‘Scandalous’ $60 Million Modigliani Nude Headlines Sotheby’s Lewis Collection Sale

Sotheby's announced that Modigliani's 'Nu assis au collier' (1917), estimated at £45 million ($60.6 million), will headline the single-owner auction of portraits from British billionaire Joe Lewis's collection. The painting, one of only seven full nudes from Modigliani's scandalous 1917 solo show that was shut down by police for indecency, returns to auction for the first time in over 30 years. Sotheby's specialist Oliver Barker noted rising interest in Modigliani, citing Johnny Depp's 2024 biopic and a new catalogue raisonné by Marc Restellini. The work last sold in 1995 for $12.4 million and will be offered on June 24, with public viewing in London from June 10–23.

Photographs of Barbara Hepworth and Ben Nicholson’s shared studio go on show in London

The Courtauld Gallery in London is presenting an exhibition of 23 black-and-white photographs taken by Paul Laib in 1932-33, documenting the shared Hampstead studio of sculptor Barbara Hepworth and painter Ben Nicholson. The images, drawn from a larger archive of 22,000 glass-plate negatives gifted to the Courtauld in 1974, reveal the creative partnership between the two artists, who were a couple from 1931 to 1951. The show includes fourteen vintage prints and nine modern prints, curated by Chloe Nahum and Gerlind May, and runs from 6 June to 4 October.

A MoMA Retrospective Proves Duchamp Was More Sincere Than He Seems

A new retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York surveys the full career of Marcel Duchamp, featuring 300 works across media. The exhibition traces his evolution from early paintings—such as a placid chess scene of his brothers and the watercolor *Woman Hack Driver* (1907)—through his iconic readymades like *Pharmacy* (1914) and *Nude Descending a Staircase* (1911–12), to the monumental *The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors, Even* (The Large Glass, 1915–23). It is the first comprehensive survey of Duchamp's oeuvre since 1973, and includes reproductions, facsimiles, and even contemporary caricatures from the American press.

Museums across North America hope to score with World Cup programmes

Museums across North America are launching sports-themed programming ahead of the 2026 FIFA World Cup, aiming to bridge political and cultural divides between the US, Canada, and Mexico. The Pérez Art Museum Miami (Pamm) opened the exhibition "Get in the Game: Sports, Art, Culture" (originating from SFMOMA) with a conference called "Game Time" featuring artists, athletes, and curators. Artist Hank Willis Thomas discussed his quilted replica of Picasso's Guernica made from sports uniforms, framing sports as sublimated combat and highlighting labor inequities. Other institutions, like LACMA, are also presenting football-related shows.

A Guide to Museum Mile, New York’s Premier Cultural Corridor

The article serves as a guide to New York City's Museum Mile, highlighting the annual Museum Mile Festival on June 9, which closes Fifth Avenue to traffic and offers free admission and special programs at a core group of about eight museums. It provides an overview of key institutions including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Neue Galerie New York, the Guggenheim Museum, and the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, noting upcoming exhibitions such as "Musical Bodies" at the Met and a Carol Bove survey at the Guggenheim, as well as the Met's planned merger with the Neue Galerie in 2028.

Pace Gallery Downsizes, Cutting Artists and Staff

Pace Gallery, a major force in the contemporary art market, is cutting approximately 50 artists and estates from its roster of over 130 names and laying off about 50 of its 250 staff members. CEO Marc Glimcher announced the downsizing, citing a broken gallery model and a prolonged downturn in the market for contemporary art. The gallery plans to focus on around 80 artists going forward, dropping names such as Keith Coventry, Glenn Kaino, teamLab, and John Gerrard, while retaining recent additions like Anicka Yi and the estate of Constantin Brancusi. Pace will continue to participate in major art fairs, including Art Basel in Switzerland.

Emily Sargent’s Watercolors Arrive at Auction After Decades Hidden in a Trunk

A cache of 19 watercolors by Emily Sargent, the sister of famed painter John Singer Sargent, is heading to auction at Dreweatts in Newbury, England, on July 7, with an upper estimate of £102,000 ($137,000). The works were discovered in a forgotten trunk in 1998 by a descendant, and over a third of the original 440 watercolors have since been donated to major U.S. and U.K. museums. The sale also includes seven works by John Singer Sargent, bringing the total estimate to £489,000 ($658,000). Emily Sargent, who suffered from a childhood spinal injury, began painting in her 30s and traveled extensively with her brother, producing accomplished watercolors that showcase her skill with composition and light.

