Art News. Vasari Codex

trending_up market schedule Nov 13, 2025 visibility 11 link 2 artists

metallica kirk hammett conan frank frazetta

Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett is auctioning Frank Frazetta's painting *Conan the Berserker* (1967), which he purchased directly from the artist for $1 million in 2009. The work, originally used as cover art for a paperback edition of Robert E. Howard's novel *Conan the Conqueror*, will be offered in Heritage Auctions' “Hollywood/Entertainment Signature Auction” on December 9–10, with bidding starting at $10 million. The sale follows a record-breaking Frazetta auction in September, when his oil painting *Man Ape* (1966) sold for $13.5 million.

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person people schedule Nov 13, 2025 visibility 16 link 1 artist

j paul getty trust glenn lowry lionel sauvage board

The J. Paul Getty Trust has appointed Glenn D. Lowry, former director of New York's Museum of Modern Art, and Lionel M. Sauvage, a French philanthropist and collector, to its board of trustees, effective in 2026. Lowry led MoMA for 30 years, overseeing major expansions and the integration of PS1, while Sauvage holds leadership roles at Les Arts Décoratifs and other cultural institutions.

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article culture schedule Nov 10, 2025 visibility 17 link 4 artists

rosalia lux patti smith la yugular

Rosalía's fourth studio album, *LUX*, features a recording of Patti Smith from a 1976 interview on the closing track "La Yugular." The article describes Rosalía's admiration for Smith, recounting a meeting where Smith complimented her dress and discussed the song. Smith's influence is highlighted through her music, memoir *Just Kids*, and her artistic practice in photography and mixed media, including her first solo exhibition at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in 2011. Smith also recently released a new memoir, *Bread of Angels*.

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museum exhibitions schedule Nov 7, 2025 visibility 17 link 6 artists

erwin olaf freedom retrospective stedelijk

The Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam has opened "Erwin Olaf—Freedom," a major retrospective of the late Dutch photographer Erwin Olaf, who died in 2023 at age 64. The exhibition spans over a dozen rooms, showcasing his diverse output from subcultural documentation and commercial work to staged tableaux, self-portraits, and club ephemera, alongside video and sculpture. It juxtaposes formally refined portraits, such as Queen Máxima, with provocative early works like "Joy" (1985), refusing to impose a single narrative on his career.

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article news schedule Oct 29, 2025 visibility 12 link 2 artists

perez art museum miami billboard lawsuit

Miami's Frost Museum of Science has filed a lawsuit against the Florida Department of Transportation seeking the removal of a giant digital billboard on the grounds of the Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM). The 1,800-square-foot sign, which advertises luxury brands like Tiffany and Yves Saint Laurent alongside PAMM programming, was built under a 2023 city commission exception that allowed billboards nearly twice the legal size limit. That exception was later overturned amid controversy over campaign contributions from the billboard's operator, Orange Barrel Media, to the commissioner who introduced it. PAMM argues the sign was approved by all relevant authorities, while Frost Science claims it violates state law, degrades the museum environment, and jeopardizes federal highway funding.

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museum exhibitions schedule Oct 17, 2025 visibility 13 link 7 artists

robert rauschenberg dance guggenheim

A gala performance at the Guggenheim Museum in New York marked what would have been Robert Rauschenberg's 100th birthday, featuring dancers performing Paul Taylor's 'Tracer' (1962), for which Rauschenberg created costumes and sets—including a spinning bicycle wheel that served as a portal to the exhibition above. The show, 'Robert Rauschenberg: Life Can’t Be Stopped,' opened in one of the museum's tower galleries and runs through May 3, presenting select works from the Guggenheim's collections and loans from the artist's foundation, including major pieces like 'Barge' (1962–63), the largest silkscreen painting Rauschenberg made in the early 1960s, back in New York for the first time in nearly 25 years.

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trending_up market schedule Oct 16, 2025 visibility 23 link 2 artists, 3 galleries

pace japan director tokyo interview

Kyoko Hattori, vice president of Pace Japan, expressed her desire for Tokyo to become the center of art in Asia in a recent interview with the Japan Times. This comes one month after the third edition of Tokyo Gendai art fair closed with solid but unspectacular sales. Pace, the only mega-gallery with a location in Tokyo, opened a space in the Azabudai Hills development, which has been seen as a signal of the city's arrival on the global art stage. The article notes cautiously optimistic data, with Japan seeing 2 percent growth in the art market last year while the wider market contracted by 12 percent, and competitors China and Korea saw significant drops.

