Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh announces plans to re-open its four museums safely

Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh announced it will re-open its four museums in late-June, with timed ticketing and other safety protocols in place to protect staff and welcome back the community. Carnegie Museums of Art and Natural History, Carnegie Science Center, and The Andy Warhol Museum will re-open to all visitors on Monday, June 29, and to only members from Friday, June 26, through Sunday, June 28. Timed ticketing will be available on all Carnegie Museums websites as of Monday, June 15. The museums have been closed to the public since Saturday, March 14, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We have been preparing for this day with a single-minded focus: the safety and well-being of our staff and our visitors. That will continue to drive everything we do,” said Steven Knapp, President and CEO of Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh. “As Pennsylvania has entered the Green Phase of its COVID-19 re-opening process, we are thrilled to be able to re-open our doors and welcome back the community that never stopped supporting us.

“The four Carnegie Museums are ideal places to be inspired and uplifted by the wonders of art and science while also practicing social distancing,” Knapp added, “and we are fully prepared to conform to recommended guidelines.”

The steps the four Carnegie Museums are taking to be visitor-ready on June 26 include: limiting the number of visitors to 25% of building capacity at any one time; the use of timed ticketing for all visitors, including members; clearly marked foot-traffic patterns in high-traffic areas; enhanced cleaning protocols; the modification of interactive exhibits where possible and placement of additional hand sanitizers near interactive exhibits; and the installation of plexiglass shields at visitor services desks and in office spaces. Visitors and staff will be required to wear masks and practice safe social distancing.

“We have faced daunting challenges over the past three months,” Knapp said, “but I am extremely proud of the way our family of museums has continued to serve audiences of all ages and interests through digital offerings that carry our collections and programs directly into their homes. We look forward to welcoming visitors back for the kind of encounters that are only possible when one is face-to-face with a powerful, inspiring, informative object.”

At the start of its COVID-19 closure, Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh joined with a group of other museums and cultural institutions from across Southwestern Pennsylvania to collaboratively prepare their organizations for safe re-openings. The group started meeting digitally in late March, and it now includes more than 30 different museums and arts organizations that span Allegheny, Westmoreland, and Fayette Counties that meet weekly to share plans and discuss key elements of re-opening, including visitor guidelines, facilities, staff and volunteers, and diversity and equity issues.

“Although each institution is evaluating re-opening under its own schedule, we are confident that these shared conversations will facilitate safe and smooth re-openings across the region, helping to ensure that all our visitors feel comfortable, safe, and prepared to return to the cultural organizations they love,” Knapp said.

While this group convened for the purpose of collaborating on best practices for re-opening, those meetings have opened the door for other vital collaborative efforts, such as addressing the group’s support for racial equity and ending the cycle of violence and oppression affecting Black members of the community. “Our collaboration will continue, as we commit ourselves to listening to the needs of our community and discussing specific actions we can take to bring about the kind of changes we know we need to make,” Knapp said.

Summer Exhibitions at Carnegie Museums
Among the exhibitions that visitors will discover when the Carnegie Museums re-open: An-My Lê: On Contested Terrain at Carnegie Museum of Art; the world premiere of Dinosaur Armor at Carnegie Museum of Natural History; and Femme Touch at The Andy Warhol Museum. To learn more about the museums’ virtual offerings, see Carnegie Museums from Home.