‘A kind of reconnecting with the past’: the Met celebrates the art of the portrait

The Metropolitan Museum of Art has opened a new exhibition, 'The Face of Modern Life,' featuring nearly 80 works from its permanent collection that challenge traditional definitions of portraiture. Curated by Stephanie D’Alessandro, the show includes pieces by Max Beckmann, Wifredo Lam, Pablo Picasso, and Joan Miró, among others, exploring how portraits can be rooted in memory, myth, and abstraction rather than mere physical likeness. Highlights include Picasso's iconic portrait of Gertrude Stein and Lam's recent acquisition 'Ídolo,' which draws on Santería imagery.

Art Basel Reveals More Participating Galleries and the Artists Selected for its ‘Exclusive’ Initiative, Which Withholds Artworks from Email Previews

Art Basel has announced that 193 of its 232 main-sector exhibitors (83%) have signed on to a new initiative called Basel Exclusive, which requires participating galleries to withhold at least one artwork—or their entire presentation—from emailed PDF previews sent to collectors and advisors before the fair opens. The initiative debuts at the upcoming Art Basel in Basel (June 18–21, with VIP previews June 16–17) and includes major galleries such as Gagosian, Hauser & Wirth, David Zwirner, and Pace, as well as smaller venues like Bortolami and James Cohan. About 230 artists are covered, including Jean-Michel Basquiat, Louise Bourgeois, Alexander Calder, David Hockney, and Andy Warhol. Participating galleries will be marked on floor plans, and selected works will be highlighted by plaques.

Citing “Unfixable” Gallery Model, Pace Makes Deep Cuts to Artist Roster, Staff

Pace Gallery has cut fifty artists from its roster of 135 and eliminated fifty of its 250 staff, according to a New York Times report. The layoffs were announced before staff were notified, with a town hall scheduled for the following morning. CEO Marc Glimcher stated that the current gallery model is "unfixable" and that Pace is returning to its roots by focusing on around 80 artists, including an intergenerational mix. Among the dropped artists are Glenn Kaino, Keith Coventry, John Gerrard, TeamLab, and several others, while the gallery retains its blue-chip status alongside Gagosian, Hauser & Wirth, and Zwirner.

Inside Chicago’s Obama Center

The article reports on the upcoming opening of the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago's Jackson Park, a new $850 million campus designed to embody the legacy of Barack and Michelle Obama. It features artworks by Idris Khan, Maya Lin, and others, and is set to open to the public later this month. The piece also covers a planned nationwide strike by Italian cultural workers on June 12, demanding better working conditions and solidarity with Palestine, and notes controversial renderings of a Penn Station redesign that prominently display Trump's name.

Sanford Wurmfeld’s Unstable Geometry

Hyperallergic reviews Sanford Wurmfeld's exhibition "Squares 1971–74" at Ceysson & Bénétière in New York, featuring six paintings and one study from 1971 to 1974. The show highlights Wurmfeld's methodical exploration of color through gridded compositions of one-inch squares, using a limited palette of four hues to create optical interactions that shift as the viewer looks. Wurmfeld, who was the youngest artist in MoMA's 1968 "Art of the Real" exhibition, has long operated under the radar of the New York art world.

Cats, flowers and Harry Hill’s car on fire – RA Summer Exhibition review

The 2024 Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, coordinated by conceptual artist Ryan Gander, is reviewed as being less awful than usual. Gander introduces strangeness to the historic open-submission show, including a video of Bowie karaoke and a disembodied corpse in a living-room installation. The exhibition features thousands of works, from amateur flower drawings to pieces by Tracey Emin, Antony Gormley, and Sean Scully, alongside standout contributions from Harry Hill (paintings of cars on fire), Harriet Porter, and Glen Pudvine. The review notes the show's overwhelming density and its function as a buying opportunity for the public.

5 Books on Steffani Jemison’s Shelf

Artist Steffani Jemison, whose work appears in the New Museum's "New Humans" exhibition, shares five books from her shelf in an interview with ARTnews. She discusses John Keene's "Counternarratives" and Kevin Quashie's "Black Aliveness," among others, explaining how these texts inform her practice, which moves between writing and visual art and explores alternative literacies, historical gaps, and Black world-making.

Crystal Bridges’s New Expansion Makes Room for More of Its Story

Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art will unveil a 114,000-square-foot expansion on June 6–7, 2025, designed by architect Moshe Safdie, who also designed the original 2011 campus. The expansion includes two new galleries—one for contemporary art and one for temporary exhibitions—a Learning and Engagement Hub with ceramic and artmaking studios, artist-in-residence spaces, a café called Quartz and Honey, and five acres of landscaped trails, gardens, and a pond. Museum founder Alice Walton insisted Safdie remain the architect despite his age, accelerating a 50-year plan into a five-year timeline.

