Exhibition | Mark di Suvero, 'Avanti!' at Paula Cooper Gallery, 534 West 21st Street, New York, United States

Paula Cooper Gallery in New York will present an exhibition of large-scale sculptures and drawings by Mark di Suvero from May 2 through July 17. The show features the debut of the kinetic sculpture 'Avanti!' (c. late 1990s), a human-intervention piece with a suspended beam that viewers can rock with their body weight, alongside the 1986 work 'Nelly' and the stainless steel 'Tables Turn’d' (2004), as well as a selection of works on paper including interactive "sliding drawings."

This free exhibition celebrates the Monogram’s 130th anniversary with a selection of exceptional trunks in Paris.

To mark the 130th anniversary of Louis Vuitton's Monogram canvas, the Parisian auction house Gros & Delettrez is hosting a free exhibition of rare travel trunks and accessories from May 18 to 20, 2026. The display features iconic pieces including two expedition bed trunks (one from 1911 with the initials 'B.B.'), a library trunk, a desk trunk, and other travel innovations designed between 1880 and 1930, all before they go up for auction on May 21.

Museum Moves 24 – 30 April 2026

This article is a weekly roundup of museum news from 24–30 April 2026, covering openings, closures, and exhibitions across the UK. Highlights include the permanent closure of Blackpool's Tramtown museum due to structural unsafety, the reopening of Sibsey Trader Windmill after a five-year restoration, and several new exhibitions: 'Vennels: Perth’s Little Streets' at Perth Museum, 'The 90s: Art and Fashion' at Tate Britain, 'Regeneration' at Hull's Streetlife Museum, 'Inspiration' at Stockport Station, 'Our Story with David Attenborough' at Outernet London, and 'Lynn Chadwick at Houghton Hall' in Norfolk.

A Struggle Between Artist and Machine

Ein Ringen zwischen Künstler und Maschine

Mario Klingemann, a pioneer of AI art, presents "Conflict of Interest," a pop-up exhibition at Sleek Art Space in Berlin during Gallery Weekend. Curated by Anika Meier and produced in collaboration with Art on Tezos, the show features works that challenge the flood of AI-generated imagery. Klingemann displays mundane landscape photographs from private slides, a series called "Weapons of Mass Distraction" where he disrupts an AI algorithm's image generation, and a haunting 2020 video in which AI-generated faces morph to music. The exhibition makes visible the struggle between human control and machine logic.

This solo exhibition in Mumbai by Koshy Brahmatmaj draws from pain

Koshy Brahmatmaj's debut solo exhibition, titled 'how do i make you believe,' is currently on view in Mumbai. The show presents artworks that draw from personal pain and limitation, with the artist choosing to work within constraints rather than against them. Images of the exhibition have been released by the gallery, showing pieces that reflect Brahmatmaj's engagement with themes of ecology, identity, archives, and community-based practice.

‘In Mali, When Animals Dance’ – Inside the Pulse of Sogo Bò

Yoann Cormier curates 'In Mali, When Animals Dance' at the Musée des Confluences, an exhibition dedicated to sogo bò, a Malian performance tradition blending theater, dance, music, and community. Rejecting static displays, Cormier uses immersive scenography—light, sound, film footage from the early 2000s by Sonia and Albert Loeb, and reconstructed masks made with the Lyon Opera costume workshop—to evoke the festive atmosphere of sogo bò, moving visitors through a simulated Malian day from afternoon to night.

Masterpieces by Klimt, Matisse and Freud set for London’s most valuable auction

Sotheby's will auction a major collection of masterpieces by artists including Gustav Klimt, Henri Matisse, Lucian Freud, and Francis Bacon, consigned by Joe Lewis and his daughter Vivienne, whose family owns Tottenham Hotspur. The collection, expected to fetch over £150 million, is projected to become the most valuable ever offered in London, with highlights such as Klimt's 'Bildnis Gertrud Loew' (estimated £20-30m) and Egon Schiele's 'Danaë' (estimated £12-18m, potentially setting a new artist record). The works will be exhibited in New York and London before the June sales.

