Astrup Fearnley Museet in Oslo presents "Grammars of Light," a major exhibition featuring immersive works by Cerith Wyn Evans, Ann Lislegaard, and P. Staff. The show includes architecturally scaled video projections and luminous sculptures made from repurposed consumer, medical, and industrial lighting, transforming the museum's galleries into sensory environments that challenge perception.
Art Basel Qatar has appointed Iraqi curator Wassan Al-Khudhairi as artistic director for its second edition, scheduled for January 28–30, 2027, in Doha. The fair will be themed “between / بين,” exploring states of betweenness and fluid cultural encounters, and will feature a scaled-up Special Projects sector with large-scale, site-specific works, alongside solo gallery presentations. Al-Khudhairi, a specialist in modern and contemporary Arab art, previously served as founding director of Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art in Doha and held curatorial roles at the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis.
The Whitney Biennial 2026, the 82nd edition of the longest-running survey of American art, opened with a stripped-down, self-referential title and no subtitle, reflecting a moment of national self-questioning. The exhibition features 56 artists, duos, and collectives, with highlights including Agosto Machado's shrine sculptures dedicated to friends lost to AIDS, Emilie Louise Gossiaux's tender works about her guide dog London, and Michelle Lopez's apocalyptic video projection *Pandemonium*. Machado, a longtime downtown New York artist and caregiver, died shortly after the biennial opened, and his ashes are to be mixed with those of Marsha P. Johnson and spread in the Hudson River.
This travel guide explores the cultural landscape of Northwest Arkansas, focusing on the upcoming 114,000-square-foot expansion of the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, set to open June 6, 2026. The author recounts a road trip from Little Rock to the Ozarks, visiting the Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts (with its new Studio Gang-designed building), dining at Coursey's Smoked Meats, and encountering a white supremacist billboard in Harrison, while also highlighting Thorncrown Chapel by E. Fay Jones as a transcendent architectural stop.
A rare 5.5-carat blue-green diamond ring, named Ocean Dream, sold for over $17 million at Christie’s Magnificent Jewels auction in Zurich on May 13, 2026. The triangular-cut stone, estimated at $9–12 million, is set in an 18-karat white gold band with pink and white diamonds. The buyer was an unnamed private client, and the ring took 20 minutes to sell. It had previously fetched nearly $10 million at Christie’s Geneva in 2014.
The 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair has returned to the Starrett-Lehigh Building in Chelsea, New York, featuring over 20 galleries from Africa and the diaspora, with a special focus on Brazil and Afro-Brazilian perspectives. The fair, running through Sunday, includes first-time participants from Lagos, São Paulo, Nassau, and New York, and highlights five standout booths: Sulette van der Merwe's surrealist paintings at Blond Contemporary, Modou Dieng Yacine's Senegalese wrestler-inspired works at 193 Gallery, Ekene Ijeoma's Black Forest Library community project, Rommulo Vieira Conceição's aluminum works at Aura, and the curated section "Brazil Beyond Brazil" featuring 10 artists selected by Igor Simões.
Jordan Eagles presents "Bases Loaded," a solo exhibition at Brooklyn's Pioneer Works that explores his lifelong fandom of the New York Mets through works made with donated blood and medical waste. The show features three bodies of work: large-scale reproductions of New York Post covers about the team, cast-resin sculptures of home plate filled with blood and family artifacts, and T-shirts given to blood donors at the Mets ballpark that Eagles cropped and splashed with blood from HIV-positive gay men, arranged by color into orange and grey factions.
London-based artist Anouska Samms has accused the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute and curator Andrew Bolton of displaying a garment in the spring 2026 exhibition "Costume Art" that she claims is a counterfeit of her collaborative work. Samms says the piece, titled Corpus Nervina 0.0, was inspired by a 2023 hair dress she co-created with fashion designer Yoav Hadari for his label Psycheangelic. Despite a contract giving Samms sole ownership of the hair-based textile's intellectual property, the museum's wall label credits only Hadari and states Samms's textile was not used. Samms's lawyer, Jon Sharples, says the museum initially expressed interest in acquiring the original dress but later shifted to a remake after Hadari reported water damage, then stalled entirely before the exhibition opened.
