jean widmer dead designer centre pompidou

Jean Widmer, the influential French-Swiss graphic designer who created the iconic visual identity for the Centre Pompidou, has died at age 96. Widmer is best known for distilling the complex, high-tech architecture of Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers into a minimalist logo of black lines and a zig-zagging diagonal, a design that has remained unchanged since the museum's opening in 1977. Beyond the Pompidou, his career spanned fashion art direction at Le Jardin des Modes and the creation of France's standardized highway signage system.

Tintoretto Genesis Cycle Restored

tintoretto genesis cycle restored

Four paintings from Tintoretto’s 16th-century “Stories from Genesis” cycle have been reunited in Venice for the first time in two centuries following an extensive restoration. The exhibition at the Gallerie dell’Accademia features three works from the museum’s permanent collection alongside a crucial loan from the Uffizi Galleries, all of which underwent a year-long conservation process to remove centuries of darkened varnish and grime.

Lawh Wa Qalam: M. F. Husain Museum Doha Review

lawh wa qalam mf husain museum doha review

The Lawh Wa Qalam: M. F. Husain Museum has opened in Doha, Qatar, dedicated to the prolific career of the late Indian modernist Maqbool Fida Husain. Commissioned by Sheikha Moza bint Nasser and designed by architect Martand Khosla based on a sketch by the artist himself, the 32,300-square-foot blue-mosaiced structure houses 150 works including paintings, films, and sculptures. The museum traces Husain’s journey from the 1950s through his final years in Qatar, highlighting his cross-cultural explorations of faith, science, and history.

national portrait gallery shells record 4 million artemesia gentileschi self portrait

London's National Gallery has acquired a recently rediscovered self-portrait by Artemisia Gentileschi, 'Self Portrait as Saint Catherine of Alexandria' (c. 1615–17), for £3.6 million ($4.7 million). The painting was purchased from a London dealer who had secured it at a Paris auction in December, where it set a new auction record for the artist. The acquisition marks a significant addition to the museum's holdings, as it is only the 21st work by a female artist in its collection of over 2,300 pieces.

long lost henry raeburn painting found scottish portraitist

A long-lost portrait of Scottish poet Robert Burns by Sir Henry Raeburn has been rediscovered and is now on display at the National Galleries of Scotland in Edinburgh. The painting was found at a London house sale last year, consigned to Wimbledon Auctions with a low estimate of £300–£500, but sold for £68,000 after intense bidding. It was purchased by Edinburgh-based art collector William Zachs, who had it restored and brought to Scotland, where experts confirmed it as an authentic Raeburn. The work is a copy Raeburn made in 1803 of a 1787 portrait by Alexander Nasmyth, commissioned by London publishers Cadell & Davies but lost shortly after completion.

top architecture firm accused of illegally firing union supporting staff founding editor of artforum dies morning link for january 20 2025

The National Labor Relations Board has accused Snøhetta, a prominent New York-based architecture firm, of illegally firing eight employees who supported a 2023 unionization campaign. The NLRB complaint alleges that managers tracked union supporters and improperly questioned staff about their sympathies, while Snøhetta denies the claims, attributing layoffs to business pressures predating the union drive. Separately, Singapore Art Week is spotlighting women artists from Southeast Asia, with the launch of Krystina Lyon's book "You Are Seen" and the National Gallery Singapore exhibition "Fear No Power: Women Imagining Otherwise." Other news includes the death of Artforum founding editor Philip Leider at 96, LANZA chosen for the Serpentine Pavilion, and a Louvre heist caught on newly released footage.

beloved rocky statue will move to top of philadelphia art museum steps

The Philadelphia Art Commission has voted to relocate the popular bronze statue of Rocky Balboa from its current position at the bottom of the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art to the top of those steps. The move, budgeted between $150,000 and $250,000, includes the creation of a new 14-foot-tall pedestal. The statue, a fictional boxer played by Sylvester Stallone, has long been a tourist attraction and local icon, though a second casting already exists at the top. The project will be overseen by Creative Philadelphia.

marie antoinette arts patronage

Marie Antoinette, the final queen of France, is the subject of a blockbuster exhibition titled "Marie Antoinette Style" at London's V&A museum, running through March 22. The show highlights her boldly modern taste, her patronage of women artists like Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun and Anne Vallayer-Coster, and her role as the first French queen to own and redecorate her own palace, the Petit Trianon. The article details how she used her influence to secure Vigée Le Brun's admission to the Académie Royale and pressured the Louvre to exhibit Vallayer-Coster's work, while also exploring how her extravagant spending earned her the epithet "Madame Déficit" and contributed to her downfall during the French Revolution.

