The Art World This Week, 19 September 2025

Ocula's weekly briefing reports strong sales at viennacontemporary with 15,000 visitors and six-figure results for Galerie Zimmermann Kratochwill. Sotheby's announced $248 million in pre-tax losses for 2024 but achieved $100 million from the Karpidas collection sale and consigned the Pritzker and Lauder collections for November. Haegue Yang was appointed chair of the executive board at Kunst-Werke Berlin. Yemen's National Museum in Sanaa was damaged by Israeli airstrikes. Gallerist Sebastian Gladstone opened a new Los Angeles space, while L.A. Louver closed its Venice Beach gallery after 50 years. Taymour Grahne Projects opened in Dubai. Samia Halaby won the MUNCH Award, Jennifer Packer and Marie Watt received Heinz Family Foundation awards, and the Henry Moore Foundation distributed £100,000 to UK sculptors.

“Making Their Mark” exhibition celebrating women in art comes to the Kemper Art Museum

The Kemper Art Museum in St. Louis will host "Making Their Mark," an exhibition of 68 works by women artists from the collection of Komal Shah and the Shah Garg Foundation. Running from September 12 to January 5, 2026, it is the museum's largest-ever exhibition and its third stop after New York and Berkeley. Curated by Cecilia Alemani and Sabine Eckmann, the show features artists including Joan Mitchell, Howardena Pindell, Charline von Heyl, Judy Chicago, and Suzanne Jackson, organized under themes like "Painting is Technology" and "Luminous Abstraction."

Modern Art to open a new 4,700-sqft Art Space.

Modern Art, the London-based gallery founded by Stuart Shave in 1998, will open a new 4,700-square-foot space at 8 Bennet Street, St James’s, London SW1, on 14 November 2025. The inaugural exhibition, titled 'Polygrapher', will feature new watercolour-on-gessoed-canvas paintings by American artist Joseph Yaeger, marking his first show with the gallery. The Bennet Street location will become Modern Art’s principal London gallery, while its existing spaces on Helmet Row and Bury Street are set to close in early 2026. The gallery also maintains a location in Paris.

On View: 'Danielle McKinney: Tell Me More' at Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University is Painter's First U.S. Solo Museum Exhibition

Danielle McKinney's first solo museum exhibition in the United States, 'Danielle McKinney: Tell Me More,' has opened at the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts. The show features 13 intimately scaled paintings created between 2021 and 2025, depicting Black women in dimly lit domestic interiors—lounging, reading, or smoking—often nude or in robes, with saturated colors and cinematic compositions. McKinney, born in Montgomery, Alabama, and based in Jersey City, began her career as a photographer and earned an MFA from Parsons School of Design before turning to painting in 2020 during the pandemic. The exhibition is curated by Gannit Ankori, the museum's director and chief curator, and runs from August 20, 2025, to January 4, 2026.

Salman Toor to See First Solo Show in Europe Next Year

The Courtauld Gallery in London has announced its 2026 programme, headlined by Pakistani-born, New York-based painter Salman Toor's first solo exhibition in Europe. Titled "Someone Like You," the show will feature around 20 of Toor's emblematic canvases, including "The Bar on East 13th" (2019), which directly references Édouard Manet's "A Bar at the Folies-Bergère" (1882) from the Courtauld's collection. The exhibition will also include a selection of Toor's works on paper, such as "Fag Puddle in Vitrine" (2021), recently acquired by the museum. Toor's profile has risen sharply over the past five years as his intimate paintings of queer, South Asian men have resonated with institutions and the art market.

Actor Sharon Stone is up for the Women in Art Prize

Actor Sharon Stone, known for her role in *Basic Instinct*, has been nominated for the Women in Art Prize, now in its eighth year. The non-profit award exclusively honors women artists, and Stone began painting intensely during the Covid-19 lockdowns, holding her first solo gallery show at Allouche Gallery in Los Angeles in 2023. Other finalists among the 25 competing for 22 awards include painter Bianca Raffaella, who is registered blind, and Jenny Lewis, whose work addresses menopause. The prize also features the Paula Rego Painting Prize, created with the artist's estate to honor her influence on women in the arts. Winners will be announced at a ceremony at the British Library on 17 September, hosted by historian Amanda Foreman, with an exhibition at York Street Gallery in London from 16-24 September.

‘Making Their Mark: Works from the Shah Garg Collection’

The article announces the exhibition 'Making Their Mark: Works from the Shah Garg Collection' at Washington University in St. Louis (WashU). The show features works from the collection of Shah Garg, highlighting a selection of contemporary artworks.

