NEW YORK, NY.- The Aperture Foundation, a nonprofit organization founded in 1952 by a group of prominent photographers, has announced that it purchased a new headquarters for $8.95 million. The group will occupy the lower two floors of a Romanesque Revival building at 380 Columbus Ave. on the Upper West Side, across the street from the American Museum of Natural History.

Now occupying fourth-floor rented quarters in Chelsea, Aperture said Thursday that it would relocate in summer 2024, after a renovation of the space’s 10,000 square feet by the Levenbetts architecture firm. A ground-floor entrance and windows will offer greater visibility to its exhibitions, bookstore and public programming, while another level will provide additional offices for administrative and publication workers.

“We looked at hundreds of properties,” said Sarah Meister, Aperture’s executive director. “This had so many of the elements we had been hoping for — great accessibility and visibility, flooded with light, and a space that had a real historic character that resonated with my sense of the importance of Aperture’s history.”

The organization’s founders include Minor White, Dorothea Lange and Ansel Adams. Aperture publishes books and an eponymous quarterly magazine devoted to the discussion and promotion of photography. It also runs a website, educational programming for public schools and a traveling exhibition program.

“Photography can encourage a tolerance of the new, and it rewards careful looking and thinking, as a model for society,” Meister said. “Aperture could be to photography what Kleenex is to facial tissue, but to do that, we have to find a way that opens us up to the public.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.