pointing fingers in old master paintings study

A new study published in *Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts* by French researcher Temenuzhka Dimova uses eye-tracking technology to examine how pointing fingers in Old Master paintings affect viewer attention. Conducted through the University of Vienna’s Laboratory for Cognitive Research in Art History (CReA), the study compared participants' eye movements when viewing original paintings—such as Theodor Rombouts's *The Card Players*—and digitally altered versions where the pointing gestures were removed. Results showed that viewers focused more on the faces of pointing figures and the narrative context, not just the target of the gesture, and that removing the finger fundamentally changed how the story was perceived.

george washington dollar portrait gilbert stuart auction

Christie’s is launching its largest-ever Americana Week in January, featuring a George Washington portrait by Gilbert Stuart that inspired the dollar bill. The painting, commissioned by James Madison, is expected to fetch between $500,000 and $1 million. The auction includes 700 lots across nine sales, with highlights such as a signed Emancipation Proclamation and the contract that created Apple. The portrait, a Vaughn-type from 1795, was consigned by Clarkson University and has a provenance tracing back to Madison, confirmed by a 19th-century catalog and a note from Madison’s secretary.

christies auction painting george washington one dollar bill

Christie’s will auction an 1804 oil portrait of George Washington by Gilbert Stuart, estimated at $500,000 to $1 million, during its “We the People: America at 250” sale in early 2025. The painting was commissioned by President James Madison and served as a model for the engraving on the one-dollar bill. It was recently deaccessioned by Clarkson University, a technical school in upstate New York, which decided to sell the work to coincide with the 250th anniversary of the United States, with proceeds supporting the university’s educational mission.

how to take creative risks loic gouzer

This episode of the podcast series "How to Get Ahead in the Art World" features Loïc Gouzer, the former Christie's executive known for orchestrating the record-breaking $450 million sale of Salvator Mundi. Gouzer discusses his career risks, including pioneering the curated sale format and launching Fair Warning, a private auction app that has achieved new price records. He emphasizes trusting instinct over data in the art market and offers advice on spotting opportunities, mastering skills before breaking rules, and building an authentic personal brand.

saya woolfalk empathic universe

New York-based artist Saya Woolfalk is the subject of her first retrospective, "Saya Woolfalk: Empathic Universe," at the Museum of Arts and Design (MAD) in New York. The exhibition, curated by Alexandra Schwarz, runs from April 12 to September 7, 2025, and surveys two decades of Woolfalk's multidisciplinary practice, which blends science fiction, fantasy, and critical examinations of race, science, anthropology, and identity. The show is organized into chapters highlighting major projects, including her fictional "Empathics"—a race of women who can fuse with plants—and features sculptures, video, painting, works on paper, a commissioned audio drama, and live dance performances.

professor terminated art history paintings muhammad

An adjunct professor at Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota, Erika López Prater, lost her job after showing her art history class two Medieval paintings depicting the Prophet Muhammad during an online lecture on October 6, 2022. She issued a content warning before displaying the images, which came from a 14th-century manuscript by Rashīd al-Dīn and a 16th-century work by Mustafa ibn Vali. A student, Aram Wedatalla, complained, and the university's administration, including associate vice president David Everett, decided not to renew her contract, calling the incident Islamophobic. The decision has sparked widespread debate, with a Change.org petition signed by over 2,500 scholars and a condemnation from PEN America.

caravaggio top 10 paintings ranked

Artnet News published a ranked list of Caravaggio's top 10 paintings, highlighting works such as 'Victorious Cupid' (1601–02), 'The Cardsharps' (c. 1594), 'Young Sick Bacchus' (c. 1593), 'The Incredulity of Saint Thomas' (1602), 'Supper at Emmaus' (1601), 'Narcissus' (1597–99), and 'Boy Bitten by a Lizard' (1594–96). The article scores each painting on storytelling, behind-the-scenes intrigue, and sheer audacity, and notes that 'Victorious Cupid' recently went on view in the U.K. for the first time.

national portrait gallery spielberg jamie dimon

The National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., will debut an exhibition titled “Portrait of a Nation: 2025 Honorees” on December 12, featuring newly commissioned and acquired portraits of filmmaker Steven Spielberg, JP Morgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, scientist Temple Grandin, and poet Joy Harjo. The show follows a fundraising gala and includes works by Kate Capshaw, Jason Alden, Joel Daniel Phillips, and David Lenz, with the Spielberg portrait combining oil painting and film projection.