Prix de West 2025 Celebrates Excellence In Western Art In Grand Tradition

The 53rd annual Prix de West Invitational Art Exhibition & Sale took place in late June at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, featuring nearly 300 original works by nearly 100 artists. The event generated over $3.2 million in sales, with Utah-based artist James Morgan winning the prestigious Purchase Award for his oil-on-linen painting *White on White*, which will enter the museum's permanent collection. Morgan also received the Robert Lougheed Memorial Award for best display of three or more works.

New art fair Arrival brings collectors to the bucolic Berkshires

Arrival, a new art fair, launched its inaugural edition on June 12 at the Tourists hotel in North Adams, Massachusetts, featuring 36 exhibitors from across the US. The biennial fair, running through June 15, includes panels, talks, and off-site programming at nearby museums. Galleries set up in hotel rooms, creating an intimate, domestic atmosphere. Founders Yng-Ru Chen, Sarah Galender Meyer, and Crystalle Lacouture—who together bring 60 years of art-world experience—aim to offer a respite from conventional convention-center fairs. Early sales included works by Hayal Pozanti, Chelsea Ryoko Wong, and Pae White, and the Williams College Museum of Art acquired three works from the fair.

‘I paint extreme emotions’: Rachel Jones on her riotously colourful paintings – and her obsession with mouths

Rachel Jones, a 34-year-old British artist, is preparing for a major retrospective at Dulwich Picture Gallery, her first institutional solo show in the UK and the museum's first solo exhibition of a contemporary artist in its main space. After graduating from the Royal Academy Schools in 2019, Jones was quickly represented by Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, had work acquired by the Tate, and exhibited at Chisenhale Gallery, the Hayward Gallery, and the Hepworth Wakefield. She has since left gallery representation, expanded into sound and performance, and created a short opera titled 'Hey Maudie' (2023), now being developed into a full-length opera. Her upcoming show at Dulwich, 'Gated Canyons', will pair her large-scale abstract paintings with works from the museum's collection, and she also has a site-specific commission at the Courtauld Gallery opening in September.

Tefaf New York wish list: objects and treasures to suit every collector’s taste

Tefaf New York presents a curated wish list of objects and treasures catering to diverse collector tastes. Highlights include Lee Bontecou's monumental mixed-media sculpture 'Untitled (1980-2001)' shown by Ortuzar and Marc Selwyn Fine Art, a rare René Magritte collage from 1926 offered by Di Donna Galleries, an ancient Egyptian bronze Osiris statue from David Aaron, and an Aboriginal painting by Mantua Nangala from Salon 94. Each piece is accompanied by price estimates and provenance details, reflecting the fair's focus on high-quality, historically significant works.

Ten Highlights From New York’s Spring Marquee Auctions

New York's spring marquee auctions are set for May 2025, with Christie's, Sotheby's, and Phillips presenting strong lineups after a 25% drop in total public sales in 2024. Highlights include the $250 million Leonard and Louise Riggio collection at Christie's, featuring Piet Mondrian's *Composition with Large Red Plane, Bluish Gray, Yellow, Black and Blue* (est. $50 million), and Alberto Giacometti's *Grande tête mince* (est. over $70 million) at Sotheby's. Other top lots include Lucio Fontana's *The End of God*, Jean-Michel Basquiat's *Baby Boom*, a Rothko from the Bass mansion, Claude Monet's *Crepuscular Peupliers*, Olga de Amaral's evening sale debut, a trove of 40 Roy Lichtenstein works, and an Ed Ruscha piece. The sales test market resilience amid supply constraints and a cautious art market.

6 Questions Every New Art Buyer Should Ask a Gallery

Annabel Keenan's article offers practical guidance for first-time art buyers navigating the gallery system. It outlines six essential questions to ask galleries, covering price transparency, provenance, and the artist's market context. The piece features insights from gallery director Joseph Clarke of Anima Mundi, collector and MCA Chicago trustee Ellen-Blair Chube, and gallerist Madelyn Jordon of Madelyn Jordon Fine Art, who emphasize that asking questions is key to building confidence and knowledge as a collector.

louvre museum acquires first video mohamed bourouissa 1234756813

The Musée du Louvre has acquired its first video work, *Les 4 temps (The 4 Seasons)*, created by Algeria-born artist Mohamed Bourouissa. The piece centers on the Tuileries Gardens in Paris, which connect the museum to the Place de la Concorde, and also references the 4 Temps mall in La Défense where Bourouissa grew up. The video will be on view in the Salle de la Chapelle from October 22 through January 19, 2026. The acquisition follows Bourouissa's year-long Instagram takeover for the Louvre, during which he posted 52 weekly videos that garnered millions of views.

