Director Steven Soderbergh is set to release 'The Christophers', a new film centered on the London art world starring Ian McKellen and Michaela Coel. The plot follows a faded 1960s Pop Art star whose estranged children hire a former art forger to secretly complete his unfinished canvases to secure a future inheritance. Following its premiere at the Toronto Film Festival, the movie is scheduled for a theatrical release in April.
Six national nonprofit organizations have filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration, alleging the illegal censorship and removal of educational signage across U.S. national parks. The legal challenge, filed in the U.S. District Court of Massachusetts, targets the Department of the Interior and the National Park Service for stripping displays related to climate change, slavery, and the history of marginalized groups. The plaintiffs argue these actions violate federal mandates requiring parks to reflect diverse cultural backgrounds and current scientific research.
The Trump administration removed the Pride flag from the flagpole at the Stonewall National Monument in New York City, a site commemorating the birth of the modern LGBTQ+ rights movement. The action, reportedly carried out by the National Park Service, followed a memo restricting "non-agency" flags at federal sites.
Gregory Crewdson, known for his meticulously staged photographs of small-town America, has partnered with the fashion brand Aritzia for its Artistic License Series. The collaboration features Crewdson's images on limited-edition shopping bags, in stores, and online, accompanied by an exhibition during Frieze Week in Los Angeles. The series has previously worked with photographers like Juergen Teller, Ryan McGinley, and Harley Weir. In an interview, Crewdson discusses his influences, including filmmakers David Lynch and Steven Spielberg, and the challenges of shooting a rain scene when a real storm interrupted the set.
Ann Rower's novel "Lee & Elaine," originally published in 2002 by Serpent's Tail, is being reissued next month by Semiotext(e). The autofictional work follows a narrator—a lightly fictionalized version of Rower—who, after learning of the death of her friend, artist Hannah Wilke, becomes obsessed with the graves of Lee Krasner and Elaine de Kooning at Green River Cemetery. The narrator imagines these two women, known primarily as wives of famous male painters, as secret lovers or comrades, and attempts to write a joint biography that doubles as a journey of self-discovery.
Toteme and CULTURED hosted a pre-Frieze week cocktail party at Toteme's Melrose Avenue flagship in West Hollywood. The intimate sunset gathering featured Ruinart champagne, Grey Goose martinis, and a curated collection of artworks by Swedish women artists, including pieces by Barbro Bäckström, Lisa Larson, and Alina Chaiderov. Guests included fashion tastemakers, arts patrons, interior designers, dealers, artists, and models, such as Christine Wuerfel-Stauss, Michelle Rubell, Yana Peel, Emma Webster, and Esther Kim Varet.
CULTURED and Aritzia co-hosted a dinner party at the former Fred Segal store on Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles during Frieze Week. The event celebrated Aritzia's Artistic License series, featuring photographer Gregory Crewdson, whose work appears on shopping bags and in stores. Guests included Aritzia CEO Jennifer Wong, CULTURED Editor-in-Chief Sarah Harrelson, artists Chloe Wise and Maya Man, curator Essence Harden, and others from the art and fashion worlds. The evening featured a multi-course meal, Krug champagne, and copies of CULTURED's Entertainers Issue.
Dior has launched the 10th edition of its Lady Art initiative, inviting a new roster of artists to reimagine the iconic Lady Dior handbag. The project, which began nearly a decade ago, has previously featured artists like Judy Chicago, Jack Pierson, and Mickalene Thomas. This year's participants include Jessica Cannon and Ju Ting, who discuss their creative processes, material explorations, and the dialogue between their artistic practices and Dior's heritage. The handbags incorporate sculpted tulle, pleated silk, stones, glass beads, and pearlized elements, blending fine art with fashion.
Artists Rhett Tsai and Chang-Ching Su have presented tandem projects at Chicago's Watershed Art & Ecology, inspired by a joint research trip to fishing villages on China's Huangqi Peninsula. Their works explore the practice of light-lure fishing, with Su creating photographic exposures using the green LED lights from squid-fishing boats and translating satellite fishing data into sculptural installations. Tsai's contributions include CGI films and a VR video that depict the rhythms and social realities of coastal communities, focusing on the Tanka boat-dwelling people.
The Racine Art Museum has announced the winners of its annual PEEPS art exhibition, a community-focused event where artists create works using the iconic marshmallow candy. The exhibition, which features these whimsical, edible-art entries, is now open to the public and will run through April 18.
Bodenrader in Chicago is currently hosting a group exhibition titled "Ethical Managers Make Their Own Rules," featuring works by Jessica Diamond, Hélène Fauquet, and Jason Hirata. The exhibition, which runs from March 21 through May 2, 2026, presents a curated selection of contemporary works documented through an extensive digital archive of installation views.