In the Studio with Jevon Brown

Artist Jevon Brown, a Miamian of Bahamian, Jamaican, and Black Southern descent, discusses his multidisciplinary practice in an interview conducted in his Miami Beach apartment and studio. Brown works across textiles, silkscreen printing, fashion, and photography to explore cultural identity, belonging, queerness, and history. He describes how memories of Miami sunsets, family members like his uncle (a sneakerhead and hat collector), and ancestral references inform his creative process. Key works discussed include the "HAIREtage" series (2025), which uses materials like burlap and raffia to connect contemporary streetwear culture with African and Caribbean spirituality, and his inclusion in the exhibition "Material, Material World" at David Castillo Gallery.

When Fashion Meets the Body, Can a Whole Museum Come Alive?

The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute will open its latest fashion exhibition, "Costume Art," in a new gallery space adjacent to the Great Hall, formerly the museum's gift shop. Curated by Andrew Bolton, the show features 400 objects from the permanent collection, organized thematically around the dressed body—exploring the naked, classical, anatomical, and mortal body—rather than chronologically. The exhibition aims to connect artistic representations of the body with fashion as an embodied art form.

Laura K. Sayers’ Vibrant Postage Stamps Celebrate the Beauty of Everyday Moments

Laura K. Sayers creates intricate miniature postage stamps using cut paper, depicting everyday scenes from her home in Scotland and places she visits. Her solo exhibition "The Wee Small Hours" at N. atelier in Glasgow showcases these tiny tableaux, which also include works inspired by her residency at the Fiskars Artist-in-Residence program in Finland. The exhibition runs through this weekend.

Raghu Rai’s masterful images of Indian life – in pictures

Raghu Rai, the celebrated Indian photographer who was recruited to Magnum Photos by Henri Cartier-Bresson in 1977, has died at the age of 83. Over five decades, he produced defining images of Indian life, ranging from intimate portraits of Mother Teresa to stark documentation of the Bhopal disaster. His work captured both the grand and the everyday, from crowds at Mumbai's Churchgate railway station to slums in Dharavi, and he published more than 18 books, receiving multiple awards for his unflinching human gaze.

Still in Sound Exhibition Opens on May 16 at the Clyfford Still Museum

The Clyfford Still Museum in Denver will open a multisensory exhibition titled "Still in Sound" on May 16, exploring how visitors can experience abstract visual language through sound. Co-curated by Bailey Placzek, the museum's curator of collections, and British multidisciplinary artist Ben Coleman, the exhibition features original sonic interpretations by contemporary artists Maria Chávez, Maya Dunietz, Kalyn Heffernan, Matana Roberts, and Michael Schumacher, each responding to a specific Clyfford Still artwork. The museum will also open a special-feature exhibition, "Celebrating 15 Years: 15 New Paintings in 15 Months," unveiling one previously unseen painting each month for 15 months. The exhibition runs through February 14, 2027.

New Exhibits open today at the African Art Museum

The Savannah African Art Museum is opening two new exhibitions today, April 30, 2026, with a ribbon-cutting ceremony from 5:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. The new exhibits include a permanent gallery featuring artwork from West and Central Africa that explores the connections between agriculture, spirituality, and daily life. Museum representative Alisa Evans-Newsome highlighted that the exhibit shares agricultural and spiritual practices from the West African interior, emphasizing agriculture as a vital link to the land and ancestors.

Artnet et Artsy amorcent leur intégration

Artnet and Artsy, both acquired in 2025 by British fund Beowolff Capital, are beginning their integration under a shared management structure while maintaining separate brands and websites. The reorganization has already involved job cuts and aims to more closely align market data, online visibility, and transactions amid a fragile online art sales environment.

Millon relance Pierre Bergé & Associés

Millon has taken full control of Pierre Bergé & Associés, becoming its sole shareholder. The auction house, founded in 2002 and restructured two years ago by Alexandre Landre after judicial recovery, will now operate under Millon's financial, logistical, and commercial backing while retaining its Avenue Kléber address and operational team.

Francois Boisrond prend de la hauteur

French artist François Boisrond, a key figure of the 1980s Figuration libre movement, presents his new series "Ouvrages d'art" at Galerie Maïa Muller in Paris. The series reinterprets monumental architecture—including the Millau Viaduct, the Pont de Normandie, Mont Saint-Michel, Notre-Dame, and the Eiffel Tower—using drone-sourced images. Boisrond employs a new liquid acrylic technique that creates a matte, flat finish, producing works that appear hyperrealistic from a distance but dissolve into impressionistic or pixelated abstraction up close. The exhibition, extended through May 16, 2026, features large-format paintings priced between €25,000 and €50,000.