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A new museum dedicated to M. F. Husain, one of India's most important modernist artists, will open in Doha, Qatar, on November 28, 2025. Officially named Lawh Wa Qalam: M. F. Husain Museum, it is operated under the Qatar Foundation and will be the first museum devoted solely to Husain. The 32,300-square-foot institution, designed based on a 2008 sketch by the artist, will house a newly formed permanent collection spanning paintings, tapestries, photographs, films, installations, and poetry. Highlights include a series of paintings on Arab civilization commissioned by Sheikha Moza bint Nasser and Husain's final work, *Seeroo fi al ardh* (2009), which will have its own gallery. The museum is located in Doha's Education City, home to several US university outposts.

Damien Hirst's studio has been recreated in Seoul for a major exhibition dedicated to him (including the original floor)

Lo studio del celebre artista Damien Hirst è stato ricreato a Seoul per una grande mostra a lui dedicata (c’è pure il pavimento originale)

The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (MMCA) in Seoul has launched "Nothing Is True But Everything Is Possible," the largest retrospective of Damien Hirst’s work ever held in Asia. Spanning 35 years of his career, the exhibition features over 50 iconic works, including his formaldehyde-preserved animals, diamond-encrusted skull, and a recreation of his Pharmacy Restaurant. A unique highlight is the meticulous reconstruction of Hirst’s London studio, complete with the original paint-stained floor transported to South Korea and 30 previously unseen unfinished canvases from his new "River" series.

Counterpublic Triennial Names 47 Artists and Collectives for Upcoming Third Edition, Including Glenn Ligon, Rebecca Belmore, Rirkrit Tiravanija

The St. Louis-based triennial Counterpublic has unveiled the artist list for its third edition, titled "Coyote Time," scheduled to run from September 12 to December 12, 2025. The exhibition features 47 artists and collectives, including major figures such as Glenn Ligon, Rebecca Belmore, and Rirkrit Tiravanija, alongside posthumous presentations of works by Juanita McNeely and Benjamin Patterson. Curated by a five-person international team, the triennial will activate various sites across the city, including the Mississippi Riverfront and the historically Black neighborhood of The Ville.

walter swennen dead 1234749496

Walter Swennen, a Belgian artist who began his career as a poet before turning to painting, has died at age 79. His death was announced by his gallery, Xavier Hufkens, without specifying a cause. Swennen was known for his playful, language-infused paintings that combined cryptic phrases, comic-book-like figures, and unconventional materials such as found wood and metal. He rose to prominence in Belgium alongside other painters interested in materiality, but his work stood out for its freewheeling humor and destabilization of meaning. A major retrospective at WIELS Contemporary Art Centre in Brussels in 2013 helped revive his career, leading to later shows at Gladstone Gallery in New York and a growing international following.

The Venice Biennale has long been a sales platform—now no one is pretending otherwise

The Venice Biennale, traditionally a government-subsidized non-commercial institution where sales were downplayed, is experiencing an unprecedented open embrace of commerce. For the first time, Christie's is hosting an invitation-only selling exhibition in Venice, offering works ranging from Old Masters like Lucas Cranach to Modern and contemporary giants such as Andy Warhol, Louise Bourgeois, and Mark Bradford, with prices from $500,000 to over $35 million. Dealers, auction houses, and private foundations are openly pricing and selling works to collectors, spurred partly by Italy's reduced 5% VAT rate on art imports, now Europe's lowest.

Remembering Georg Baselitz, Nicole Hollander, and Doris Fisher

Hyperallergic's weekly 'In Memoriam' column honors seven figures from the art world who recently passed away, including German Neo-Expressionist painter Georg Baselitz, feminist cartoonist Nicole Hollander, and arts patron Doris F. Fisher, co-founder of The Gap. Other notable figures remembered are photographer Stephanie Chernikowski, West Coast assemblage artist George Herms, Spanish artist and designer José María Cruz Novillo, and Bay Area muralist Dan Fontes. The article provides brief biographies and highlights of their contributions to visual art, photography, comics, and public art.

The Carnegie International Looks Back at Itself

The 58th Carnegie International at the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh looks back at its own 130-year history, featuring a gallery dedicated to past iterations. The exhibition includes Chris Ofili's "The Adoration of Captain Shit and the Legend of the Black Stars" (1998), which was originally shown in the 53rd International in 1999, the same year Ofili's more notorious "The Holy Virgin Mary" sparked controversy at the Brooklyn Museum. The article reviews how the current iteration captures the excitement of earlier exhibitions while providing commentary on authoritarianism and militarism.

