Art News. Vasari Codex

museum exhibitions schedule Jan 6, 2026 visibility 19 link 11 artists

nyc holiday art shows

Artnet News has compiled a guide to holiday art shows in New York City for December 2025. The featured exhibitions include the Metropolitan Museum of Art's annual "Christmas Tree and Neapolitan Baroque Crèche" (November 25–January 6), the American Museum of Natural History's "Origami Holiday Tree" (November 24–January 20) inspired by its dinosaur extinction exhibition, the Morgan Library and Museum's display of Charles Dickens's original manuscript of "A Christmas Carol" (November 25–January 11), and the New York Public Library's "Best Friends Forever: Holiday Greeting Cards" (December 3–January 4). Each venue offers a unique artistic take on the holiday season, from 18th-century Neapolitan figurines and thousands of origami animals to literary history and vintage greeting cards.

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article news schedule Jan 6, 2026 visibility 17 link 6 artists

louvre strike 2

Louvre staff went on strike again on Monday over understaffing, working conditions, and the museum's $820 million renovation plan, echoing calls for director Laurence des Cars to step down. The walkout forced the museum to close to the public, reopening only a few major attractions like the Mona Lisa, Venus de Milo, and Winged Victory of Samothrace. The strike, originally launched in December, was suspended briefly but resumed after all 350 staff voted unanimously in favor. Unions demand a re-evaluation of the renovation project, dubbed "Nouvelle Renaissance," arguing the high cost is unrealistic and that priorities should shift to urgent technical maintenance.

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candle obituary schedule Jan 2, 2026 visibility 30 link 27 artists

kathleen goncharov curator dead

Kathleen Goncharov, a curator known for her work at Just Above Midtown gallery and the Boca Raton Museum of Art, died at her home in Boca Raton, Florida, on December 31 at age 73. Over her career, she served as senior curator at the Boca Raton Museum of Art from 2012 to 2025, curated exhibitions internationally from Rio de Janeiro to Rome, and was commissioner of the US Pavilion for the Venice Biennale in 2003, presenting Fred Wilson's exhibition "Speak of Me as I Am." She also held positions at Creative Time, the New School, MIT, the Nasher Museum of Art, and the Brodsky Center for Innovative Editions, and was a working artist for 40 years.

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article culture schedule Jan 1, 2026 visibility 10 link 5 artists, 2 galleries

experts how to make it art world

Artnet News has launched a new four-part podcast mini-series titled "How to Get Ahead in the Art World," produced in partnership with Art Market Mentors. Hosted by editor-in-chief Naomi Rea and produced by Sonia Manalili, the series features insights from top art-world insiders including Cat Manson (former Christie's leader turned career coach), Loïc Gouzer (former Christie's rainmaker and founder of Fair Warning), and Brooke Lampley (senior roles at Sotheby's and Gagosian). Each episode covers a key career lesson: taking ownership of your career, trusting your instincts, leading with passion, and embracing a layoff as a reset.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 22, 2025 visibility 22 link 14 artists

baku azerbaijan art week

The article recounts the author's experience attending Baku Art Weekend in Azerbaijan, a festival centered at the Zaha Hadid-designed Heydar Aliyev Centre. The event featured a major exhibition of Fernando Botero's work, "The Triumph of Form," alongside kinetic installations by Daniel Wurtzel and sculptures by Jorge Marín. The festival is shaped by Leyla Aliyeva, vice president of the Heydar Aliyev Foundation and daughter of Azerbaijan's president, who aims to position Baku as a global cultural capital.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 19, 2025 visibility 19 link 4 artists

mathaf museum campus expansion architect lina ghothem

Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art in Doha has appointed Lebanese architect Lina Ghotmeh to lead a major campus expansion, announced as the institution celebrates its 15th anniversary. The project will redesign the ground floor lobby and library as an open majlis-inspired space, expand the cafe and shop, add a monumental portrait by Yan Pei-Ming, and later transform the plaza and parking area into artist studios, ceramics facilities, glass and material labs, and a sound studio in collaboration with Tarek Atoui. Mathaf director Zeina Arida called the plan 'a new chapter' for the museum.

