Vasari Art Codex

article news schedule Jan 26, 2026 visibility 11 link 27 artists, 12 galleries

paint drippings art industry news jan 26 2740130

This week's art industry roundup covers major developments across auctions, galleries, and institutions. Christie's will auction René Magritte's 'Les grâces naturelles' (ca. 1961) as the star lot of its Art of the Surreal evening sale in London on March 5, with an estimate of £6.5–9.5 million. Zona Maco in Mexico City has announced 241 exhibitors for its 22nd edition, including a new section called Forma. The London Art Fair reported strong sales for British women abstract painters, while Vienna's Spark Art fair canceled its 2025 edition for a strategic pause until 2027. In gallery news, Amy Sherald signed with Creative Artists Agency, and several other artist-gallery representation changes were announced. The U.K. government pledged £1.5 billion to support cultural organizations from 2025 to 2030, and Tarek Atoui was named the next Turbine Hall commission artist at Tate Modern.

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trending_up market schedule Jul 2, 2025 visibility 4 link 8 artists, 3 galleries

princedale modern edward warburton 2661083

London-based art advisory Princedale Modern, founded by Edward Warburton in 2022, has marked its second anniversary amid significant shifts in the global art market. Warburton discusses the firm's growth, including scaling alongside the U.K. art market's rise to 18% of global share, and highlights attendance at major art fairs in Basel, New York, Miami, and Paris. He notes that while auction house sales at Christie's, Sotheby's, and Phillips have dropped nearly one-third and the overall market contracted by 12%, private sales have risen 14% and online sales remain strong at 17%.

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museum exhibitions schedule May 13, 2025 visibility 4 link 21 artists, 8 galleries

from artemisia gentileschi in paris to yoshitomo naras u k debut 9 must see european museum shows in 2025 2578017

Artnet News highlights nine must-see European museum exhibitions opening in 2025, spanning from Amsterdam to Zurich. Featured shows include Noah Davis's first U.K. museum survey at the Barbican in London, a dual Anselm Kiefer exhibition at the Van Gogh Museum and Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, Tracey Emin's first major Italian retrospective at Palazzo Strozzi in Florence, and a dedicated Artemisia Gentileschi show at Musée Jacquemart-André in Paris. Other notable exhibitions cover Marlene Dumas, Yayoi Kusama, and Yoshitomo Nara, among others.

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trending_up market schedule May 1, 2025 visibility 2 link 24 artists, 14 galleries

asia rising morgan stanley artnet 2030273

Artnet News and Morgan Stanley have collaborated on a report analyzing the art market's recovery after COVID-19, with a focus on Asia's emergence as a powerful engine. Using data from the Artnet Price Database and Artnet Analytics, the report shows that China (including Hong Kong) has become a dominant force, overtaking the U.S. and U.K. in fine-art auction sales. By 2020, China reclaimed the top-selling global fine-art auction market position, and as of mid-2021, it remains neck and neck with the U.S. The report also examines the role of Hong Kong, which has consistently contributed over 40% of China's fine-art sales, driven by its unique economic policies and integration into the global art market.

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person people schedule Jul 9, 2025 visibility 6 link 11 artists, 1 gallery

8 times david hockney broke rules 2638563

David Hockney, the legendary British artist, turns 88 on July 9, and Artnet News reflects on his seven-decade career of rule-breaking. The article highlights eight key moments of defiance, including his openness about his homosexuality before decriminalization in the U.K., his public smoking habit that led to a Paris Metro ad being pulled, and his controversial "Hockney-Falco thesis" arguing that Old Masters used optical tools like the camera lucida. Hockney currently ranks third on the Artnet Intelligence Report for best-selling and most bankable postwar artists, and his largest-ever exhibition is on view at the Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris.