I’ve Got the Post-Duchamp Blues

The article is a review of the Marcel Duchamp retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York, the first such show since 1973. Featuring around 300 works from Duchamp's six-decade career, the exhibition includes his iconic readymades like "Fountain" (1917) and early paintings such as "Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2" (1912). Co-curated by MoMA's Ann Temkin and Michelle Kuo along with Matthew Affron of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the show runs through August 22, 2026, before traveling to Philadelphia.

Alice Tippit’s Mischievous Erotics

Alice Tippit's solo exhibition "Rose Obsolete" at the DePaul Art Museum in Chicago features 23 small oil paintings, three murals, a neon sign, word drawings, and a series of 46 notepad drawings. The works toggle between multiple interpretations—snakes and smiles, blouses and pears, curtains and bodies—inviting viewers to see shifting forms like a psychological test. Tippit, born in 1975 near Kansas City and based in Chicago since 2006, paints each oil work in a single day without tape, achieving sharp edges and subtle layering that reward close looking.

A Blockbuster Take on Ovid’s “Metamorphosis”

The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam has opened a major exhibition titled 'Metamorphoses,' inspired by Ovid's poem. The show brings together Renaissance masterpieces, antiquities, and contemporary works, grouping them by the myths they depict to explore themes of transformation, desire, and gender through striking visual juxtapositions.

In an Unlikely Pairing, Giacometti Sculptures Head to The Met's Temple of Dendur

The Metropolitan Museum of Art has announced a major summer exhibition titled "Giacometti in the Temple of Dendur," featuring 17 sculptures by the 20th-century Swiss master Alberto Giacometti. The show, organized in collaboration with the Fondation Giacometti, will place the artist's iconic slender bronze figures within and around the first-century BCE Roman Period Egyptian temple. The installation includes significant loans such as "Femme qui marche I" and "Femme de Venise I," marking a rare dialogue between modern existentialist sculpture and ancient architectural history.

Georgia O'Keeffe Museum Launches Digital Catalogue Raisonné

The Georgia O’Keeffe Museum has launched Access O’Keeffe, a comprehensive digital catalogue raisonné that makes over 2,000 of the artist’s works available to the public for free. Based on the definitive 1999 scholarship by Barbara Buhler Lynes, the platform includes paintings, sketches, and letters, featuring advanced search tools that allow users to filter by color, medium, and theme. The project was completed despite a significant funding scare when a federal grant was briefly rescinded during the Trump administration before being restored via legal action.

Marcel Duchamp Was the Messenger of History

The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York is launching the first comprehensive U.S. exhibition of Marcel Duchamp’s work in over 50 years. In an interview regarding the opening, renowned scholar Thierry de Duve discusses the artist's enduring legacy, from his infamous readymades like "Fountain" to his complex, labor-intensive works like the "Large Glass." The exhibition seeks to reconcile Duchamp’s identity as both a conceptual provocateur and a meticulous craftsman.

Why the Photo Market Is Moving Closer to Painting, With Unique Works Leading the Way

Artnet Auctions has launched its Spring Photographs sale, running through April 16, 2026, featuring works by blue-chip artists such as Peter Beard, Adam Fuss, and Diane Arbus. The auction highlights a significant shift in the photography market toward unique, one-of-a-kind works—including photograms, hand-painted images, and collages—that blur the lines between photography and painting. This trend is evidenced by increasing auction prices, with several works recently crossing the $1 million and $2 million thresholds.

Revisiting One of Fauvism’s Wildest Painters

The Parisian gallery Helene Bailly Marcilhac is hosting a comprehensive monographic exhibition dedicated to the Dutch-French painter Kees van Dongen. The show traces the artist's career from his early days as a leading figure of the Fauvist movement through his later developments in portraiture, still life, and genre painting. Spanning several decades, the exhibition highlights Van Dongen's evolution from the "terrifying" bold colors of his youth to the more nuanced, expressive works of his later years, such as his 1950s floral studies and racing scenes.

Despite Uncertainty, Gulf Art World Projects Normalcy

Galleries and museums in Gulf states like the UAE, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia are reopening and projecting normalcy despite the ongoing US-Israel war on Iran, which has entered its fourth week. Major events like Art Dubai have been postponed, and institutions like the Sharjah Art Foundation have delayed gatherings, but many cultural venues are operating with adjusted formats or by appointment.