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article news schedule Dec 18, 2025 visibility 19 link 13 artists

top ukrainian art historian believes italian museum holds 14 fake russian and ukrainian modernist works

Konstantin Akinsha, a prominent curator and art historian of Russian and Ukrainian art, has identified 14 artworks in the collection of the Palazzo de Nordis museum in Cividale del Friuli, Italy, as likely forgeries. In a Substack post and interview with ARTnews, Akinsha scrutinized the De Martiis Collection, donated in 2015 by the late collector Giancarlo De Martiis, which includes works attributed to Russian and Ukrainian modernist painters. He points to suspicious provenances involving Jean Chauvelin, a disgraced French art dealer, and Boris Gribanov, a convicted forger. A specific still life attributed to Olga Rozanova (1915-17) is nearly identical to a 1999 painting by contemporary Russian artist Andrei Saratov, who confirmed he did not paint the museum's version. Elisabetta Gottardo, the municipal head of culture, acknowledged Akinsha's authority and pledged further investigation.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 17, 2025 visibility 13 link 2 artists

sothebys 2025 sales results analysis

Sotheby's is projecting $7.0 billion in consolidated 2025 sales, a 17% increase over the previous year and the strongest result in the company's history. Auction sales rose 26% to $5.7 billion, driven by high-quality consignments including the Leonard A. Lauder Collection and a $236.4 million Klimt painting. Luxury sales climbed 22% to $2.7 billion, while RM Sotheby's surpassed $1 billion for the first time. The opening of Sotheby's new global headquarters at the Breuer Building was a commercial centerpiece, generating $1.17 billion in its inaugural week. The company also expanded rapidly in the Middle East, staging the first international auction in Saudi Arabia and launching Collectors' Week in Abu Dhabi.

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article news schedule Dec 16, 2025 visibility 15 link 6 artists

louvre strike

On December 15, 2025, the Musée du Louvre in Paris was forced to close as approximately 400 of its 2,100 employees went on strike, picketing outside the museum's glass pyramids and turning away visitors. The strike follows a series of crises at the institution, including a $102 million jewel heist in broad daylight two months prior, a flooding incident from a burst water pipe in November, and ongoing concerns about deteriorating facilities, long lines, and substandard restrooms and dining areas. Workers are demanding higher wages and better conditions, with three trade unions—CGT, SUD, and CFDT—warning in an open letter that staff feel like "the last bastion before collapse."

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trending_up market schedule Dec 15, 2025 visibility 29 link 18 artists

malba acquires 1200 works

Eduardo F. Costantini, founder of the Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires (Malba), announced the acquisition of the Daros Latinamerica Collection in Zurich, adding 1,233 works by 117 artists to the museum's holdings. This roughly doubles Malba's collection to 3,000 works, with a major expansion project planned to accommodate the new pieces, set to begin next fall to mark the museum's 25th anniversary. Highlights include works by Doris Salcedo, Ana Mendieta, Julio Le Parc, Alfredo Jaar, Lygia Clark, and Jesús Rafael Soto, with 75 artists new to Malba.

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person people schedule Dec 12, 2025 visibility 20 link 7 artists

maria balshaw tate

Maria Balshaw, the director of Tate, will step down in the new year after nine years at the helm, the museum announced Friday. Appointed in 2017, Balshaw was the first woman to lead the institutional network, which includes Tate Modern and Tate Britain. Her tenure was marked by a substantial diversification of Tate’s collection and programming to spotlight new art forms, indigenous artists, and artists from the Global South. She also oversaw the launch of a landmark £150 million endowment fund for Tate Modern to address financial woes. Memorable exhibitions included surveys of pre-internet digital artists, modern art in Nigeria, and retrospectives for Leigh Bowery, Isaac Julien, Yoko Ono, and Emily Kam Kngwarray.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 12, 2025 visibility 19 link 9 artists, 1 gallery

lalanne hippopotamus bar 31 million record

A 1976 Hippopotamus Bar by François-Xavier Lalanne sold for $31.4 million at Sotheby's after a 26-minute bidding war, setting a new auction record for the French artist. The hand-wrought copper, steel, and wood piece, commissioned by art patron Anne Schlumberger, is the only copper prototype from the series and features concealed compartments for bottle storage, ice bucket, and glassware. The sale was part of the Schlumberger collection, which also included a gold-patinated bronze armchair by Claude Lalanne that fetched $1 million and a pair of bronze gates that sold for $787,400.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 11, 2025 visibility 23 link 13 artists