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article news schedule Oct 15, 2025 visibility 25 link 7 artists

leading artists call for nationwide resistance against authoritarian forces

Visual artist Dread Scott, playwright Lynn Nottage, and dozens of cultural figures have launched "Fall of Freedom," a nationwide weekend of creative demonstrations scheduled for November 21–22, 2025, to protest rising authoritarianism under the Trump administration. The project invites arts communities to organize independent actions—such as storefront readings, pop-up performances, exhibitions, and workshops—at museums, galleries, classrooms, comedy clubs, or any community gathering space. Participating institutions include the Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, which will host a "Wear Your Rights" silk-screening workshop, and New York's Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art, which will turn a gallery into a library of queer art activism books. Other notable participants include artists Marilyn Minter, Robert Longo, and Amy Sherald, who recently canceled a Smithsonian exhibition after concerns over her painting of a Black transgender Statue of Liberty.

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article culture schedule Oct 15, 2025 visibility 15 link 6 artists

art heist that inspired the mastermind

Kelly Reichardt's new film *The Mastermind*, starring Josh O'Connor, depicts a low-stakes art heist at the fictional Framingham Museum of Art, inspired by a real 1972 theft at the Worcester Art Museum in Massachusetts. In the actual heist, two robbers stole four paintings by Rembrandt, Picasso, and Gauguin, worth about $7.72 million today, and shot an unarmed guard. The film, set in the early '70s, draws on details like two schoolgirls who witnessed the crime, but Reichardt deliberately makes the cinematic version less thrilling than the real event.

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trending_up market schedule Oct 9, 2025 visibility 27 link 18 artists

christies arnold joan saltzman fernand leger picasso matisse

Christie’s will sell over 70 works from the collection of Arnold and Joan Saltzman during its fall marquee sales in November, with a group estimate exceeding $70 million. The modern art collection includes pieces by Pablo Picasso, Fernand Léger, Edvard Munch, František Kupka, Robert Delaunay, Henri Matisse, and Henry Moore. The top lot is Léger’s 1914 painting *Composition (Nature Morte)*, estimated around $20 million, from his celebrated 'Contraste de formes' series. Other highlights include Henry Moore’s bronze sculpture *Reclining Woman: Elbow* (1981), estimated at $9–12 million, and Henri Matisse’s *Femme au chapeau fleuri* (1923), estimated around $10 million. The collection, built over 60 years, will be featured in Christie’s 20th century evening sale on November 17 and day sales on November 18.

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article news schedule Oct 8, 2025 visibility 19 link 6 artists

admiral nelsons sexuality in spotlight once again after war hero branded queer by british museum

The Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool, UK, has included British naval hero Horatio Nelson in a "Queer relationships" collection, citing his contested final words "Kiss me, Hardy" as evidence. The museum added Daniel Maclise's *The Death of Nelson* (1859-1864) and Benjamin West's 1806 painting of the same name to an online article about LGBTQ+ love. This follows a similar move by London's National Maritime Museum, which examined Nelson through a "queer lens" during a "Queer History Night" event last year.

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trending_up market schedule Oct 7, 2025 visibility 22 link 1 artist, 1 gallery

wade guyton artwork inigo philbricks flops at sothebys

A Wade Guyton artwork (2007) that was forfeited by Inigo Philbrick's business partner Robert Newland failed to sell at Sotheby's New York in late March 2025, carrying an estimate of $200,000 to $300,000. The same piece had previously sold for $208,000 at a U.S. Marshals Service auction in Texas in August 2023, a steep decline from its $490,000 sale at Sotheby's in 2015. Another Guyton from the same forfeiture—a 2018 piece owned by Philbrick himself—sold for $215,100 at the Texas auction, representing a 65% drop from its 2018 Christie's Paris sale of €535,500 (about $625,000). The article also notes a curious discrepancy: the Texas auction catalog listed a Phillips auction house label on the 2007 Guyton, but Phillips does not appear in the work's provenance, and Philbrick was known to do business with Phillips.

