswoman on issues of equality. She is particularly interested in the shared origins of sex and race caste systems, gender roles and child abuse as roots of violence, non-violent conflict resolution, the cultures of indigenous peoples, and organizing across boundaries for peace and justice. In 2013, President Obama awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom, this country’s highest civilian honor.  She has authored many books, including My Life on the Road, which was adapted into a feature length film, The Glorias. She lives in New York City.

GALA CO-CHAIRS

ALAN D* & BARBARA MARKS

GALA HOST

DARNELL L. MOORE

PERFROMANCES

Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company
kNoname Artist | Roderick George
Ogemdi Ude

MUSIC BY

DJ JUST LOVE

2025 Gala Host Committee Members

List in formation as of April 9th

Kyle Abraham
Speaker Adrienne Adams
AllianceBernstein, L.P.
Sarah Arison
Jody and John Arnhold
Council Member Erik Bottcher
Derek Brown and Deborah Hellman*
Aimee Meredith Cox*
Claire Danes and Hugh Dancy
David A. Dechman and Michel Mecure
Terence Dougherty and Pierre Duleyrie*
Zoe Eskin
Adam Flatto
William Floyd
LaToya Ruby Fraizer*
Eleanor Friedman*
Emma Friedman-Cohen*
Linda Genereux*
Agnes Gund
Helen Haje*
Ryan Hastings and Lauren Cascio
Alexes Hazen
Ruth and Stephen* Hendel
Jenny Holzer
Charla Jones*
Colleen Keegan*
Raja Feather Kelly
Borough President Levine
Richard H. Levy*
Robert Longo
Alan D.* and Barbara Marks
Darnell L. Moore* and Yashua Simmons
Amy Newman* and Bud Shulman
Mark O’Donnell
Okwui Okpokwasili
The Pevaroff Cohn Family Foundation
Randy Polumbo*
Ellen M. Poss*
Matthew Putman*
Slobodan Randjelović* and Jon Stryker
Thomas Rom and Adrian Danchig-Waring
Jeffrey Schneider and Jeffery Povero
Jane Bovingdon Semel*
Ruby Shang*
Cindy Sherman
Catharine Stimpson*
Wade Turnbull* and David Hamed

*New York Live Arts Board Member

Email jdavis@newyorklivearts.org or call 212.691.6500 ext. 310 to join the Host Commitee or click the link at the top of the page.