(New York, May 6, 2026)—Teens Take The Met! will return to The Metropolitan Museum of Art on Friday, May 15. The annual event welcomes teens from New York City's five boroughs to the Museum for a night filled with a range of dynamic programs. This year, over 60 local community partners will offer programs, including performances, hands-on activities, and dancing. Teens Take The Met! is free for all teens (ages 13 or older) with a middle school or high school ID. Advance registration is recommended but not required.
This event is made possible by the Gray Foundation.
“The Met has a long tradition of deepening its relationship with our city’s teens in various ways, from our paid internship program and peer-to-peer conversations to our drop-in Teen Fridays, where teens come to create, move, listen, and discuss,” said Heidi Holder, Frederick P. and Sandra P. Rose Chair of Education at The Met. “Every year, Teens Take The Met! celebrates our commitment to being a place where our city’s young people can engage with art in a variety of forms—visual, literary, performance—as a way of understanding themselves and the changing world around us. This year, we invite them to the Museum for science, poetry, pop-up podcasts, and a silent DJ battle and dance party on the roof. To our teen community, we can’t wait to see you again at The Met!”
To participate, teens will need a special-event wristband, which they can pick up upon arrival at either of the Museum’s two Fifth Avenue entrances (at 81st and 83rd Streets). The wristbands will provide access to activities throughout the building starting at 4 p.m. The event will kick off at 5 p.m. with a performance by the Bard High School Early College Panthers Step Team outside the Museum.
The event will offer more than 75 programs and activations throughout the galleries, ranging from art making and writing to activities and demonstrations led by The Met and partner institutions. This year, there will be a new series of performance showcases in the Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium, featuring teen dancers, singers, actors, DJs, and more from across New York City. Additional highlights include a new 360-degree photo booth in The Charles Engelhard Court; a silent dance party at the Temple of Dendur; a series of jazz performances featuring Belongó and Jazz House Kids; sustainable seed tape making with the New York Botanical Garden; a chance to create your own personalized set of tarot cards with the Morgan Library & Museum; a pop-up podcast with the New York Public Library; activities created and led by Met Teen Interns inspired by the current exhibitions Gothic by Design: The Dawn of Architectural Draftsmanship and Household Gods: Hindu Devotional Prints, 1860–1930; and many ongoing activations and giveaways from multiple organizations.
A full schedule of events can be found in both English and Spanish on the Teens Take The Met! online hub.
Large-print and Braille activity schedules, American Sign Language interpretation, sighted guides, and assistive-listening devices will be available at the welcome table in the Ruth and Harold D. Uris Center for Education. For information about accessibility, programs, and services for visitors with disabilities at The Met Fifth Avenue, visit metmuseum.org/access, email access@metmuseum.org, or call 212-650-2010.
The event will be featured on The Met’s website as well as on social media using the hashtag #metteens.
Community Partners
92NY; Aalokam; Art in the Park Inc.; Art Start; The Art Students League; Artists For Humanity; ArtsConnection; Bafa Inc. Bangladesh Academy of Fine Arts; Bard High School Early College (Manhattan); The Bronx Museum; Brooklyn Museum; Brooklyn Public Library; Building Beats; Casita Maria Center for Arts & Education; The Center for Anti-Violence Education; Center for Book Arts; Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum; DCTV; Dedalus Foundation; The Diller-Quaile School of Music, Inc.; The Door; Dorill Initiative; El Museo del Barrio; Girls for Gender Equity; Guggenheim New York; High Line; Hill Art Foundation; Intrepid Museum; JAZZ HOUSE KIDS; The Jewish Museum; LaGuardia High School / LaGuardia Dance Ensemble; Lewis Latimer House; Manhattan Theatre Club; Museum at Eldridge Street; Museum of Chinese in America; New42; New York City Center; The New York Film Academy; The New York Historical; The New York Korean Performing Arts Center; The New York Public Library (NYPL); The Noguchi Museum; NYC All City Chorus; NYC Department of Youth & Community Development; NYSCI; Planned Parenthood of Greater New York; Reel Works; Sadie Nash Leadership Project; Salvadori Center; Scholastic Awards; Snug Harbor Cultural Center & Botanical Garden; Studio Museum in Harlem; Susan E. Wagner High School Marching Band; Swiss Institute; TADA! Youth Theater; Teens@Graham; Titan Theatre Company; UrbanGlass; Wave Hill; Whitney Museum of American Art; Woolmark; The Yellow Tulip Project
About The Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Met presents art from around the world and across time for everyone to experience and enjoy. The Museum lives in two iconic sites in New York City—The Met Fifth Avenue and The Met Cloisters. Millions of people also take part in The Met experience online. Since it was founded in 1870, The Met has always aspired to be more than a treasury of rare and beautiful objects. Every day, art comes alive in the Museum's galleries and through its exhibitions and events, revealing both new ideas and unexpected connections across time and across cultures.
About The Met’s Education Department
Dedicated to making art accessible to everyone, regardless of background, disability, age, or experience, the work of The Met’s Education Department is central to the Museum’s mission to engage local and global audiences, making our collection accessible to all. The Education Department currently presents over 29,000 educational events and programs throughout the year. These programs include workshops, art-making experiences, specialized tours, fellowships supporting leading scholarship and research, high school and college internships that promote career accessibility and diversity, access programs for visitors with disabilities, K–12 educator programs that train teachers to integrate art into core curricula across disciplines, and school tours and programs that spark deep learning and lifelong relationships with and through art.
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May 6, 2026
Photo by Paula Lobo