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person people schedule Oct 6, 2025 visibility 17 link 7 artists

frick collection chief curator aimee ng

The Frick Collection in New York has promoted Aimee Ng to chief curator, effective November. She succeeds Xavier F. Salomon, who is leaving to become director of the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum in Lisbon. Ng, a curator at the Frick since 2015, has organized exhibitions on Italian Renaissance artists and co-curated the landmark 2023 show "Barkley L. Hendricks: Portraits at the Frick." Her appointment is the second senior leadership choice under director Axel Rüger, who joined in March ahead of the museum's long-awaited reopening.

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article culture schedule Sep 24, 2025 visibility 14 link 9 artists, 1 gallery

roberta smith interviews larry gagosian

Roberta Smith, the former New York Times co-chief art critic, interviews Larry Gagosian, the world's most famous art dealer, for Numero magazine. The conversation covers Gagosian's hands-on management of his 18 galleries, his admission of mistakes in closing locations in San Francisco and Geneva, and his view of his galleries as tryout spaces akin to off-Broadway. Gagosian shares anecdotes about his first Picasso purchase at Sotheby's for $900,000 (now worth $40 million), his early shows featuring David Salle and Warhol's Oxidation paintings, and his regret over selling Eli Broad's Basquiat skull painting for $80,000. Smith recalls attending Gagosian's first New York show in the 1970s, and the two reflect on their long, distant acquaintance.

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trending_up market schedule Sep 15, 2025 visibility 19 link 12 artists

leonard lauder sothebys klimt matisse

Sotheby's has secured a major consignment of approximately $400 million in art from the collection of the late Leonard Lauder, who died in July at age 92. The highlight is Gustav Klimt's "Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer" (1914–16), expected to fetch over $150 million, potentially shattering Klimt's auction record. The sale also includes two other Klimt landscapes, six bronzes by Henri Matisse, a $20 million Edvard Munch painting, and an Agnes Martin work, totaling 55 artworks. The auction will inaugurate Sotheby's new space in the former Whitney Museum building, designed by Marcel Breuer.

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trending_up market schedule Sep 9, 2025 visibility 17 link 15 artists

elaine wynn francis bacon lacma christies november auction

The estate of Elaine Wynn, the late casino magnate and top art collector who died in April 2024, has announced plans for her renowned collection. Francis Bacon's triptych *Three Studies of Lucian Freud* (1969)—which Wynn purchased for a record $142.2 million at Christie's in 2013—will be donated to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), where she served as board cochair. The painting, the first Bacon to enter LACMA's collection, will debut in the museum's new David Geffen Galleries when they open next year. Separately, Christie's will auction 20 works from Wynn's collection across three sales in New York this November, with estimates totaling at least $75 million. Highlights include Richard Diebenkorn's *Ocean Park #40* (1971), Lucian Freud's *The Painter Surprised by a Naked Admirer* (2004–05), Joan Mitchell's *Sunflower V* (1969), and J.M.W. Turner's *Ehrenbreitstein* (1835).

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article culture schedule Sep 9, 2025 visibility 19 link 5 artists

jason wu the robert rauschenberg foundation collaborate new york fashion week

Fashion designer Jason Wu has collaborated with the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation to create a Spring 2026 collection titled "COLLAGE," inspired by the late artist's work and presented during New York Fashion Week. The collection draws on ten works from the foundation's holdings, including pieces from Rauschenberg's "Hoarfrost" series (1974–76) and "Airport Suite" (1974), with Wu granted rare access to study the artist's use of fabric and collage. The collection will be shown alongside a major Rauschenberg piece on September 14, 2025, and will be available for purchase in February 2026.

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person people schedule Aug 20, 2025 visibility 20 link 2 artists

brian ferriso named director dallas museum of art

The Dallas Museum of Art (DMA) has appointed Brian Ferriso, the longtime director of the Portland Art Museum (PAM), as its next director, effective December 1. Ferriso succeeds Agustín Arteaga, who left last year to lead the Crocker Art Museum in Sacramento. During his 18-year tenure at PAM, Ferriso grew the endowment by $40 million, eliminated $7 million in debt, doubled curatorial staff, and made the museum free for visitors 17 and under. He also oversaw major collection diversification, co-commissioned Jeffrey Gibson’s U.S. Pavilion at the 2024 Venice Biennale, and will open a 100,000-square-foot expansion funded by a $140 million capital campaign.