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museum exhibitions schedule Jul 3, 2025 visibility 4 link 5 artists, 4 galleries

yoshitomo nara hayward gallery london 2025 2654470

The first U.K. public institutional solo exhibition of Japanese artist Yoshitomo Nara opened at London's Hayward Gallery in June 2025, featuring over 150 works spanning four decades. The retrospective includes paintings, drawings, sculptures, and installations, such as the large-scale painting "I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight" (2017), which sold for $12.3 million at Sotheby's Hong Kong. Notable visitors include artist Takashi Murakami and collector RM of BTS. The exhibition runs through August 31.

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article news schedule Jun 5, 2025 visibility 5 link 10 artists, 3 galleries

omai portrait joshua reynolds national portrait gallery fundraising campaign 2268648

The National Portrait Gallery (NPG) in London is in a last-minute push to raise £50 million ($60 million) to acquire Joshua Reynolds's 1776 portrait of Omai, a Polynesian visitor to Britain, before a temporary export ban expires on March 10. Despite raising roughly £25 million through a grassroots campaign involving public donations, a £2.5 million grant from the Art Fund, and £10 million from the National Heritage Memorial Fund, the NPG remains short of its goal and is reportedly in secret talks with the Getty Museum to jointly purchase the painting.

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article news schedule May 29, 2025 visibility 8 link 9 artists, 3 galleries

damien hirst will keep making artworks after dies 2650250

Damien Hirst, the 59-year-old British artist and one of the world's wealthiest living artists, has revealed a plan to continue creating artworks after his death. In an interview with the London Times, Hirst described a system of 200 notebooks, each representing one year after his demise, which will contain instructions for artworks that collectors can buy the rights to produce. These rights will be tradable certificates, and the works will be signed by his descendants. The scheme allows for back-dating of works, including a sculpture of a pig in formaldehyde conceived in 1991 but never made, which could be fabricated 145 years after his death and dated to 1991. This follows criticism Hirst faced in 2024 for assigning 1990s dates to formaldehyde sculptures actually produced recently, which his company Science Ltd. defended as conceptual artworks dated by conception.

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museum exhibitions schedule May 22, 2025 visibility 8 link 17 artists, 12 galleries

see all artworks unlimited 2024 art basel switzerland 2498466

Art Basel's Unlimited sector opened on Monday at the Messeplatz in Basel, featuring 70 large-scale projects selected from 93 galleries. Curated by Giovanni Carmine, the showcase includes works such as Agnes Denes' wheat field installation, Mario Ceroli's peace-themed flags, Christo's wrapped Volkswagen Beetle (priced at $4 million), and pieces by Lutz Bacher, Alex Da Corte, and Anna Uddenberg. VIP collectors and museum directors, including Paul Ettlinger and Chris Dercon, were among the first attendees, with galleries using early social media posts to signal status and generate buzz.

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museum exhibitions schedule Apr 20, 2026 visibility 19 link 17 artists, 6 galleries

Thomas J. Price’s Monumental Sculpture Anchors V&A East’s Opening in London

The V&A East Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum's second site in East London, opened to the public on April 18. The inaugural presentation features new site-specific commissions by artists Rene Matić, Carrie Mae Weems, and Tania Bruguera, with Thomas J. Price's monumental sculpture serving as a key anchor piece for the new institution.

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museum exhibitions schedule Jun 9, 2025 visibility 5 link 13 artists, 1 gallery

bona de mandiargues 2646612

The article profiles Bona de Mandiargues, an overlooked Italian Surrealist artist whose work is finally gaining international recognition. Her major debut occurred at the 2024 Venice Biennale, and her first U.K. solo show is now on view at Alison Jacques gallery in London through June 28. The exhibition focuses on her mature period (1975–1995), featuring dark, erotic, and occult-inspired collages and assemblages that challenge gender norms.

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museum exhibitions schedule Jun 6, 2025 visibility 4 link 6 artists, 4 galleries

do ho suh tate 2647202

Artist Do Ho Suh presents his first solo exhibition at London's Tate Modern in two decades, titled "The Genesis Exhibition: Do Ho Suh: Walk the House." The show features his signature translucent fabric architectural sculptures, including the newly created installation "Nest/s" (2024), a collection of 1:1 scale replicas of spaces where Suh has lived and worked across Seoul, New York, London, and Berlin. The exhibition explores themes of home, memory, and migration, drawing from Suh's own experiences moving from Seoul to New York and later London.

