Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art

The museum grew out of the Leslie-Lohman Gay Art Foundation, established by J. Frederic "Fritz" Lohman and Charles W. Leslie, who mounted their first gay art exhibition in 1969 at their Prince Street loft. Their commercial gallery closed in the early 1980s during the AIDS epidemic; the foundation applied for nonprofit status in 1987 and was granted it in 1990, a process during which the IRS objected to the word "gay" in its name. From a first permanent home in a basement at 127B Prince Street it moved to a ground-floor gallery at 26 Wooster Street in 2006, and expanded in 2016-17. The New York State Board of Regents granted it museum status in 2011, it was accredited as a museum in 2016, and it is a member of the American Alliance of Museums.