French Culture in New York City is influential in art, ballet, fashion, film, food, and tango. The Statue of Liberty was a gift from France. Bastille Day is New York’s big French celebration.
Nova Frontier Film Festival Screens Films of the African Diaspora, Middle East, and Latin America with Talk, Live Music and Community at Harlem Stage
HARLEM STAGE, Manhattanville, West Harlem 🇺🇸 🇧🇪 🇬🇧 🇨🇴 🇫🇷 🇬🇳 🇮🇷 🇲🇽 🇲🇦 🇵🇷 🇸🇳 🇪🇸 🇹🇷 🇨🇴
Blue Note Jazz Festival New York Presents Some Great Latin Artists
BLUE NOTE, Greenwich Village, Manhattan
SONY HALL, Times Square Theater District, Manhattan
SUMMERSTAGE Rumsey Playfield, Central Park, Manhattan
National Sawdust, Williamsburg, Brooklyn
BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn!, Prospect Park, Brooklyn
Westminster Dog Show 2026 Celebrates 150 Years of Best in Show
JAVITS CENTER, Hudson Yards, Manhattan
MADISON SQUARE GARDEN, Chelsea, Manhattan
2024 ~ 🇨🇩 🇨🇬 🇨🇺 🇫🇷 🇮🇹 🇲🇽 🇵🇹 🇿🇦 🇪🇸 🇿🇼
NADA New York is an Emerging Contemporary Art Fair
STARRETT-LEHIGH BUILDING, Chelsea, Manhattan 🇨🇦 🇨🇺 🇫🇷 🇲🇽 🇳🇬 🇵🇷 🇷🇴 🇿🇦
1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair Shows African and African Diaspora Art
THE HALO, Financial District, Manhattan 🇧🇸 🇧🇷 🇨🇩 🇫🇷 🇭🇰 🇮🇹 🇯🇵 🇳🇬 🇿🇦 🇬🇧 🇺🇸
TEFAF New York 2025 Brings Europe’s Leading Fine Art Antiques Fair to New York City
PARK AVENUE ARMORY, Upper East Side, Manhattan 🇧🇷 🇨🇦 🇨🇺 🇫🇷 🇮🇹
Independent New York 2025 is the New Yorker of New York Art Fairs
SPRING STUDIOS, Tribeca, Manhattan 🇺🇸 🇨🇦 🇪🇹 🇫🇷 🇮🇹 🇲🇽 🇷🇴 🇪🇸
Youth America Grand Prix 2025 Gala Stars of Today and Tomorrow is Our Favorite Ballet in New York City
ALICE TULLY HALL, Lincoln Center, Manhattan 🇺🇸 🇦🇷 🇫🇷 🇪🇸
Doc Fortnight 2025, MoMA’s New Documentary Film Festival, Screens Many Latin Films
Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) 🇺🇸 🇦🇷 🇫🇷 🇮🇹 🇲🇽 🇳🇬 🇵🇪 🇷🇴 🇪🇸
Frieze New York 2025 Anchors the Frieze Week Cluster of Contemporary Art Fairs
THE SHED, Hudson Yards, Manhattan 🇺🇸 🇧🇷 🇨🇴 🇫🇷 🇬🇹 🇮🇹 🇲🇽 🇿🇦 🇪🇸
Winter Show 2025 is America’s Longest-Running Antiques Fair
PARK AVENUE ARMORY, Upper East Side, Manhattan 🇺🇸 🇦🇷 🇨🇴 🇫🇷 🇨🇦 🇮🇹 🇵🇹 🇪🇸
New York French Culture News
French New York City
The Statue of Liberty, icon of New York, is a gift from France. With a little irony (Haiti), she celebrates the end of human slavery in the United States.
French live mostly in Manhattan’s Upper East Side and Brooklyn. New York City’s “Little Paris” is Centre St between Broome and Grand in Little Italy, Manhattan.
New York Latin Culture Magazine began publishing in Paris, France as Tango Beat® in 2009.