Primitivism to Reinvent Art

Le primitivisme pour réinventer l’art

Philippe Dagen has published the third and final volume of his series on primitivism, covering the period from World War II to the late 1970s. The book traces how Western artists, from Barnett Newman and Jackson Pollock to members of the CoBrA movement and figures like Jean Dubuffet, Lucio Fontana, and Yayoi Kusama, engaged with so-called "primitive" art from Africa, Oceania, and the Americas, often as a means of rejecting or redefining modern civilization. Dagen also examines the intellectual debates surrounding primitivism, including the critiques of colonized peoples who refused the label "primitive," and the shifting attitudes of thinkers like Claude Lévi-Strauss, Michel Leiris, and Aimé Césaire.

A Record for Lalanne

Un record pour Lalanne

Sotheby's New York achieved a major result with the sale of a set of fifteen mirrors by Claude Lalanne (died 2019), commissioned between 1974 and 1985 for the music room of Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Bergé's Paris apartment. Estimated at $10–15 million, the lot—from the collection of Jean and Terry de Gunzburg after the 2009 Saint Laurent-Bergé sale—fetched $33.5 million including fees, setting a record for the artist.

Forgers, One-Way Mirrors of the Art Market

Les faussaires, miroirs sans tain du marché de l’art

Anthropologist Monique Jeudy-Ballini has published a new book, "Peintres de l’ombre. Les faussaires à l’œuvre," in which she examines art forgers through an ethnographic lens. Drawing on autobiographical accounts, published interviews, and expert writings—including those of notorious forgers Wolfgang Beltracchi, Eric Hebborn, and Guy Ribes—she explores the motivations and practices of these clandestine figures, arguing that their work involves not only technical skill but also the creation of elaborate narratives and pedigrees for their forgeries. The book is part of the Ethnologiques series edited by Philippe Descola and published by Éditions Mimésis.

Lee Miller in Wide Angle

Lee Miller en grand angle

The Musée d'Art moderne de Paris (MAM) has opened a major retrospective of photographer Lee Miller (1907-1977), featuring nearly 250 prints—many vintage and previously unseen. The exhibition originated at Tate Britain, where it drew over 250,000 visitors, and was co-organized with MAM and the Art Institute of Chicago. Curated by Michal Goldschmidt (former Tate Britain curator) and Fanny Schulmann of MAM, with new research led by Hilary Floe, the show emphasizes Miller's ties to Paris, her technical mastery, and her wartime reporting, including contact sheets from Dachau and Buchenwald never before shown in France.

Meloni takes control of Italian museums

Meloni reprend en main les musées italiens

Italy’s culture ministry under Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has appointed 14 new directors for so-called “second-tier” museums, reinforcing a shift away from the international “super-director” model introduced by the 2014 Franceschini reform. All appointees are Italian except for French director Axel Hémery, who was reappointed at the Pinacoteca di Siena due to his strong performance. The move follows the earlier ousting of foreign directors at top-tier museums, with only two foreign-born directors—Eike Schmidt and Gabriel Zuchtriegel—remaining, both of whom hold Italian citizenship.

Hervé Barbaret s’éloigne de France-Muséums

Hervé Barbaret, aged 60, will step down as director general of France-Muséums on April 30, returning to the Cour des comptes (Court of Auditors). He had led the organization since 2019. Barbaret, a former student of the École Nationale d'Administration (ENA) and a senior counselor, previously served as general administrator of the Louvre, overseeing the Louvre-Lens project, the Department of Islamic Arts, and Louvre Abu Dhabi. He also directed the Mobilier national and was secretary general of the Ministry of Culture. France-Muséums coordinates French museum expertise internationally, from Louvre Abu Dhabi to a project in New Delhi. His successor has not yet been announced.

Pablo Diaz, directeur de Sciences Po Rennes : « L’acte II de l’INSEAC de Guingamp »

Pablo Diaz, director of Sciences Po Rennes, announces that the Institut national supérieur de l'éducation artistique et culturelle (INSEAC) in Guingamp has been transferred from the Conservatoire national des arts et métiers (Cnam) to Sciences Po Rennes as of January 1, 2026. The institute, which opened in 2021 and focuses on training, research, and resources for arts and cultural education, will now operate under public-sector governance with oversight from the French ministries of Culture, Education, and Higher Education. Diaz outlines plans to appoint a dedicated site director in Guingamp and establish a strategic orientation committee chaired by interministerial delegate Emmanuel Ethis, aiming to resolve past management and governance issues.