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museum exhibitions schedule Mar 23, 2026 visibility 9 link 2 artists, 1 gallery

Churchill Landscape Gets First U.K. Showing in Exhibition Tracing His Artistic Life

An exhibition titled "Churchill the Artist" has opened at Chartwell, Winston Churchill's former home in Kent, England. The show features personal artifacts like his paint-spattered Savile Row overalls and spectacles, alongside paintings, including the first U.K. display of his work "Quiet Waters," a gift to his friend Lord Beaverbrook.

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article news schedule Jan 9, 2026 visibility 3 link 4 artists, 1 gallery

can you insure a national treasure bayeux tapestry loan sparks 1 1 billion debate 2735912

France's historic loan of the Bayeux Tapestry to the British Museum has sparked controversy over the proposed £800 million ($1.1 billion) insurance cover, which critics argue is unsuitable for such a fragile, 950-year-old textile. Art historians and conservators have raised concerns that the U.K.'s Government Indemnity Scheme does not cover damage from preexisting conditions or inherent vice, and that no sum can adequately insure an irreplaceable heritage object. A French petition calling on President Emmanuel Macron to cancel the loan has garnered over 75,000 signatures, but the U.K. government has proceeded with plans, including a practice "dry run" using a facsimile and a custom crate designed to minimize vibrations.

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trending_up market schedule Jul 3, 2025 visibility 6 link 6 artists, 2 galleries

turner rediscovered masterpiece auction 2653461

A rediscovered oil painting by J.M.W. Turner, titled *The Rising Squall, Hot Wells, from St Vincent’s Rock, Bristol*, sold for £1.9 million ($2.6 million) at Sotheby’s Old Masters and 19th Century Paintings evening auction in London—more than six times its high estimate. The work, painted in 1792 when Turner was 17, had been misattributed and sold for just $506 at a Dreweatts auction the previous year. After cleaning revealed Turner’s signature, scholars confirmed its authenticity, and it was identified as Turner’s first publicly exhibited oil painting, exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1793. The winning bidder was a private collector in the U.K., outbidding Bristol Museum and Art Gallery, which had raised over £100,000 from donors in a failed attempt to acquire the work.

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museum exhibitions schedule Jun 27, 2025 visibility 5 link 11 artists, 1 gallery

marie antoinette style exhibition va 2658788

London's V&A Museum will open "Marie Antoinette Style" in September, the first U.K. exhibition focused on the French queen's influence on fashion and design. Featuring 250 objects including historical artifacts from Versailles, court dresses, jewels, and contemporary pieces, the show explores how Marie Antoinette's lavish personal style—from pastel gowns and towering wigs to rococo interiors—reshaped 18th-century aesthetics and continues to inspire artists and designers like Alexander McQueen and Sofia Coppola. The exhibition is sponsored by shoemaker Manolo Blahnik and includes immersive scent recreations of the queen's favorite perfume.

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article news schedule Jun 25, 2025 visibility 6 link 7 artists, 2 galleries

emily sargent 2215370

The article reveals that Emily Sargent (1857–1936), sister of famed portraitist John Singer Sargent, was a dedicated and original watercolorist whose extensive body of work remained hidden for decades. In 1998, a family member discovered a trunk containing 440 of her watercolors, and after nearly 25 years, the Sargent family has begun donating these works to major museums in the U.S. and U.K., including the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (45 works), the Tate, London (29), the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. (24), the Metropolitan Museum of Art (22), and the Brooklyn Museum (20).

