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For three decades, the MetroCard was more than just a ticket to ride. That flimsy little card was a tiny, swipeable symbol of New York life. Now, as the city moves fully into the contactless OMNY era, a new exhibition at Grand Central will reframe that familiar yellow rectangle as something else entirely.
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Opening March 16 at the New York Transit Museum’s Grand Central Gallery & Store, "Inspired by MetroCard" explores how the humble fare card evolved into a creative canvas for artists, designers and institutions across the city. The free exhibition pulls from contemporary artworks and the museum’s own collection to show how MetroCards have been transformed into fashion pieces, sculptures, paintings and collages, as well as limited-edition cards.
“The MetroCard was one of the most accessible design objects in New York history,” said New York Transit Museum Acting Director Regina Shepherd in a statement. “This exhibition captures how artists transformed that shared experience into works that are personal, inventive, and unmistakably New York.”
Introduced in the mid-1990s to replace subway tokens, the MetroCard quickly reshaped daily transit life, eventually enabling features like free transfers and unlimited rides that changed how New Yorkers moved through the city. Over time, it also became a cultural icon, appearing in commemorative designs, advertising campaigns and art projects.
Rather than treating the MetroCard solely as transit technology, "Inspired by MetroCard" presents it as an accessible design object, one handled by almost every New Yorker and that material artists repurposed in strikingly personal ways. The show includes rare art MetroCards, fashion collaborations and works created from expired or discarded cards.
Among the highlights are works by artists as different as Nina Boesch, Barbara Kruger, Nina Vishneva, Thomas McKean and VH McKenzie, who have turned the cards into everything from mosaic tiles to canvases and even a wedding dress.
Located in the shuttle passage at 42nd Street and Park Avenue, the Grand Central gallery is one of the most accessible museum spaces in the city, fitting for a show about an object built on accessibility. "Inspired by MetroCard" runs through October 2026, offering one last chance to see how a piece of plastic helped shape not just how New Yorkers traveled, but how they expressed themselves along the way.
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