Richard Lewer has won the 2026 Archibald Prize, Australia's most prestigious portraiture award, for his portrait of Pitjantjatjara elder, traditional healer, and senior artist Iluwanti Ken. The $100,000 prize was announced at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, with the judging panel selecting the work unanimously from 59 finalists. Lewer, a six-time Archibald finalist, painted Ken life-size against a yellow ochre background, capturing her quiet authority and role as a working artist. The Wynne Prize for landscape painting was also awarded to Gaypalani Waṉambi for *The Waṉambi tree*.
Cooper Jacoby's sculptures at the Whitney Biennial explore how AI corporations and other companies turn personal data into financial assets. His five works, displayed in a green-carpeted space he describes as "almost like a rat trap," include the 2026 piece *Estate (July 10, 2022)*—a folding screen with an intercom that uses AI trained on social media posts from deceased creatives to generate vocal outputs. Another series, *Mutual Life*, features eye-like sculptures with clock hands that spin based on the biological age of anonymous individuals in the artist's network. Jacoby's work highlights the lack of regulation around digital life and death, and the opaque nature of AI systems.
Natasha Tontey's new installation "The Phantom Combatants" at the Ateneo Veneto in Venice reimagines the story of Len Karamoy, a woman who was part of the CIA-funded Permesta resistance movement in North Sulawesi, Indonesia (1957-1961). The 22-minute film, commissioned by the LAS foundation and Amos Rex, features absurdly muscular mutant warriors and draws on Indigenous belief systems, video games, Indonesian soap operas, and B-movie aesthetics to explore themes of autonomy, resistance, and historical perspective.
Pedro Reyes's new sculpture 'Tlali' (2026), a four-meter-tall Olmec-inspired volcanic-stone female face installed at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Lacma), has sparked criticism in Mexico. An open letter signed by nearly 80 cultural figures, published on the art criticism site Cubo Blanco, alleges the work is a new version of a 2021 project that was canceled after backlash. That earlier project, 'Tlalli', was meant to replace a Christopher Columbus statue on Mexico City's Paseo de la Reforma but faced opposition from over 300 cultural figures who argued a male, non-Indigenous artist should not represent Indigenous women. The site later became the 'Glorieta de las Mujeres que Luchan', an anti-monument against gender violence.
The Bahamas will return to the Venice Biennale in 2026 after a 13-year absence with a posthumous exhibition for artist John Beadle, who died in 2024 at age 60. Beadle was originally selected to represent the country in 2015 but the government withdrew funding. The exhibition, titled "In Another Man’s Yard," will feature Beadle’s work alongside that of his mentee, Lavar Munroe, using materials from Beadle’s studio including sails from Haitian migrant sloops. The pavilion is organized by commissioner Amanda Coulson and curator Krista Thompson, who raised private funds after the government declined to support the project.
Fiona Pardington has created a new series of human-scale photographic portraits of native New Zealand birds, many of which are extinct or endangered, using taxidermy specimens from regional museums. The series, titled "Taharaki Skyside," will be exhibited at the Aotearoa New Zealand pavilion at the 2026 Venice Biennale. Pardington, who has Māori and Scottish ancestry, incorporates the birds' eyes with superimposed historical landscapes to evoke their lost habitats and spiritual significance as intermediaries between human and divine worlds in Māori culture.
New York–based artist Guadalupe Maravilla, in Venice to install his work for the 2026 Venice Biennale, alleges he was racially profiled by police after leaving the Arsenale venue. Two officers demanded his documents, called backup, and attempted to handcuff him before he de-escalated the situation and left. Maravilla, known for his 'Disease Thrower' sculptures that address migration and healing, shared the incident on Instagram and provided a statement to ARTnews.
Artist Natasha Tontey will unveil a major immersive installation titled "The Phantom Combatants and the Metabolism of Disobedient Organs" during the Venice Biennale at the Ateneo Veneto di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti. Jointly commissioned by Berlin’s LAS Art Foundation and Helsinki’s Amos Rex, the work combines video, sound, light, and sculpture to reimagine the story of Len Karamoy, a combatant in the CIA-supported Permesta movement that fought the Indonesian government from 1957 to 1961 in North Sulawesi. Tontey, a Minahasan Indigenous artist, uses LiDAR, quantum ghost imaging, and other technologies to explore Indigenous identity, ecology, and the blurring of history and myth.