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trending_up market schedule Jun 5, 2025 visibility 5 link 5 artists, 1 gallery

ashmolean museum acquires fra angelico painting 2566049

The Ashmolean Museum in Oxford has raised $4.48 million ($5.8 million) to acquire Fra Angelico's early Renaissance painting "The Crucifixion with the Virgin, Saint John the Evangelist, and the Magdalen" (1420s). The work had been in a private British collection for two centuries and was nearly sold to a foreign buyer until the U.K. government imposed an export deferral in January 2024, giving time for a domestic buyer to step in. The acquisition was completed via a private treaty sale at a discounted price, funded by over 50 donors including chairman Lord Lupton, the National Heritage Memorial Fund, Art Fund, and the Headley Trust.

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museum exhibitions schedule May 7, 2025 visibility 2 link 4 artists, 1 gallery

diedrick brackens 2637723

Diedrick Brackens, a Los Angeles-based artist known for his woven tapestries, is experiencing a major career moment in 2025. The Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) has opened a large-scale solo exhibition titled "The Shape of Survival" (on view through July 7), while another solo show, "Woven Stories," debuted at the Holburne Museum in Bath, England, marking his U.K. debut. Additionally, his works are featured in group shows at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and Dallas Contemporary. Brackens's tapestries feature silhouetted figures against abstracted backgrounds, and his recent works explore themes of autobiography, history, and mythology, using moody dusk hues to reflect his personal journey from the American South to the West.

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person people schedule Dec 12, 2025 source 2 sources visibility 10 link 12 artists

nnena kalu turner prize winner 2025 2726186

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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museum exhibitions schedule Apr 24, 2026 visibility 19 link 2 artists, 1 gallery

Thom Yorke and Stanley Donwood Plot a Mysterious Art Show in Venice

Musician Thom Yorke and artist Stanley Donwood will present a new exhibition titled “No Go Elevator (not without no keycard)” in a small gallery in Venice next month, coinciding with the Venice Biennale. The show marks their first showcase outside the U.K. and features a mix of drawings and a large painting created in London this year, with cryptic textual components and no unifying theme, according to the artists.

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article news schedule May 2, 2025 visibility 2 link 1 artist, 1 gallery

the ashes tudor lodge wall paintings 2635562

Rare 16th-century wall paintings depicting fantastical beasts, heraldic rabbits, and Grotesque heads have been uncovered at the Ashes, a Tudor hunting lodge in Inglewood Forest, Cumbria, U.K. Built in the 1560s during Elizabeth I's reign, the two-story building originally housed William Simpson, a bailiff of Castle Sowerby Manor. The paintings, created using the secco technique on dry plaster, were found in stages—first on the second story in the 1970s, then on the ground floor during excavations in the 2010s and 2020s. The most recent discoveries, made by owners Jen and Richard Arkell, reveal elaborate decorative panels likely inspired by textile designs, reflecting the cosmopolitan tastes of the period.

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museum exhibitions schedule May 1, 2026 visibility 10 link 11 artists, 1 gallery

Jarvis Cocker Is Bringing His Eclectic Eye to the Hepworth Wakefield

Musician Jarvis Cocker and his wife, creative consultant Kim Sion, will curate an exhibition titled “The Hodge Podge” at the Hepworth Wakefield in the U.K., opening in May 2027. The show will feature artworks selected by the couple that challenge conventional definitions of art, spanning diverse media and time periods, with artists including Peter Doig, Barbara Hepworth, Jeremy Deller, and Emma Kunz. The exhibition will be bookended by an immersive Dreamachine, a 1959 light-art device by Brion Gysin and Ian Sommerville. Cocker and Sion have outlined their curatorial philosophy in a Hodge Podge Manifesto, celebrating beauty in chaos and disorder.

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trending_up market schedule May 1, 2025 source 2 sources visibility 1 link 9 artists, 1 gallery

state of the art market an analysis of global auction sales in the first five months of 2022 2136208

Artnet News, in collaboration with Morgan Stanley and the Artnet Price Database, analyzed global auction sales from January through May 20 for the years 2018 to 2022. The total auction sales for the first five months of 2022 reached $5.7 billion, just barely exceeding the previous high set in 2018. The sell-through rate was 73.4%, the second highest in the period examined. The average price of a work sold surged 180% from 2020 and 26% from 2021, driven by pent-up supply of high-value works. Sales of works priced at $10 million and above grew nearly 50% year-over-year, fueled by major consignments from the estates of Thomas and Doris Ammann, Anne Bass, and Harry and Linda Macklowe. Meanwhile, sales of works under $10,000 increased 43% since 2018, partly due to the rise of online auctions during the pandemic.