Crystal Bridges To Open $150 Million, 100,000 Square Foot Expansion

Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas, will unveil a $150 million expansion to the public on June 6–7, adding 114,000 square feet of new space. Designed by Safdie Architects, the project increases exhibition space by 50 percent and includes new galleries, a restaurant, artist-in-residence studios, a ceramic-making space, and five acres of forest trails. The expansion also features a 14,000-square-foot Learning and Engagement Hub and 29,000 square feet of new gallery space.

Miami Beach’s Bass Museum of Art hires Philippe Vergne as artistic director and chief curator

The Bass Museum of Art in Miami Beach has appointed Philippe Vergne as its inaugural artistic director and chief curator. Vergne joins from the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art in Porto, where he led the institution's expansion with the Álvaro Siza Wing, inaugurated in 2024. He succeeds former chief curator James Voorhies and will work alongside executive director Silvia Karman Cubiñá. The new role was created organically to leverage Vergne's extensive experience with artist commissions and project oversight, including past curatorial work such as co-organizing the 2006 Whitney Biennial and solo exhibitions of artists like Kara Walker, Yves Klein, and Mike Kelley.

Bricking it! How a ‘crinkle crankle’ wall reinvented the Serpentine Pavilion

Lanza Atelier, a Mexico City-based studio founded by Isabel Abascal and Alessandro Arienzo, has designed the 2025 Serpentine Pavilion in London's Kensington Gardens. The pavilion features a 'crinkle-crankle' wall—a wavy, single-brick-thick structure historically used in rural Suffolk and introduced by Dutch engineers in the 17th century. The design reinterprets this form as a gathering space, with a flat glass roof, steel grid, and fixed louvres, alluding to the Serpentine pond and existing tree canopies.

18 must-see exhibitions for a European art road trip this summer

This article highlights 18 must-see art exhibitions across Europe for summer 2026, featuring major solo shows by artists such as Cecilia Vicuña at the Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin, Yayoi Kusama at Museum Ludwig in Cologne, Ruth Asawa at the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Marina Abramović at the Gallerie dell'Accademia in Venice, Pierre Huyghe at Fondation Beyeler in Basel, and Danh Vo at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam. Many of these exhibitions are traveling shows or coincide with key art events like the Venice Biennale and Art Basel, offering a rich cultural itinerary for visitors.

She Beat Warhol to Pop Art’s Biggest Ideas. The Art World Wrote Her Out Anyway

The article features an interview with Alexandra Munroe, senior curator at large for global arts at the Guggenheim Museum, discussing Yayoi Kusama's inclusion in the new exhibition "Guggenheim Pop: 1960 to Now." Munroe explains that Kusama, now 97, anticipated many art movements including pop art but was historically excluded from the pop art canon despite showing with Andy Warhol as early as 1962 and garnering more press than him in 1968. The exhibition features Kusama's "INFINITY MIRRORED ROOM – DANCING LIGHTS THAT FLEW UP TO THE UNIVERSE (2019)" and one of her "Infinity Net" paintings.

Lisson at Art Basel 2026

Lisson Gallery returns to Art Basel 2026 with a presentation of new and historic works from its international programme, featuring painting, sculpture, textiles, and photography. Highlights include Ryan Gander's animatronic mouse installation 'I’ve felt everything I’m going to feel – The Unspeakable World' and Wael Shawky's site-specific extension of 'I Am Hymns of the New Temples' at Art Unlimited, alongside a booth with works by Olga de Amaral, Dana Awartani, Anish Kapoor, Carmen Herrera, and others. The presentation coincides with major exhibitions for Lisson artists at the 61st Venice Biennale and its collateral programme, including Dana Awartani's National Pavilion of Saudi Arabia project and Anish Kapoor's solo shows across Europe and the US.

126 galleries, one weekend, one app: How to navigate London’s biggest gallery event

London Gallery Weekend 2026 will take place from June 5 to 7, featuring 126 galleries across the capital in its sixth edition. GalleriesNow has been named the Official Navigation Partner, providing an interactive app with maps, curated routes, exhibition listings, and offline access to help visitors explore the three-day event, which focuses on Central London on Friday, South London on Saturday, and East London on Sunday. Highlights include a solo exhibition of Emily Kam Kngwarray at Pace Gallery, a retrospective of Dotty Attie at Public Gallery, works by Paul McCarthy at Hauser & Wirth, and paintings by David Hockney at Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert, alongside 15 new participating galleries.

From Masters of the Universe to Monteverdi: your complete entertainment guide to the week ahead

This article is a weekly entertainment guide from The Guardian, covering cinema, gigs, art, stage, streaming, games, albums, and brain food. In the art section, it highlights three exhibitions: Julio Le Parc at Tate Modern (London), featuring his pioneering immersive installations and light sculptures from the 1950s to the 2020s; Chico da Silva at Nottingham Contemporary, showcasing the Brazilian artist's psychedelic mythical creatures and his role in Brazil's Indigenous art explosion; and Project a Black Planet: The Art and Culture of Panafrica at Barbican Art Gallery (London), examining how the Pan-Africa movement shaped 20th-century anti-colonial art and culture.