ultra contemporary chinese artists market

The article analyzes the auction performance of Chinese artists born after 1990 (post-90s) in the first half of 2025, based on data from the Artnet Price Database and the Artnet Intelligence Report. It highlights a shift from short-term speculation to longer-term competition, with the market showing more robust structure including stratified pricing and wider transactional geography. Key figures include Li Hei Di, whose large-scale painting sold for HK$2.67 million at Sotheby’s Hong Kong, and other artists like Zhang Zipiao, Yuan Fang, and Wang Qianyao achieving consistent mid-range prices between HK$300,000 and HK$800,000. Sales in Hong Kong reached HK$12.4 million, while artists also entered Western markets in New York and London.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 9, 2025 visibility 29 link 13 artists, 4 galleries

emma mcintyre 2025

Emma McIntyre, a New Zealand-born painter known for her oxidation technique using rust on canvas, has rapidly ascended in the art world. After earning MFAs in Auckland and Pasadena, she joined mega-gallery David Zwirner in 2024, with additional representation by Château Shatto in Los Angeles and Air de Paris. Her auction record was set at Phillips London in October 2025, with her work "Seven types of ambiguity" selling for $225,100. McIntyre's practice blends material experimentation—including iron oxide pigments and bubble wrap—with references spanning Greek myth to Rococo art.

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person people schedule Dec 9, 2025 visibility 20 link 9 artists

christina vassallo leaving contemporary arts center cincinnati pew center for arts heritage

Christina Vassallo is leaving her role as director of the Contemporary Arts Center (CAC) in Cincinnati, Ohio, effective January 2, 2026, to become the new director of the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage in Philadelphia starting January 5, 2026. Vassallo, who joined the CAC in 2023, oversaw exhibitions including a group show celebrating the 20th anniversary of Zaha Hadid's first completed US building, as well as solo shows by Vivian Browne, Marcus Leslie Singleton, and Sheida Soleimani. Prior to the CAC, she served as executive director of the Fabric Workshop and Museum in Philadelphia, Spaces in Cleveland, and Flux Factory in New York.

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article news schedule Dec 9, 2025 visibility 11 link 5 artists

louvre leak strike

A water pipe burst at the Musée du Louvre in Paris on November 26, damaging 300 to 400 archival documents related to Egyptian history in the Mollien Pavilion. The leak, which also posed a fire risk due to a nearby electrical cabinet, was followed by a smaller leak days later. Employees, represented by a coalition of unions including CGT, CFDT, and Sud, have voted unanimously to begin a rolling strike next Monday, demanding urgent renovations and the hiring of 200 new staff to restore the workforce to 2014 levels. The Louvre's director Laurence des Cars had previously warned that the museum's buildings were in "poor condition" and "no longer water tight," and a major renovation was announced, but pipe repairs were not scheduled until September 2026.

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person people schedule Dec 8, 2025 visibility 20 link 8 artists

ralph lemon artnews awards 2025 lifetime achievement

Ralph Lemon has been awarded the 2025 ARTnews Lifetime Achievement Award for his multidisciplinary practice spanning dance, drawing, painting, installation, sculpture, and writing. The article highlights his career trajectory from founding the Ralph Lemon Dance Company to disbanding it in 1995 to focus on broader artistic collaborations. Central to his work is the Geography Trilogy (1996–2004) and his long-term collaboration with Walter Carter, a former Mississippi sharecropper, whose life and family became a recurring subject. Lemon's recent exhibition "Ceremonies Out of the Air: Ralph Lemon" at MoMA PS1 (November 14, 2024–March 24, 2025), curated by Connie Butler and Thomas Lax, featured videos, found African sculptures, drawings, and a four-channel performance piece, Rant (redux), with Kevin Beasley and Okwui Okpokwasili.

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article news schedule Dec 8, 2025 visibility 20 link 11 artists

chief curator leaves george lucas museum

Pilar Tompkins Rivas, chief curator and deputy director of curatorial and collections at the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles, has left the museum less than a year before its scheduled September 2026 opening. The museum stated it has no immediate plans to replace her, with George Lucas continuing to oversee curatorial direction. This departure follows a series of staffing issues, including the exit of director and CEO Sandra Jackson-Dumont in March 2025, layoffs of 22 staff members in May, and the earlier losses of curator Amanda Hunt and curator-at-large Dan Nadel. The $1-billion museum, first announced in 2017, has faced repeated delays due to the pandemic and supply-chain shortages.