Yu Ji's solo exhibition at PPOW, New York, titled "Origin of the Tiger," presents sculptures and collages created after a residency she organized in Phnom Penh that offered art education to children. The show features works like reed mats with snail shells, a Sony Trinitron looping video, collaged drawings incorporating Cambodian children's art, and composite sculptures such as chairs with concrete knee casts and a figure inspired by a misattributed sixth-century Krishna statue. The exhibition draws on a Khmer folktale about transformation and includes audio of children reciting the story, though the children appear more as muses than collaborators.
Sara Shamma will represent Syria at the 61st Venice Biennale (2026) with a large-scale immersive installation titled *The Tower Tomb of Palmyra*. The 15-meter-high multisensory work combines painting, architecture, light, sound, and scent, inspired by the ancient funerary towers of Palmyra that were destroyed during the Syrian War. Shamma describes the piece as a reflection on loss, resilience, and cultural memory, and notes its resonance with the Biennale's theme, *In Minor Keys*, curated by Koyo Kouoh.
Wallace Chan returns to the Venice Biennale for the fourth time with 'Vessels of Other Worlds', a two-city exhibition opening at the Chapel of Santa Maria della Pietà in Venice on 8 May 2026 and continuing at the Long Museum West Bund in Shanghai from 18 July, coinciding with the artist's 70th birthday. Curated by James Putnam, the project features large-scale titanium sculptures that explore material transformation, perception, and metaphysical space, including a live video link between the two venues and an inhabitable mirrored sculpture at the Long Museum.
Sue Webster's solo exhibition 'Birth of an Icon' at Firstsite in Colchester traces her lifelong obsession with pop culture, from teenage fandom of Siouxsie Sioux to her evolution as an artist. The show features a sprawling installation 'The Crime Scene' (2017–) that maps her personal history through albums, newspaper clippings, and objects, alongside painted jackets and self-portraits. It marks a departure from her earlier work as half of the duo Tim Noble and Sue Webster, embracing a more personal, amateurish style that reflects her journey through adolescence, marriage dissolution, and motherhood.
Chanel will launch an annual, one-year fellowship in fall 2026 in collaboration with the Guggenheim. The Chanel Culture Fund Fellowship will host a fellow in New York and at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice, targeting MA and PhD-level scholars dedicated to collection studies and curatorial research. The program complements existing Guggenheim fellowship and internship programs, aiming to nurture emerging talent in modern and contemporary art curation.
Nearly eighty Mexican cultural figures have signed an open letter condemning the installation of Pedro Reyes's sculpture 'Tlali' (2026) in the plaza of LACMA's new David Geffen Galleries. The work, described as a selfie-friendly monolithic face inspired by Olmec art, closely resembles a 2021 proposal for a Mexico City sculpture titled 'Tlalli' that was abandoned after protests from hundreds of cultural workers. Critics argue that Reyes, a male artist who does not identify as Indigenous, should not represent Indigenous womanhood, and that the new work perpetuates colonial stereotypes and nationalistic aesthetics. LACMA has defended the piece, claiming it is entirely different in purpose and meaning, while Reyes has not commented.
Intervista al grande scultore Charles Ray che a Los Angeles si mostra in due diverse gallerie
Charles Ray, the renowned American sculptor, opened two simultaneous solo exhibitions in Los Angeles on April 18, one at Matthew Marks Gallery and the other at Jeffrey Deitch Gallery, located about a mile apart. The Matthew Marks show features three new works, including "Junk 2" (2026) and "The Animation of Pandora" (2026), while the Deitch exhibition presents three older iconic pieces such as "Firetruck" (1993), "Pepto-Bismol in a Marble Box" (1988), and "Table" (1990). Ray, who has lived in Los Angeles for four decades, is known for his meticulous, slow-working process and his exploration of the human body and everyday objects at altered scales.