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article culture schedule Aug 18, 2025 visibility 19 link 12 artists

spike lee art collection highest 2 lowest

Spike Lee's new film *Highest 2 Lowest*, an English-language reinterpretation of Akira Kurosawa's *High and Low*, prominently features artworks from Lee's personal collection—or replicas of them—as set decoration. Production designer Mark Friedberg used Lee's collection, previously surveyed at the Brooklyn Museum in 2023, as a reference to establish the character of music tycoon David King, played by Denzel Washington. Works by Jean-Michel Basquiat, Kehinde Wiley, Deborah Roberts, Gordon Parks, Henry Taylor, and others appear in the film, including Basquiat's *Horn Players* (1983) and *Now's the Time* (1985), Tim Okamura's portrait of Toni Morrison, and pieces from Andy Warhol's 'Muhammed Ali' series.

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candle obituary schedule Aug 11, 2025 visibility 33 link 46 artists, 1 gallery

legendary art collector sylvio perlstein has died

Sylvio Perlstein, the legendary art collector, patron, and impresario, died on August 6. Hauser & Wirth confirmed the news, calling him a visionary who shaped one of the most important art collections of the past century. In 2018, the gallery exhibited 380 pieces from his collection across its Chelsea and Hong Kong locations in the show 'The Sylvio Perlstein Collection – A Luta Continua'. Perlstein was born in Belgium in the 1930s, fled to Brazil with his family during World War II, and later joined the diamond business in Antwerp. His collection spanned Dada, Surrealism, American minimalism, and Land art, featuring works by Man Ray, René Magritte, Donald Judd, and many others. He maintained close friendships with artists and displayed works throughout his Paris home, which cultural critic Arthur Lubow described as 'a contemporary version of Ali Baba's cave'.

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museum exhibitions schedule Aug 11, 2025 visibility 25 link 18 artists

aspen air festival 2025

The inaugural AIR festival took place in Aspen as part of Aspen Art Week, featuring a mix of talks, performances, and a closed-door retreat for artists, writers, scientists, and theorists. Highlights included a pack of panting huskies, a psychoanalysis talk in a psychedelic chapel, an artist conversing with his AI doppelganger, and a whispery musical performance on a museum rooftop. The festival kicked off with a film by Apichatpong Weerasethakul accompanied by composer Rafiq Bhatia, followed by discussions on dreaming and catastrophe, and site-responsive works by Jota Mombaça and Paul Chan.

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candle obituary schedule Aug 3, 2025 visibility 23 link 14 artists, 2 galleries

robert wilson theatre director artist dead

Robert Wilson, the influential playwright and artist known for his spare, slow-moving productions that blurred the line between performance art and theater, died Thursday at age 83 in Water Mill, New York. His death was announced by the Watermill Center, the arts center he founded, which stated he died of a brief but acute illness. Wilson's career spanned stage works like the landmark 1976 opera *Einstein on the Beach* (with Philip Glass and Lucinda Childs), video portraits of figures such as Lady Gaga and Brad Pitt, and sculptures, all characterized by stillness and a radical use of time.

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article news schedule Jul 29, 2025 visibility 20 link 4 artists

john roberts smithsonian kim sajet firing

Kim Sajet, the former director of the Smithsonian-run National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., resigned after President Donald Trump claimed he fired her via social media. Despite Trump's demand, Sajet continued reporting to work until formally quitting. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., chancellor of the Smithsonian Institution, intervened to block internal board suggestions to follow Trump's orders, leading the board to issue a resolution affirming its sole authority to fire museum directors. The controversy followed Trump's executive order accusing the Smithsonian of promoting a "divisive, race-centered ideology" and his post calling Sajet a "highly partisan person" and "strong supporter of DEI." Separately, artist Amy Sherald withdrew her mid-career survey from the National Portrait Gallery after being asked to remove a portrait of a trans woman posing as the Statue of Liberty.

