The Whitney Museum of American Art - known informally as the "Whitney" - is an art museum located in Manhattan. It was founded in 1931 by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (1875-1942), a wealthy and prominent American socialite and art patron after whom the museum is named. The Whitney focuses on 20th- and 21st-century American art. Its permanent collection comprises more than 21,000 paintings, sculptures, drawings, prints, photographs, films, videos, and artifacts of new media by more than 3,000 artists.
Move to the Upper East Side
In 1961, the museum began seeking a site for a larger building. The Whitney settled in 1966 at the southeast corner of Madison Avenue at 75th Street in Manhattan's Upper East Side. The building, planned and built 1963-1966 by Marcel Breuer and Hamilton P. Smith in a distinctively modern style, is easily distinguished from the neighboring townhouses by its staircase facade made from granite stones and its external upside-down windows. In 1967, Mauricio Lasansky showed The Nazi Drawings. The exhibition traveled to the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, where they appeared with shows by Louise Nevelson and Andrew Wyeth as the first exhibits installed in the new museum.  The institution grappled with space problems for decades. From 1973 to 1983 the Whitney operated its first branch at 55 Water Street, in a building owned by Harold Uris who gave the museum a lease for $1 a year. In 1983 Philip Morris installed a Whitney branch in the lobby of its Park Avenue headquarters. In 1981 the museum opened an exhibition space in Stamford, Connecticut, that was housed in Champion International Corporation. In the late 1980s, the Whitney entered into arrangements with Park Tower Realty, I.B.M. and The Equitable Life Assurance Society of the United States, setting up satellite museums with rotating exhibitions in the lobbies of their buildings. Each museum had its own director, and all plans were to be approved by a Whitney committee.  The institution has tried to expand its landmark building and in 1978 commissioned UK architects Derek Walker and Norman Foster to design a tall tower alongside, the first of several proposals from leading architects. But each time the effort was abandoned, either because of the cost or the design or both. In order to secure additional space for the museum's collections, then-director Thomas N. Armstrong III developed plans for a 10-story, $37.5-million addition to the Whitney's main building. The proposed addition, designed by Michael Graves and announced in 1985, drew immediate opposition. Graves had proposed demolishing the flanking brownstones down to the East 74th Street corner for a complementary addition. After the project gradually lost the support of many of the museum's trustees, the plans were dropped in 1989. Between 1995 and 1998, the building underwent a renovation and addition by Richard Gluckman. In 2001, Rem Koolhaas was commissioned to submit two designs for a $200 million expansion; plans were dropped again in 2003, causing director Maxwell L. Anderson to resign. New York restaurateur Danny Meyer opened Untitled, a restaurant in the museum in March 2011. The space was designed by the Rockwell Group.

Q: what happened in 1961
A: In 1961, the museum began seeking a site for a larger building.

Q: were they able to get
A: The Whitney settled in 1966 at the southeast corner of Madison Avenue at 75th Street in Manhattan's Upper East Side.

Q: any notable person in the article
A: shows by Louise Nevelson and Andrew Wyeth as the first exhibits installed in the new museum.

Q: How is the new building better than the old
A: distinctively modern style, is easily distinguished from the neighboring townhouses by its staircase facade made from granite stones and its external upside-down windows.

Q: who built the new musuem
A: The building, planned and built 1963-1966 by Marcel Breuer and Hamilton P. Smith

Q: Any intresting thing
A: The institution grappled with space problems for decades.
does the musuem has branch
From 1973 to 1983 the Whitney operated its first branch at 55 Water Street,
From 1973 to 1983 the Whitney operated its first branch at 55 Water Street,