The International Center of Photography, which is trying to redefine itself in an image-saturated digital era and attract a new generation of benefactors, has decided to buy a building on the Bowery near the New Museum and relocate there next year, after its longtime lease in Midtown ends.

The center opened its final exhibition, “Sebastião Salgado: Genesis,” last week in its space on 43rd Street at Avenue of the Americas. The crowd that packed the show’s opening often seemed less occupied with that Brazilian photographer’s giant images of the earth’s threatened landscapes than with the center’s own future, which has been in limbo since an announcement in March that it would leave its Midtown home but had not yet found a new one.

Widely regarded as one of the most innovative and experimental institutions for photography in the world, the center has struggled at times to attract visitors and financial support proportionate to its critical standing.

Mark Lubell, who took over as executive director last year, said that as the center faced leaving Midtown he and other officials had considered several possible new locations, among them Chelsea and some Brooklyn neighborhoods. (The center has operated rent-free for more than 20 years in a building owned by the Durst Organization, which now has new plans for the center’s space.)