‘PLAY IT LOUD: INSTRUMENTS OF ROCK & ROLL’ at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (through Oct. 1). Presented in collaboration with the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, this exhibition offers a vision of history in which the rock music that flowered in the 1960s and ’70s sits firmly at the center. The format of the rock band provides the structure of the show, with one room given over to the rhythm section and another showcasing “Guitar Gods.” Yet another room has a display highlighting the guitar’s destruction, with pieces of instruments trashed by Kurt Cobain and Pete Townshend. To the extent that it shifts focus toward the tools of the rock trade, the show is illuminating. Of particular interest is the room set aside for “Creating a Sound,” which focuses on the sonic possibility of electronics. The lighting in “Play It Loud” is dim, perhaps reflecting rock music as the sound of the night. Each individual instrument shines like a beacon, as if it’s catching the glint of an onstage spotlight. It makes the space between audience member and musician seem vast, but that doesn’t diminish the wonder of browsing the tools once used by pop royalty. (Mark Richardson)

212-535-7710, metmuseum.org

‘PUNK LUST: RAW PROVOCATION 1971-1985’ at the Museum of Sex (through Nov. 30). This show begins with imagery from the Velvet Underground: The 1963 paperback of that title, an exploration of what was then called deviant sexual behavior and gave the band its name, is one of the first objects on display. Working through photos, album art and fliers by artists like Iggy Pop, the New York Dolls, Patti Smith and, yes, the Sex Pistols, the exhibition demonstrates how punk offered a space for sexual expression outside the mainstream. In the story told by “Punk Lust,” much of it laid out in placards by the writer and musician Vivien Goldman, one of the show’s curators, graphic sexual imagery is a tool for shock that frightens away the straight world and offers comfort to those who remain inside. While some of the power dynamic is typical — underage groupies cavorting with rock stars — images from female, queer and nonbinary artists like Jayne County and the Slits make a strong case for sex as an essential source of punk liberation. (Richardson)

212-689-6337, museumofsex.com

‘SCENES FROM THE COLLECTION’ at the Jewish Museum (ongoing). After a surgical renovation to its grand pile on Fifth Avenue, the Jewish Museum has reopened its third-floor galleries with a rethought, refreshed display of its permanent collection, which intermingles 4,000 years of Judaica with modern and contemporary art by Jews and gentiles alike — Mark Rothko, Lee Krasner, Nan Goldin, Cindy Sherman and the excellent young Nigerian draftswoman Ruby Onyinyechi Amanze. The works are shown in a nimble, nonchronological suite of galleries, and some of its century-spanning juxtapositions are bracing; others feel reductive, even dilettantish. But always, the Jewish Museum conceives of art and religion as interlocking elements of a story of civilization, commendably open to new influences and new interpretations. (Farago)

212-423-3200, thejewishmuseum.org

STATUE OF LIBERTY MUSEUM on Liberty Island (ongoing). Security concerns stemming from the Sept. 11 attacks led the National Park Service to restrict the number of people who could go inside the Statue of Liberty’s massive stone pedestal and up to the crown. So the Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation wanted to offer something more for visitors who found the outdoor view less than satisfying: a stand-alone museum on the island that would welcome everyone who wanted to hear the story behind Lady Liberty. Going beyond the vague and often dubious ideal of American “liberty,” the museum’s displays highlight the doubts of black Americans and women who saw their personal liberties compromised on a daily basis in the 1880s, when the statue opened. These exhibits also spotlight a bit of history that is often forgotten: that the French creators intended the statue as a commemoration of the abolition of slavery in the United States. (Julia Jacobs) statueoflibertymuseum.org

‘STONEWALL 50 AT THE NEW-YORK HISTORICAL SOCIETY’ (through Dec. 1). For its Stonewall summer, the society offers a bouquet of three micro-shows: “Letting Loose and Fighting Back: L.G.B.T.Q. Nightlife Before and After Stonewall,” which closes on Sept. 22, is devoted the night life that thrived in places such as the 1950s lesbian bar called the Sea Colony and the gay male sex clubs like the Anvil and the Ramrod that sizzled in the 1970s. “By the Force of Our Presence: Highlights From the Lesbian Herstory Archives” documents the founding in 1974 — by Joan Nestle, Deborah Edel, Sahli Cavallero, Pamela Olin and Julia Stanley — of a compendious and still-growing register of lesbian culture. And “Say It Loud, Out and Proud: Fifty Years of Pride” turns a solo spotlight on charismatic individuals: Storme DeLarverie (1920-2014), Mother Flawless Sabrina/Jack Doroshow (1939-2017), Keith Haring (1958-90) and Rollerena Fairy Godmother. (Cotter)

212-873-3400, nyhistory.org

‘T. REX: THE ULTIMATE PREDATOR’ at the American Museum of Natural History (through Aug. 9, 2020). Everyone’s favorite 18,000-pound prehistoric killer gets the star treatment in this eye-opening exhibition, which presents the latest scientific research on T. rex and also introduces many other tyrannosaurs, some discovered only this century in China and Mongolia. T. rex evolved mainly during the Cretaceous period to have keen eyes, spindly arms and massive conical teeth, which packed a punch that has never been matched by any other creature; the dinosaur could even swallow whole bones, as affirmed here by a kid-friendly display of fossilized excrement. The show mixes 66-million-year-old teeth with the latest 3-D prints of dino bones, and also presents new models of T. rex as a baby, a juvenile and a full-grown annihilator. Turns out this most savage beast was covered with — believe it! — a soft coat of beige or white feathers. (Farago)

212-769-5100, amnh.org