Art News. Vasari Codex

person people schedule Dec 12, 2025 source 2 sources visibility 28 link 13 artists, 2 galleries

nnena kalu turner prize winner 2025

Nnena Kalu, a Glasgow-born, London-based artist known for her charged abstract works driven by rhythmic repetition, has won the 2025 Turner Prize, the U.K.'s top award for contemporary art. The announcement was made at a ceremony at Bradford Grammar School, with Kalu receiving £25,000 ($33,000) for her presentation at Bradford's Cartwright Hall Art Gallery, featuring a colorful installation of suspended bundles made from found materials like VHS tape, fabric, rope, and paper. Kalu, born in 1966, is the first learning disabled artist to be nominated for and win the Turner Prize, marking a historic milestone.

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person people schedule Apr 10, 2026 visibility 27 link 5 artists, 3 galleries

ArtReview Podcast | Episode 5: Rene Matić

Artist Rene Matić discusses their multidisciplinary practice and cultural influences in the latest episode of the ArtReview Podcast. The conversation explores Matić’s background as a second-generation skinhead of St Lucian heritage, their status as the youngest-ever Turner Prize nominee, and the upcoming commission for the grand opening of the V&A East Museum in April 2026.

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person people schedule Apr 9, 2026 source 4 sources visibility 41 link 9 artists

Hirshhorn Director Melissa Chiu Departs to Lead Guggenheim Museum

Melissa Chiu is stepping down as director of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden after a decade-long tenure to lead the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York. Appointed by Guggenheim Foundation CEO Mariët Westermann, Chiu will officially assume her new role on September 1, while deputy director Aaron Seeto takes the interim helm at the Hirshhorn.

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person people schedule Apr 9, 2026 visibility 71 link 9 artists

Hirshhorn Museum Director Melissa Chiu Leaves for Guggenheim, Another Smithsonian Departure

Melissa Chiu has been appointed as the new director of the Guggenheim Museum in New York, departing her long-standing role at the Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. Starting September 1, Chiu will report to Mariët Westermann, CEO of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, effectively splitting the leadership responsibilities previously held by Richard Armstrong. During her decade-long tenure at the Hirshhorn, Chiu was known for staging massive blockbuster exhibitions, including the record-breaking Yayoi Kusama "Infinity Mirror Rooms" show, though she also faced criticism for commercial ventures like a reality TV competition.

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person people schedule Oct 10, 2025 source 2 sources visibility 27 link 25 artists, 2 galleries

Artists Gala Porras-Kim, Jeremy Frey and Tuan Andrew Nguyen among winners of 2025 MacArthur ‘genius grants'

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation has announced its 2025 cohort of MacArthur Fellows, awarding 27 recipients—including visual artists Gala Porras-Kim, Jeremy Frey, Matt Black, Garrett Bradley, Tonika Lewis Johnson, and Tuan Andrew Nguyen—with $800,000 each over five years. The artists span conceptual institutional critique, Indigenous basketry, documentary photography, film, and social practice, with several currently holding major solo exhibitions or biennial features.

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person people schedule May 27, 2026 visibility 3 link 6 artists

$50,000 Driskell Prize Goes to Cheryl Finley of Spelman College

Cheryl Finley, the director of visual arts and culture at Spelman College and head of the Atlanta University Center Art History + Curatorial Studies Collective, has been awarded the 2025 David C. Driskell Prize by Atlanta’s High Museum of Art. The prize, established in 2005, includes $50,000 and honors figures who have made significant contributions to African American art and art history. Past recipients include Alison Saar, Naomi Beckwith, Amy Sherald, Mark Bradford, and Rashid Johnson. Finley has led the AUC Art Collective since 2019, co-organized the “Black Portraiture[s]” academic convening since 2013, and authored books such as Committed to Memory: The Art of the Slave Ship Icon.

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person people schedule May 22, 2026 visibility 9 link 38 artists

Serralves museum director steps down

Philippe Vergne, the French curator who has served as director of the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art in Porto since 2019, will step down at the end of July 2026 at his own request. The Serralves Foundation announced that Vergne will continue contributing to exhibition curation until his departure, and the search for a new director will begin immediately. During his tenure, the museum presented major exhibitions of artists including Alexander Calder, Joan Miró, Cindy Sherman, Mark Bradford, and Maurizio Cattelan, and expanded its space with the Álvaro Siza Wing.