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article culture schedule Dec 8, 2025 visibility 14 link 11 artists

art bites facts holiday small talk

Artnet News offers a lighthearted holiday guide with seven art-historical conversation starters designed to deflect awkward family small talk. The article reveals quirky facts such as a secret apartment atop the Eiffel Tower, the Surrealists' party game 'Exquisite Corpse,' Leonardo da Vinci's role as a wedding planner for Milan's nobility, Marcel Duchamp paying his dentist with a fake check, and Frank Lloyd Wright inspiring Lincoln Logs.

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article news schedule Dec 5, 2025 visibility 15 link 5 artists

lucas museum of narrative art pilar tompkins rivas departs

Pilar Tompkins Rivas, chief curator and deputy director of curatorial and collections at the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles, has left her post, as first reported by the Los Angeles Times. Her departure is the latest in a series of leadership exits at the institution, which is set to open on September 22, 2026. The museum was founded by George Lucas and Mellody Hobson, and Rivas was one of six women of color appointed to high-ranking roles in 2020 by then director and CEO Sandra Jackson-Dumont, who left in February. The museum laid off 15 employees in May, and CEO duties are now held on an interim basis by Jim Gianopulos, while Lucas himself oversees curatorial content.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 2, 2025 visibility 14 link 7 artists

nybg holiday train show whitney museum

The New York Botanical Garden's 34th annual "Holiday Train Show" features miniature replicas of New York landmarks crafted from natural materials by the botanical artists of Applied Imagination. This year's edition adds two new models: the recently renovated Delacorte Theater in Central Park and the Whitney Museum of American Art's Meatpacking District flagship, designed by Renzo Piano. The Whitney replica, built over three months by artist Ava Roberts and fabrication director Kaitlin Schmidt, uses a new two-way mirrored acrylic glass technique for the windows and incorporates materials like purple smoke bush branches, horse chestnut bark, and fallen Zelkova bark. The company, founded by Paul Busse in 1991 and now run by his daughter Laura Busse Dolan, creates whimsical versions of landmarks using leaves, sticks, fungi, and other dried plant materials.

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article news schedule Dec 2, 2025 visibility 21 link 11 artists

hong kong fire arts groups asian art news

A devastating fire in Hong Kong's Tai Po neighborhood, which killed at least 151 people, has prompted a period of mourning and led several major cultural institutions to cancel or postpone public events. The Hong Kong Arts Festival and the Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust cancelled a press conference for the "No Limits" program, while M+ rescheduled its "Night: Festive Play" event. Meanwhile, art fairs and galleries continue to announce developments: Kiaf Seoul will run concurrently with Frieze Seoul in 2026, Contemporary Istanbul will introduce a new Focus Asia section, and Art Basel Hong Kong 2026 will feature new sectors Echoes and Zero 10. In the market, On Kawara's "NOV. 27, 1984" sold for HK$8.5 million at Bonhams Hong Kong, and standout results were seen at Sotheby's Hong Kong.

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person people schedule Dec 2, 2025 visibility 15 link 10 artists

komal shah making their mark foundation forum launch

Komal Shah, a prominent art collector, announced the renaming of her Shah Garg Foundation to the Making Their Mark Foundation, coinciding with a three-day forum in Washington, D.C., scheduled for March 2025. The foundation takes its name from the traveling exhibition "Making Their Mark: Works from the Shah Garg Collection," curated by Cecilia Alemani, which highlights women artists from Shah and her husband Gaurav Garg's collection. The forum, held at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library, will feature panels, keynotes, and performances organized around themes like Visionary Voices and Changemakers, with Alemani as curatorial director and Loring Randolph as director.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 2, 2025 visibility 22 link 5 artists

elephant sculptures migrate to art basel miami beach

A herd of 100 life-size elephant sculptures, handcrafted by 200 Indigenous artisans from South India, has arrived at Art Basel Miami Beach as part of "The Great Elephant Migration," a global public art and conservation project. The sculptures are made from lantana camara, an invasive plant, and are modeled after individual elephants from the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve. Organized by Ruth Ganesh and the Coexistence Collective, the installation aims to promote coexistence between humans and wildlife, with proceeds from sculpture sales funding 22 conservation NGOs. The elephants have toured the U.S., appearing in Newport, Rhode Island, Manhattan's Meatpacking District, and now Miami Beach, where they have drawn enthusiastic crowds—and even a reported incident of a couple having sex on one of the sculptures, prompting police patrols.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 1, 2025 visibility 15 link 9 artists