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trending_up market schedule Jul 24, 2025 visibility 21 link 17 artists

albright college collection sale reading museum

Albright College in Reading, Pennsylvania, has sold its Freedman Gallery collection for $995,000 to address budget deficits, despite immediate pushback from faculty, community members, and the Freedman family. The Reading Public Museum acquired more than 250 works through a pre-sale agreement, selecting pieces that enhance its holdings, include renowned masters, or have local resonance. The remaining works were auctioned online by Pook and Pook on July 16, surpassing presale estimates, with top lots by Salvador Dalí and Leonid Sokov.

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museum exhibitions schedule Jul 23, 2025 visibility 23 link 5 artists

guggenheim rauschenberg 100th birthday

Two major New York museums are celebrating the centennial of Robert Rauschenberg's (1925–2008) birth this fall with exhibitions that spotlight lesser-known chapters of his career. At the Guggenheim New York, the monumental silkscreen painting "Barge" (1962–63) returns to New York in October for the first time in nearly 25 years as part of a show titled "Life Can't Be Stopped." The Museum of the City of New York (MCNY) will showcase Rauschenberg's undersung photography work focused on New York City. Neither exhibition features his famous "Combines," instead highlighting other aspects of his wide-ranging practice. The Guggenheim's show is part of its new "Focus" series, launched in November 2024, which aims to highlight the museum's collection.

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article news schedule Jul 16, 2025 visibility 17 link 5 artists

barbara guggenheim abigail asher lawsuit

Barbara Guggenheim Associates, Inc., a New York art advisory firm, is embroiled in legal conflict after founder Barbara Guggenheim and her longtime associate Abigail Asher filed dueling lawsuits in the Supreme Court of the State of New York. Guggenheim’s suit, filed in August but only recently reported by Artnet News, accuses Asher of diverting some $20.5 million in firm revenue for personal expenses, including rent, dinner bills, and home repairs, and alleges Asher wrongfully kept commissions from a Jean-Michel Basquiat artwork. Asher countersued, accusing Guggenheim of bullying, gaslighting, and using firm funds for personal costs like funeral expenses and luxury vehicles, while denying the financial misconduct claims. The lawsuits also involve the firm’s CPA, Robert Mandeltort, and Asher’s assistant, Jessica Lewis.

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museum exhibitions schedule Jul 14, 2025 visibility 18 link 14 artists, 2 galleries

zero art fair new york free art

The Zero Art Fair, running through Saturday at the Flag Art Foundation in Chelsea, New York, offers visitors the unusual option of taking artworks home for free. Co-founded by artists Jennifer Dalton and William Powhida, the fair operates on a model where buyers can either purchase a piece outright or acquire it at no cost, with the condition that their name appears on a public registry and they agree to lend the work for exhibitions. If no paying buyer emerges after five years, the free acquirer keeps the work permanently. The fair's first edition took place during Upstate Art Week in a Hudson Valley barn, and this second edition is supported by sponsors including collector Glenn Fuhrman's Flag Art Foundation and Gagosian gallery.

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trending_up market schedule Jul 9, 2025 visibility 22 link 18 artists

crystal bridges art bridges horseman collection native art

Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art and the Art Bridges Foundation in Bentonville, Arkansas, have acquired 90 works of contemporary Native art from the John and Susan Horseman Collection. The acquisition includes pieces by prominent Indigenous artists such as Kent Monkman, Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, Kay WalkingStick, and Cannupa Hanska Luger. Nine works will go to Crystal Bridges, while the remaining 81 will join Art Bridges' collection, which now totals around 250 works, with Native art making up a third. The works will be displayed in upcoming exhibitions at the Alice L. Walton School of Medicine and Crystal Bridges' expanded campus, with loans to partner institutions planned.

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trending_up market schedule Jul 3, 2025 visibility 16 link 13 artists

turner rediscovered masterpiece auction

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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article news schedule Jul 2, 2025 visibility 19 link 4 artists

khaled sabsabi reinstated for venice biennale

Creative Australia has reinstated Lebanese-born artist Khaled Sabsabi and curator Michael Dagostino as the representatives for Australia's pavilion at the 2026 Venice Biennale, following an independent review and months of public backlash. The pair were initially removed in February after a column in The Australian criticized Sabsabi's 2007 video installation "You," which includes manipulated footage of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, accusing the artist and curator of favoring boycotts of Israel. The abrupt removal prompted resignations from senior Creative Australia staff and board members, widespread condemnation from the art community, and an open letter from shortlisted pavilion candidates demanding reinstatement.

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