French Art in NYC
The Frick Collection has a lot of French art. 🇫🇷
Villa Albertine promotes French American artist’s residencies in the Upper East Side. 🇫🇷
French Books in NYC
Albertine is a French bookstore in the French Embassy in the Upper East Side. albertine.com 🇫🇷
French Cultural Centers in NYC
French Institute Alliance Française (FIAF) is New York’s French cultural center. It hosts New York’s largest French library. 🇫🇷
French Dance in NYC
Ballet is an Italian court dance that was popularized in France. 🇫🇷
You can usually see the Can Can at Bastille Day on 60th St. 🇫🇷
English Country Dance became the world’s first international dance. The French version “contredanse” was brought to Saint-Domingue (now Haiti). There it influenced Latin dance in Cuba which eventually evolved into salsa. 🇫🇷
Tango is Argentine, but was popularized by the Tango Craze in 1913 Paris, and resurrected in Paris by the show “Tango Argentino” in 1983. 🇫🇷
French Fashion in NYC
Chanel is a French luxury goods house with a flagship store on 57th Street in Midtown. 🇫🇷
Givenchy is a French luxury goods house on Madison Avenue in the Upper East Side. 🇫🇷
Hermès is the luxury goods house of the French elite. It has a flagship store in the Upper East Side. 🇫🇷
Louis Vuitton is a French luxury goods house with a flagship store in Midtown. 🇫🇷
French Festivals in NYC
L’Alliance New York Bastille Day Celebration is a street fair of French culture. 🇫🇷
Le fête de la musique (World Music Day) is a Parisian festival of live street music on summer’s longest night, the Summer Solstice on June 20 or 21. 🇫🇷
Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday) is a French Carnival tradition that Americans know through New Orleans Carnival. 🇫🇷
French Film in NYC
Rendez-vous with French Cinema is a French film festival co-produced by UniFrance at Film at Lincoln Center. 🇫🇷
French Food in NYC
Le District is a lovely French food hall (a little Les Halles) with French markets and restaurants in Battery Park City.
French Restaurant Week usually promotes around 200 French restaurants in the first weeks of July. 🇫🇷
French Government in NYC
The French Consulate New York is in Manhattan’s Upper East Side.
French Music in NYC
“Carmen” is a French opera set in Romani Spain by Georges Bizet. Many think its famous “Habanera” aria refers to a Spanish musical form, but the habanera (la habana manera or the Havana manner) is Cuban. 🇫🇷
Many artists channel the hot jazz of Django Reinhardt. 🇫🇷
Fête de la musique is a Parisian tradition of live street music all night long on the Summer Solstice, the shortest night of the year. 🇫🇷
French Schools in NYC
International Academy is a French and Spanish immersion grade school in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn. 🇫🇷
Lycée Français is a French grade school in Manhattan’s Upper East Side. 🇫🇷
French Sports in NYC
PSG NY is New York City’s Paris Saint-Germain soccer supporter’s club. 🇫🇷
French Theatre in NYC
Moulin Rouge! (Tony Award for Best Musical) is at the Hirschfeld on Broadway in open run. (12+) From $69. 🇫🇷
French Culture
English is just French badly pronounced. Oh là là.
Ballet is an Italian court dance developed in France until the French Revolution. It was reintroduced to the world through Ballet Russes.
Paris was the center of the world in the Modern Era until the end of World War II.
French Art
Modern art developed largely in France.
French Dance
Ballet is an Italian court dance developed in France. It is the science of dance.
France played several roles in the development of Argentine tango. The Tango Craze of 1913 started in Paris before jumping to other European capitals and New York City. The Tango Renaissance of 1983 started in Paris with the opening of the “Tango Argentino” tango show.
French Film
French invented cinema. Cannes is one of the world’s leading film festivals.
French Food
French cooking is the science of food.
French Fashion
French fashion, lingerie, and high heels are world famous.
High Heels
High heels come from the boots of Turkish cavalry which work like cowboy boots. The heel prevents the rider’s foot from falling through the stirrup which can be deadly.
This style was copied by European courts when the Turks were one of the great military powers. For a time both sexes wore high heels. Red soles were a mark of royalty. French fashion designer Christian Louboutin copied that.
Eventually men’s clothing changed to be easier to work in. French postcard makers put high heels on the prostitutes they photographed. That sexualized high heels and they’ve been with us ever since.
Pornography
Pornography is universal, but modern pornography began with French postcards of prostitutes (wearing high heels no less).
France
French are interesting because they are Germanic people who were Latinized by the Romans, and the Latinization stuck. The Germanic mind and Latin heart argue a lot, but when they come together, it’s world class.
France played an important role in the development of Europe and continues to do so.
Paris was the world’s cultural capital until the end of World War II, when New York City became the world capital.
French National Day
Bastille Day, July 14, 1789, is France’s national day. It celebrates the storming of the Bastille jail fortress during the French Revolution.
Latin and Latine
The concept of “Latin America” is French. French colonizers told Mexicans they should allow themselves to be conquered because we are “Latin brothers.” Hmm. The French wanted to restart human slavery and join forces with the confederate traitors of the United States. We celebrate the French defeat in the Battle of Puebla as Cinco de Mayo.
Latin American politicians embraced the Latin label because Paris was the world capital until 1945. The U.N. adopted the term “Latin” in the 1950s. That’s how Americans of the Americas became Latins.
Cultural organizations are starting to use the word “Latine” instead of Latinx to describe themselves. Latinx is a bad idea because it means LGBTQ+, which is all good, but probably not what many organizations had in mind.
Latine isn’t any better. If you want to know the deepest meaning of Latine, go live in Haiti. You’ll see the results of French colonial exploitation ~ the total destruction of kidnapped Africans and the best land in the Caribbean.
French blame Haiti’s troubles on Africans and Vodou, but French Christians are responsible. Latine is not cool.