norton museum of art the leiden collection rembrandt

The Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach, Florida, is hosting "Art and Life in Rembrandt’s Time: Masterpieces from the Leiden Collection," an exhibition featuring 17 Rembrandt paintings from the largest private collection of his works. The show includes over 200 additional paintings and drawings by Dutch Golden Age artists such as Frans Hals, Carel Fabritius, and Johannes Vermeer, including the only Vermeer painting held in private hands. The exhibition marks the first major Rembrandt show in Florida and the largest U.S. exhibition of 17th-century Dutch paintings from a private collection, timed to coincide with the 400th anniversary of New Amsterdam's founding.

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article policy schedule Dec 1, 2025 visibility 14 link 5 artists

louvre ticket price hike

The Louvre will raise ticket prices by 45 percent for non-E.U. visitors starting January 14, 2026, with tickets increasing to €32 ($37) for travelers from the U.S., U.K., and China, while E.U. visitors continue to pay €22. The price hike, announced on November 27, is expected to generate €15–20 million annually to fund modernization plans, following intense criticism over aging infrastructure and a $102 million jewel heist in October. The museum also faces structural issues, including the temporary closure of parts of its Sully wing due to fragile support beams, and has implemented an €80 million security master plan.

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trending_up market schedule Nov 25, 2025 visibility 21 link 13 artists

new york auctions recap

New York's marquee auction week delivered strong results, with Sotheby's and Christie's posting combined sales of nearly $2 billion. Sotheby's achieved a record $706 million evening at its new Breuer Building headquarters, driven by the Leonard Lauder estate sale, while Christie's $690 million 20th-century sale was up 41.9% from last November. Gustav Klimt's *Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer* sold for $236.4 million, setting a new auction record for the artist and becoming the most expensive Modern artwork ever sold at auction. Frida Kahlo's *El Sueño (La Cama)* fetched $54.7 million, a record for a work by a woman artist at auction.

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trending_up market schedule Nov 25, 2025 visibility 11 link 9 artists

sothebys modern sales by the numbers

Sotheby's three-part modern art evening auction in New York on Thursday night achieved a total of $304.6 million, a dramatic increase from the $93.1 million equivalent sale last year. The sale featured 69 lots, with three withdrawn and none bought in, resulting in a 95% sell-through rate. Top lots included Vincent van Gogh's still life "Piles de romans parisiens et roses dans une verre" (1887), which sold for $62.7 million with premium to private advisor Patti Wong, and a work by Frida Kahlo. Third-party guarantees covered 55% of the presale low estimate, but bidding remained competitive throughout.

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trending_up market schedule Nov 21, 2025 visibility 19 link 18 artists

frida kahlo el sueno sothebys auction

Frida Kahlo's painting *El sueño (La cama)* (1940) sold at Sotheby's New York for $54.7 million on Thursday night, setting a new auction record for any artwork by a female artist. The sale, which lasted under five minutes, exceeded the previous record held by Georgia O'Keeffe's *Jimson Weed/White Flower No. 1* ($44.4 million in 2014). The painting was backed by an irrevocable bid and came from the collection of Selma Ertegun, offered as part of a Surrealist group titled "Exquisite Corpus." Anna Di Stasi, Sotheby's head of Latin American art, placed the winning bid on behalf of a client.

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trending_up market schedule Nov 21, 2025 visibility 18 link 16 artists

sothebys modern pritzker exquisite corpse auction results

On Thursday night, Sotheby’s held a three-part sale of Impressionist, Modern, and Surrealist art at the Breuer Building in New York, generating $304.6 million against a cumulative estimate of $218.8 million to $301.2 million. The smallest sale, 13 lots from the collection of Cindy and Jay Pritzker, achieved a “white glove” result with $109.5 million, led by Vincent van Gogh’s *Romans Parisiens (Les Livres jaunes)* (1887) which sold for $62.7 million. The Surrealist offering, “Exquisite Corpus,” from the collection of Nesuhi and Selma Ertegun, featured Frida Kahlo’s *El sueño (La cama)* (1940) which set a record for the artist at $54.7 million, becoming the most expensive work by a woman artist at auction (nominal price).

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