Olivia Bourrat revient au Quai Branly

Olivia Bourrat, a 45-year-old chief heritage curator trained at the École du Louvre, the INP, and the Sorbonne, has been appointed director of the heritage and collections department at the Musée du quai Branly-Jacques Chirac in Paris. She succeeds Anne-Solène Rolland, and returns to the museum after previous stints there, as well as at France-Muséums, the Louvre Abu Dhabi, the French Ministry of Culture, and Paris Musées.

Une vétérane pour diriger un des musées du Smithsonian

Lynda Roscoe Hartigan, 75, will become the director of the Smithsonian American Art Museum (SAAM) in Washington, D.C., on September 8, ending a 17-month vacancy. Hartigan, currently the director of the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, began her career at SAAM as chief curator, where she developed collections of modern, contemporary, African American, and self-taught art.

A U.S. agency that funds culture wins a judicial reprieve

Une agence américaine qui finance la culture gagne un répit judiciaire

A U.S. federal court has blocked the Trump administration's attempt to cut funding for the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), a key agency supporting museums and libraries nationwide. The lawsuit was brought by the American Library Association (ALA) and the AFSCME union, with support from the legal organization Democracy Forward, arguing that the executive branch cannot unilaterally reduce programs authorized by Congress. The ruling temporarily halts the funding reductions, which were part of broader efforts to slash federal cultural spending during Donald Trump's second term.

À Bordeaux, la métamorphose du MADD

The Musée des arts décoratifs et du design (MADD) in Bordeaux has reopened its design-focused wing after three years of renovation, featuring a new entrance pavilion designed by Antoine Dufour Architectes that connects the historic Hôtel de Lalande and the former municipal prison. The overhaul includes a monumental shelving display of eighty vases by designers such as Andrea Branzi and Gaetano Pesce, a new "gallery of know-how" dedicated to rotating thematic presentations (starting with ceramics), a graphic arts cabinet showcasing the Jacques Sargos collection of over 130 drawings, and improved climate control for conservation.

Au Louvre, l’ambitieuse restauration du cycle de Marie de Médicis

The Louvre Museum in Paris is undertaking an ambitious restoration of Peter Paul Rubens's monumental cycle of 24 paintings depicting the life of Marie de Médicis. The project, which will take four years and cost €4 million funded by the Société des Amis du Louvre, begins this autumn with the paintings being restored in situ in the Médicis Gallery. The gallery will close in May to prepare the space as a restoration workshop, where two teams of 10–15 restorers will work simultaneously on cleaning, relining, and filling gaps. The last major restoration of the cycle dates to the 1950s, and recent diagnostics revealed yellowed varnish, discordant repaints, and flaking paint layers that risk irreversible loss.

L’offre de formation se développe

French art training institutions are expanding their curricula to include provenance research, responding to a 2022 government report that identified gaps in conservator education. The Institut national du patrimoine (INP) now offers seminars on Nazi-era spoliation (1933-1945) and has added a five-day provenance research module for external competition students since 2024-2025. Paris-Nanterre University launched a master's-level diploma in 2022 covering legal, historical, and methodological aspects of provenance research. The École du Louvre now offers a specialized master's in "sensitive goods and provenance research" addressing spoliated works, human remains, colonial acquisitions, and illicit trafficking, while also integrating provenance methodology into its general curriculum from master's level one.

How the State Supports Provenance Research

Comment l’État soutient la recherche de provenance

The French Ministry of Culture has created two specialized missions to assist museums in researching the provenance of their collections, addressing looted artworks, human remains, colonial acquisitions, and illicit trafficking. The Mission for Research and Restitution of Looted Cultural Property (M2RS), established in 2019, focuses on Nazi-era spoliations (1933-1945) with a budget of €220,000 annually, while the newer Mission "Provenance," launched in 2024 under curator Catherine Chevillot, covers human remains, colonial-era objects, and illicit goods with a €450,000 budget. These missions provide expertise, funding, and coordination with institutions like the Commission for the Restitution of Property and Compensation of Victims of Anti-Semitic Spoliation (CIVS), though most museums still only initiate provenance checks during acquisitions or donations.