Hyperallergic's daily newsletter announces that Noah Fischer's comic "Prospect Heights Ghost Story" won a 2026 New York Press Club Award, thanks to collaboration with the Economic Hardship Project (EHRP). The edition also covers anti-Trump guerrilla protest art in Washington, D.C., including an arcade game titled "Operation Epic Furious: Strait to Hell" that satirizes the White House's foreign policy. Other stories include Ridgewood, Queens emerging as a new art hotspot, a feature on Francisco de Zurbarán's religious paintings, and Paddy Johnson's guide to what an "Artist Corporation" (A-Corp) is and whether artists should start one. The newsletter also reports that the Belgian Pavilion at the Venice Biennale closed on May 8 as part of cultural workers' strike for Palestine, and that nearly half of the artists in the international exhibition plus 22 national pavilions withdrew from awards consideration in solidarity with the jury's resignation.
Fair Warning, the members-only online sales platform founded by former Christie's rainmaker Loïc Gouzer, is staging a rare live auction on May 20 at Tiffany & Co.'s flagship store in New York. The centerpiece is Banksy's *Girl and Balloon on Found Landscape* (2012), a work from the artist's 'Crude Oils' series that has never been publicly exhibited. Consigned by a private collector, the painting carries an ambitious estimate of $13 million–$18 million, one of the highest ever for a Banksy. Gouzer argues that Banksy is among the most consequential artists of our time, comparing his trajectory to Jean-Michel Basquiat, and sees this sale as a landmark moment for the artist's market.
Ei Arakawa-Nash, a Japanese-born artist who no longer holds Japanese citizenship, will represent Japan at the Venice Biennale with an exhibition titled "Grass Babies, Moon Babies." The pavilion will feature over 100 baby dolls that visitors are invited to adopt and carry, engaging in caregiving tasks such as changing a nappy. Each doll corresponds to a historically significant date tied to minority communities, linking intimate acts of care to broader historical narratives. The project also includes a collaboration with the Korean Pavilion, marking the first such partnership between the two national pavilions in Biennale history.
The article is a personal tribute by curator Erin Christovale to the late artist Ulysses Jenkins (1946–2026), chronicling their decade-long friendship and collaboration. Christovale recounts how she first encountered Jenkins's video work at the William Grant Still Arts Center in Los Angeles, and how a conversation with Otolith Group's Kodwo Eshun led to her curating Jenkins's work. She describes key moments including Jenkins's video "Planet X" (2006) about Hurricane Katrina, his 1979 work "Two-Zone Transfer" featuring Kerry James Marshall in blackface masks, and the 2021 retrospective "Ulysses Jenkins: Without Your Interpretation" co-curated with Meg Onli at the Institute of Contemporary Art Philadelphia, which later traveled to the Hammer Museum and Julia Stoschek Foundation.
È il grande Mark Rothko a guidare le prime aste di Sotheby’s a New York
Sotheby's kicked off New York's art and auction week with two major sales on May 14, 2026, led by the highly anticipated Robert Mnuchin: Collector at Heart Evening Auction. The top lot was Mark Rothko's "Brown and Blacks in Reds" (1957), which sold for $85.8 million, the second-highest price ever for the artist at auction. The Mnuchin auction achieved a "white glove" sale, selling all 11 lots for a total of $166.3 million, followed by The Now & Contemporary Evening Auction which brought in $266.8 million. Combined, Sotheby's generated $433.1 million, a 133% increase over its May 2025 session. The sales reflect a strong return of high-value trophy lots to the secondary market, driven by the dispersal of prominent collectors' estates.
Art Busan, celebrating its 15th anniversary, will be held from May 21 to 24, 2026, at BEXCO in Busan, South Korea, bringing together over 110 galleries from 18 countries. The fair introduces two new integrated segments: DEFINE, which expands the fair to include collectible design, furniture, and craft, and LIGHTHAUS, which transforms gallery booths into curated spatial experiences to encourage deeper engagement. These initiatives aim to move beyond purely transactional sales and speculative momentum.
Kiki Smith, a multidisciplinary artist born in 1954, is the subject of an exhibition titled "Flight" at Galerie Lelong. The show features bronzes, stained glass, and drawings in which birds and nature reflect human emotions, continuing her 40-year exploration of the unity of living things—human, animal, and plant—from the microscopic to the cosmic. The article, published in L'ŒIL no. 796 on June 1, 2026, is behind a paywall.