We prefer to be better-doers than know-it-alls

"Wir sind lieber Bessermacher als Besserwisser"

German cultural policy official Wolfram Weimer calls the rise of the far-right AfD a 'defining moment' for the republic, urging the democratic center to reclaim cultural symbols like the German flag. In Vienna, the Mumok museum introduces temporary free admission under new director Fatima Hellberg, sparking debate over transparency and anonymous private funding. A new museum called Dataland opens in Los Angeles, dedicated exclusively to AI artist Refik Anadol. Meanwhile, critic Christine Lemke-Matwey in Die Zeit condemns filmmaker Wim Wenders for failing to properly apologize for a nude scene involving a 13-year-old Nastassja Kinski in his 1975 film 'Falsche Bewegung'.

Event: Jayden Ali and Simone Brewster, Off the Record

ArtReview and Ursula magazine have partnered to host a monthly talk series in a Mayfair wine bar, featuring intimate conversations with creative visionaries. The upcoming event on June 9 will spotlight architect and artist Jayden Ali and artist Simone Brewster, who will discuss their inspirations and working methods. Jayden Ali is a founding director of JA Projects, a London Mayor's Design Advocate, and co-curator of the British Pavilion at the 2023 Venice Biennale. Simone Brewster is a London-based artist exploring identity and cultural memory through sculpture, painting, and installation, with her work held in major collections including the Victoria & Albert Museum and the Smithsonian Institution.

15 Art Shows to See in Los Angeles This Summer

Hyperallergic's summer guide highlights 15 art shows across Los Angeles, featuring exhibitions that challenge the status quo. Highlights include Jon Rubin's 'National Museum of the Aftermath' at Oxy Arts, focusing on America's racial reckoning; a survey of Ulises Carrión's bookworks at JOAN; Scott Carrillo Azevedo's paintings on the American home at Long Beach Museum of Art; and 'Semiotext(e): Desert Islands' at ICA LA, exploring the influential publisher's fusion of theory and vernacular culture. Other shows include punk ephemera at the Skirball, Odilon Redon's portraiture, Willie Birch's papier-mâché works, and Samella Lewis's woodcuts.

Artists & Mothers Announces 2026 Recipients of Childcare Grants

New York City nonprofit Artists & Mothers has named the 2026 recipients of its $25,000 childcare grant for artists who identify as mothers. The four awardees—Sara Cwynar, Nickola Pottinger, Trisha Baga, and Mimi Ọnụọha—work across photography, sculpture, collage, video, and multimedia installation. The grant covers nine months of childcare for emerging and mid-career artists raising a child under three, and this is the program's third cycle.

Tavares Strachan’s First Monograph Surveys an Encyclopedic Practice

Tavares Strachan, a Bahamian conceptual artist known for his encyclopedic work that challenges historical narratives, has released his first monograph through Phaidon. The book surveys decades of his expansive practice, which includes a 2,400-page encyclopedia from 2018 correcting omissions from the Encyclopedia Britannica, as well as works addressing colonialism, climate change, and space exploration. The monograph coincides with his exhibition 'The Day Tomorrow Began' at The Pizzuti, part of the Columbus Museum of Art, running through January 3.

Through Sculpture, Kiah Celeste Finds Elegance in the Everyday

Kiah Celeste, a New York native who trained as a photographer at SUNY Purchase, abandoned photography after graduation and turned to sculpture, drawing inspiration from her experience as an art handler at the Louvre Abu Dhabi. Her practice involves "foraging" for discarded materials—such as a marble tub, old CDs, acrylic skylight domes, and bowling balls—which she transforms into works like *Balance Bath* (2019), *Ouroboros* (2025), and the "Dream of Pearl" (2023) series. Celeste has shown in two-person exhibitions at Document Gallery in Chicago and Swivel Gallery in New York, and her sculptures explore tension between abstraction and recognizable objects, Minimalism and Pop, and her own intersecting identities as Black and Jewish, feminine and androgynous.

11 art exhibits to check out this summer

This article highlights 11 art exhibitions opening across Greater Boston this summer, encouraging viewers to challenge their beliefs and reflect on collective memory. Featured shows include "Giorgio Griffa: Paths in the Forest" at the Clark Art Institute, the artist's first U.S. solo exhibition; "Where's Boston? 50 Years Later" at the Boston Athenaeum, revisiting Constantine Manos's 1974 photographic portrait of the city; "James Dye: The Void, the Wheel, and the Monster" at Fitchburg Art Museum; and "Stories on the Planet: Asagi Maeda" at Fuller Craft Museum, among others.