Guggenheim ‘did not authorize’ promotion of Beyoncé Cowboy Carter at museum

Promotions for Beyoncé’s next concert Cowboy Carter The album made its way to New York museums Wednesday night, nearly a week before its highly anticipated release.

Advertisements for the album, scheduled for release March 29, were shown at several museums, including the Guggenheim Museum, the Whitney Museum, the New Museum, and the Museum of Art and Design.

However, Guggenheim shared in a statement with ARTnews that the institution “was not informed and did not authorize this activation. However, we invite the public – including Beyoncé and her devoted fans – to visit the museum from May 16-20 when we will feature projections by artist Jenny Holzer on the facade of our iconic building to celebrate the opening of its grand exposure.

The promotion posted outside the Guggenheim Museum included the phrases “This is not a country album. This is a “Beyoncé” album, along with the title and release date of the album. The lines reference the Grammy-winning singer’s Instagram post earlier this week, in which she spoke candidly about what led to the creation of Act II: Cowboy Carter afterward, she previously didn’t feel “welcomed” into the country music genre.

On Wednesday, Beyoncé hinted at promotions for the new album by posting contact details for the Guggenheim Museum on her Instagram Story. The other museums would have had the Cowboy Carter Cover image projected onto the exterior of their buildings.

Fans quickly took to social media to share photos of the ads, which Guggenheim also acknowledged early Thursday morning by sharing a post on her official Instagram account and adding, “Hey @beyonce! (bee emoji).

Some fans also speculated that the album screening outside the Guggenheim Museum was related to its current exhibition titled “Going Dark: the contemporary figure at the limit of visibility”, which features “more than 100 works by a group of 28 artists, the majority of whom are black and more than half of whom are women.”

Earlier this week, another famous New York building — The empire state building – also signaled that he was ready for Cowboy Carter by responding to Beyoncé’s social media promotion with a photoshopped cowboy hat atop the Empire State Building.

Act II: Cowboy Carter is a continuation of his 2022 record album Renaissance.