The Preservation Society of Newport County is hosting "Full Circle" at the Rosecliff mansion, an exhibition that revisits the landmark 1974 outdoor sculpture show "Monumenta." The current display features scale models, preparatory drawings, and archival photographs of works by modern masters such as Claes Oldenburg, Alexander Calder, and Willem de Kooning. A significant portion of the show is dedicated to Richard Fleischner, whose site-specific earthwork "Sod Maze" remains the only original piece from the 1974 project still standing in its original Newport location.
Later this month, the interactive art installation "The Clearing" by Kingston artists Marney McDiarmid and Clelia Scala will be displayed outside the Rideau Heights Community Centre. The installation, housed in a transformed shipping container, offers a calm, nature-inspired space for reflection and includes a poem by Sadiqa de Meijer, sound design by Matt Rogalsky, and an exterior mural by Lee Stewart. Visitors are invited to contribute personal papers to a shredder, allowing the exhibition to evolve over time. The installation runs from May 20 to May 31, 2026, with scheduled hours including an open house with the artists on May 29.
DePaul Art Museum (DPAM) in Chicago is presenting the exhibition "For Chicago, With Chicago," running from May 21-31, 2026. The show features works from the museum's collection, including pieces by Melissa Ann Pinney, Josh Dihle, and Claudio Dicochea, and was curated with input from DePaul students, staff, alumni, and the public. The exhibition is organized by DPAM interns, fellows, and delegates, highlighting a collaborative, community-driven approach.
The Racine Art Museum has announced the winners of its 2026 RAM PEEPS Brand Art Exhibition, a popular annual competition featuring dioramas and sculptures made from marshmallow Peeps. Top honors in the adult division went to Julie Palmer for "Happy Birthday, PEEP Jr.," while Charlotte Barnes took first place in the youth category for "Peep Scouts Go Camping." The exhibition showcases a wide range of creative interpretations, including references to art history like "Peep Haring" and the "Peepeux Tapestry."
On August 27, the Ackland Art Museum at the University of North Carolina hosted a panel titled "Artist Conversation: Radical Ceramicists in North Carolina," featuring three female ceramicists: Hitomi Shibata, Isys Hennigar, and Jessica Dupuis. The event was part of programming around the museum's exhibition "Radical Clay," which highlights work by female Japanese ceramicists. Panelists discussed the historical marginalization of women in ceramics—Shibata noted that in 1990s Japan, studios refused to hire women, while Hennigar explained that until the early 20th century in North Carolina, female artists were only allowed to be decorators, not master ceramicists. The conversation also explored how ceramic pieces reflect their geographic origins and the importance of local artistic communities, such as Seagrove, N.C., which has the largest community of potters in the U.S.
The Greater Washington region launches "Women Artists of the DMV," the largest curated fine arts exhibition ever dedicated to contemporary female artists in the United States. Featuring more than 500 artists across Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, D.C., the landmark survey spans 16 galleries and cultural venues from late August through January 2026, with the American University Museum at the Katzen Arts Center serving as the central hub. Curated by Florencio Lennox Campello, the exhibition highlights both established and emerging voices across genres including painting, sculpture, glasswork, textiles, and public art, with strong representation from Southern Maryland and Prince George's County.
The Vincent Price Art Museum is hosting 'Before You Now: Capturing the Self in Portraiture,' an exhibition drawn from LACMA's collection that explores self-portraiture through over 50 contemporary American artists working in photography, prints, drawings, video, and installation. The show includes a video series featuring artists like Jessica Wimbley, who discusses her work 'Cabinet Portrait: Wife Portrait' (2022), a large-scale reimagining of a 19th-century cabinet card bridal portrait that centers Blackness in American material culture by depicting herself in a non-traditional black wedding dress. The exhibition runs through August 30, 2025, with a related collage workshop led by Kalli Arte Collective on August 23.
Artist Alice Sheppard Fidler, a founding member of Studio Voltaire, has created The Hide, an artist retreat and residency in Nailsworth, Gloucestershire, UK. In 2022, she launched The Hide Installation and Sculpture Showcase (THISS), an annual sculpture exhibition in her garden, which this year featured ten artists responding to themes of adaptable matter and environmental permanence. For the first time in 2024, Sheppard Fidler secured Arts Council funding for THISS, enabling artist fees and workshops with youth charities, and the event now attracts around 400 visitors from across the UK.
The Haggerty Museum of Art at Marquette University in Milwaukee announces a summer 2026 season featuring three exhibitions: the Mary L. Nohl Fund Fellowships for Individual Artists 2025, showcasing five local artists; After the Empire: American Prints from the Haggerty Collection, examining American identity through satire and social commentary; and Defying Empire: Revolutionary Prints from Britain and America, challenging traditional narratives of the American Revolution. The exhibitions run from June 4 to August 1, 2026, with the Nohl Fellowship co-presented with the Lynden Sculpture Garden.
The Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History (MAH) is celebrating its 30th anniversary with two concurrent exhibitions: “This is Thirty: Celebrating the MAH and Our Creative Community,” which mixes permanent collection works with new acquisitions, and “The Things We Did and Didn’t Do,” an archival installation by local artist Joshua Moreno. The museum originated from a merger of the Santa Cruz Historical Society and the Art Museum of Santa Cruz County, delayed by the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, and opened in 1996. The exhibits feature earthquake-related artworks, pieces by founding director Charles Hilger, and contributions from the family of Executive Director Ginger Shulick Porcella, including wearable art by her late mother-in-law Yvonne Porcella.
The Museum of Contemporary Religious Art (MOCRA) at Saint Louis University is closing to the public on May 31, 2025, after more than three decades of operation. Its final exhibition, 'Liminal,' features works from 47 artists, many drawn from the museum's permanent collection. The closure, announced last year, is a result of university budget cuts.
Furman University's Department of Art has announced its spring 2026 exhibition schedule at the Thompson Art Gallery, featuring three shows: Jessica Lambert's "Sportsball" (Jan. 12-Feb. 13), Alexa Wheeler's "ToastLab" (Feb. 19-March 27), and the 2026 Senior Thesis Exhibition. Wheeler will also serve as the spring 2026 True Inspiration Artist in Residence, working in an open studio and collaborating with university departments and the Greenville community. All events are free and open to the public.
Bowling Green State University's Fine Arts Gallery presented "Italy In The Artist’s Imagination," a student-curated exhibition running from November 21 to December 10, 2025, at the Dorothy Uber Bryan Gallery. The show featured nearly a hundred works from the university's permanent collection alongside student submissions, spanning Renaissance masters like Albrecht Dürer to contemporary artists, all exploring how Italy has inspired artistic creativity over centuries. Curated by students enrolled in Dr. Allie Terry-Fritsch's Professional Practices in Art History course, the exhibition highlighted pieces such as Dürer's woodcut "Christ Taking Leave of His Mother" (1511), Jessica Faber's screen print "Prospecttiva" (2024), and Jules Maidoff's "Lo Studio."
MotherShip Studios in San Marcos, Texas, announces its upcoming group exhibition "Scrappy: By Any Means Necessary," running from December 13, 2025, to February 7, 2026. Curated by Jennifer Moore, the show features works by eleven artists—Hollie Brown, Ellen Crofts, Lisa Guevara, Julia Hungerford, John Le, Elisa Lendvay, Niloofar Mofrad, Hilary Nelson, Gyan Shrosbree, Jim Shrosbree, and Narong Tintamusik—who explore the concept of "scrappiness" in artistic practice, embracing improvisation, process, and resourcefulness over polished finish.
A new book by Canadian art historian James King, titled "Our Little Gang," examines the Vorticist movement, highlighting its toxic internal dynamics and the marginalization of its female pioneers. King details how Wyndham Lewis, the movement's self-appointed leader, belittled followers like Jessica Dismorr and Helen Saunders, even painting over one of Saunders' works. The book also explores the movement's artistic tensions, balancing abstraction with representation, and features works by Lewis, David Bomberg, and Saunders.
Metro Art, the public art program of Los Angeles County's transit authority, is celebrating National Arts & Humanities Month in October 2024 with a series of exhibitions and events across the Metro system. Highlights include 'Love, Leimert' at Leimert Park Station, featuring moving-image works by ten artists; 'LA on the Move' at Union Station, an exhibition exploring how people and wildlife navigate the city; and guided tours of large-scale artworks at Grand Ave Arts/Bunker Hill Station. The program also features a wrapped Metro Art Bus showcasing rider portrait photography.
Media artist Refik Anadol has announced that Dataland, the world's first museum of AI arts, will open in spring 2026 at the Frank Gehry-designed Grand L.A. complex in downtown Los Angeles, delayed from its original 2025 schedule. The museum spans 25,000 square feet and includes five galleries; a sneak peek was released of the Infinity Room, an immersive multisensory space featuring swirling colors, AI-generated scents, and a proprietary AI model called the Large Nature Model. The Infinity Room concept originated in 2014 at UCLA and has since toured 35 cities, attracting over 10 million visitors.
The article analyzes the best-selling artworks at auction in the first half of 2025, covering Old Masters, Impressionist and Modern, and Postwar categories. Notable sales include a pair of Francesco Guardi views of Venice that sold for $10.5 million at Sotheby’s New York, a Piet Mondrian abstraction from the estate of Barnes & Noble founder Leonard Riggio that fetched just under $50 million, and a monumental rhinoceros-shaped desk by François-Xavier Lalanne that more than tripled its high estimate after a 13-minute bidding war. The report highlights that Old Masters sales were up 24% year-over-year, while top Impressionist and Modern lots saw lower prices compared to 2024.
The Art Studio, Inc. in Beaumont, Texas, is hosting the exhibition “The Art of Mental Health” through September 26, featuring artwork created by people whose art addresses mental health issues. The show, now in its third year, originated when board members from the foundation of Mental Health in Southeast Texas approached executive director Greg Busceme to use the studio space for art therapy. Submissions were open to all ages and skill levels, and the studio plans to continue the monthly group despite recent federal funding cuts.