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person people schedule Oct 31, 2025 visibility 15 link 5 artists

art collector pamela joyner nevada

Pamela Joyner, a prominent art collector and patron, shares a first look inside her Lake Tahoe home in Reno, Nevada, which houses her formidable collection of 20th- and 21st-century abstraction by Black artists. The collection, co-owned with her husband Fred Giuffrida, includes works by Mark Bradford, Jack Whitten, Frank Bowling, and Charles Gaines, and was shaped by Joyner's childhood visits to the Art Institute of Chicago. Joyner, a Harvard Business School graduate and founder of Avid Partners, discusses her collecting philosophy, the strategic approach she applies from her business career, and her advice for new collectors.

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person people schedule Dec 11, 2025 visibility 28 link 16 artists, 1 gallery

Groundbreaking Achievement: 2025 Turner Prize Goes to Nnena Kalu, First Artist With Learning Disability to Win Prestigious Award

London-based artist Nnena Kalu (b. 1966) won the Turner Prize 2025 at a ceremony in Bradford on December 9, becoming the first artist with a learning disability to receive the prestigious award since its inception in 1984. Kalu’s practice spans sculpture, installation, and works on paper, featuring cocoon-like hanging sculptures made from unconventional materials like masking tape and VHS ribbon, as well as large-scale drawings of spiraling vortexes. She was selected from a shortlist that included Rene Matić, Mohammed Sami, and Zadie Xa, and was recognized for her presentation in the group exhibition “Conversations” at the Walker Art Gallery and her work at Manifesta 15 in Barcelona. The prize includes a £25,000 award.

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person people schedule Dec 9, 2025 visibility 26 link 7 artists, 1 gallery

Nnena Kalu wins the 2025 Turner Prize

Scottish artist Nnena Kalu has won the 2025 Turner Prize, becoming the first learning-disabled person to receive the prestigious award. Her winning work includes suspended sculptures bound with rope and tape, along with swirling vortex drawings, currently on display at Cartwright Hall Art Gallery in Bradford as part of the UK City of Culture festival. Kalu, who is autistic and has limited verbal communication, was nominated for her contributions to the Conversations exhibition at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool and for her work Hanging Sculpture 1 to 10 at Manifesta 15 in Barcelona. The jury, chaired by Tate Britain director Alex Farquharson, praised the visual and aesthetic quality of her abstract art, noting its powerful presence and enigmatic expressiveness.

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person people schedule Nov 12, 2025 visibility 21 link 16 artists

The Interview: Thelma Golden

Thelma Golden, director and chief curator of the Studio Museum in Harlem, is interviewed ahead of the museum's reopening in a new Adjaye Associates-designed building following a $300 million capital campaign. Golden reflects on her career, including curating the politically charged 1993 Whitney Biennial and the landmark exhibition "Black Male: Representations of Masculinity in Contemporary American Art" (1994–95), as well as her influential 2001 show "Freestyle," which introduced the concept of "post-Black" art. The article also highlights the museum's first exhibition in the new building, focusing on artist Tom Lloyd, whose work was featured in the museum's inaugural show in 1968.

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person people schedule May 13, 2025 visibility 20 link 10 artists

Artist Alison Saar wins High Museum’s 20th annual Driskell Prize

Alison Saar, a Los Angeles-based artist known for sculptures exploring Black American experience through historic and symbolic imagery, has won the 20th edition of the David C. Driskell Prize from the High Museum of Art in Atlanta. The annual prize, which alternates between honoring an artist and a curator, comes with $50,000 and was announced during a reception at the Fifth Avenue Hotel in New York on 9 May. Saar succeeds 2024 winner Naomi Beckwith, and past honorees include Ebony G. Patterson, Amy Sherald, Mark Bradford, and Rashid Johnson.

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person people schedule Mar 16, 2026 visibility 15

Meet the Woman Who Made Museums More Accessible

Lorena Bradford, the first head of Accessible Programs at the National Gallery of Art, has left the institution after pioneering numerous initiatives to make museums more inclusive. Her work included launching American Sign Language tours, creating programs for individuals with memory loss, and spearheading the Short Description Project to provide detailed online artwork descriptions.

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