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article news schedule Dec 15, 2025 visibility 6 link 3 artists, 1 gallery

museum workers tate strike met union 2720847

Workers at two major museums, the Tate in the U.K. and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, are taking labor action to demand higher wages and job security. Over 150 Tate staff from the PCS Tate United union went on strike across four locations, with picketing at Tate Britain, Tate Modern, and Tate Liverpool, disrupting the opening of the exhibition "Turner and Constable: Rivals and Originals." Meanwhile, nearly 1,000 employees at the Met have petitioned the National Labor Relations Board for a union election, which would be one of the largest museum unions in the U.S.

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article news schedule Dec 12, 2025 visibility 5 link 5 artists, 1 gallery

blenheim palace restoration graffiti 2726485

Conservators at Blenheim Palace in the U.K. have discovered a mysterious dossier of names and phrases scratched into the ceilings of the Great Hall and Saloon by past workers, dating back to the 19th century. The graffiti was found during a £12 million ($15.9 million) restoration project led by OPUS Conservation, funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund and the Blenheim Foundation, which is also repairing paintings by Baroque artists James Thornhill and Louis Laguerre. The palace is now asking the public for help identifying the individuals behind the markings, which include names like "W Smith 1888" and "T Harwood Plasterer 1843."

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trending_up market schedule Feb 23, 2026 visibility 6 link 4 artists, 4 galleries

gulf art market 2740860

The Gulf region is rapidly transforming into a primary axis for the international art trade, marked by the upcoming debut of Art Basel Qatar and the rebranding of Abu Dhabi Art as a Frieze event. While state-led museum projects have long dominated headlines, a surge of commercial activity is now taking hold as blue-chip galleries like Pace and David Zwirner join local stalwarts. This expansion comes at a strategic time as traditional markets in the U.S., U.K., and China face contraction.

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article news schedule Jan 16, 2026 visibility 9 link 3 artists

norman foster time capsule america 250 2737891

A time capsule designed by British architect Norman Foster has been buried in Washington D.C. to mark the 250th anniversary of American independence. The titanium box features 13 facets and stars representing the original colonies, and contains letters from King Charles III and President Donald Trump, along with soil from George Washington's ancestral home. It was presented by Virginia governor Glenn Youngkin and U.K. officials to the U.S. Department of Interior, and is not to be opened until July 4, 2276.

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article news schedule Jan 12, 2026 visibility 4 link 2 artists, 2 galleries

hauser and wirth russia sanctions trial 2736373

Hauser & Wirth and art shipping company Artay Rauchwerger Solomons face trial over charges of evading U.K. sanctions by allegedly making artist George Condo's 2021 work on paper, *Escape from Humanity*, available to a person connected with Russia in 2022. The U.K. Crown Prosecution Service brought the charge in November, and a judge has scheduled a 10-day trial for January 2028, with a hearing on May 5, 2026, for arraignment. Hauser & Wirth has stated it will plead not guilty, while the shipping firm, which went into voluntary liquidation in April 2024, did not respond to requests for comment.

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museum exhibitions schedule Jan 12, 2026 visibility 3 link 5 artists

emily sargent exhibition metropolitan museum of art 2660505

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York is hosting "Emily Sargent: Portrait of a Family," its first exhibition of watercolors by Emily Sargent (1857–1936), the younger sister of famed portraitist John Singer Sargent. The works were rediscovered after a forgotten trunk of hundreds of paintings was found in storage by relatives, and in 2022, the family donated 26 pieces across seven museums in the U.S. and U.K. The show features about 20 of the Met's received works, rotating delicate pieces midway through its run, and includes a watercolor co-created by Emily and John.

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