michelangelo drawing sistine chapel christies new york

A five-inch-tall red chalk drawing of a foot, attributed to Michelangelo (1475–1564), is set to be auctioned at Christie’s New York in February with an estimate of $1.5–2 million. The work was discovered when Giada Damen, a specialist in Old Master drawings at Christie’s, flagged it from a public online submission; after extensive provenance research, technical analysis, and comparison with known sketches, Christie’s has declared it a preparatory study for the Sistine Chapel ceiling (1508–1512). If authenticated, it would be one of only two such Michelangelo drawings remaining in private hands.

crystal bridges to mount exhibition by singer songwriter jewel venice biennale

Crystal Bridges Museum will present an exhibition dedicated to singer-songwriter Jewel during the Venice Biennale, running from May 10 to November 22 at the Salone Verde, near Fondazione Prada. Titled “Matriclysm: An Archeology of Connections Lost,” the show is organized by Crystal Bridges curator-at-large Joe Thompson and features paintings from Jewel's “Ceremony” series, a tapestry, and three large-scale sculptures—including “Heart of the Ocean,” an eight-foot-tall piece that uses live oceanic data from NASA and Stanford University to control 60,000 programmable lights. The exhibition explores themes of feminine memory, matriarchy, and connection.

marina xenofontos cyprus pavilion 2026 venice biennale

Athens-based artist Marina Xenofontos has been selected to represent Cyprus at the 2026 Venice Biennale with a pavilion titled “It rests to the bones.” Curated by Kyle Dancewicz, deputy director of SculptureCenter in New York, the exhibition will be housed at the Associazione Culturale Spiazzi near the Arsenale. Xenofontos, born in Limassol in 1988, works across sculpture, kinetic objects, and film, often exploring Cyprus’s history and British colonial legacy. Her proposal was chosen from 21 submissions via an open call organized by Cyprus’s Department of Contemporary Culture, with a five-person advisory committee praising its engagement with Cypriot micro-histories and global issues.

raphael exhibition 2026 metropolitan museum new york

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York will open a landmark exhibition dedicated to Renaissance master Raphael in 2026. Titled "Raphael: Sublime Poetry," the show runs from March 29 to June 28 and will be the first major Raphael retrospective ever mounted in the United States. Curated by Carmen Bambach, the exhibition brings together 200 works including paintings, drawings, tapestries, and decorative arts, with loans from major museums worldwide such as the Louvre, the Uffizi, the Prado, and the Vatican Museums. Key loans include the Louvre's "Portrait of Baldassarre Castiglione" and the Galleria Borghese's "Portrait of a Lady with a Unicorn."

my wifes lovers cat painting

Carl Kahler's 1891 painting *My Wife's Lovers*, a monumental portrait of 42 cats commissioned by San Francisco millionaire Kate Birdsall Johnson, has resurfaced in popularity thanks to social media and a record-breaking sale at Sotheby's in 2016, where it fetched $826,000—more than double its high estimate. The article details Kahler's background as a horse-racing painter from Austria, his three-year stay at Johnson's Buena Vista Castle sketching her feline menagerie, and the painting's debut at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair. Johnson, an eccentric art collector and philanthropist, owned hundreds of cats and named the work after her late husband's nickname for them.

diana de rosa

A rediscovered Baroque painting by 17th-century Neapolitan artist Diana de Rosa, titled *Salome with the Head of Saint John the Baptist*, sold for £317,500 ($436,086) at Sotheby’s Old Masters and 19th Century Paintings sale in London on July 2, more than quadrupling its high estimate. The work, previously unknown to scholars, set a new auction record for the artist and was described by Sotheby’s specialist Elisabeth Lobkowicz as a powerful image comparable to Caravaggio’s treatment of the same subject.

cleveland museum of art acquires giambologna

The Cleveland Museum of Art has acquired Giambologna's marble sculpture *Fata Morgana* (ca. 1572), believed to be the last marble work by the Flanders-born Italian Mannerist in private hands. The piece, which depicts a nude woman emerging from a grotto, was originally commissioned by banker Bernardo Vecchietti and remained with his family for 200 years before being sold in 1775. It was misattributed for centuries until London dealer Patricia Wengraf correctly identified it at a 1989 Christie's auction, purchasing it for £715,000. The museum acquired the sculpture for an undisclosed price, making it only the second Giambologna marble in the U.S. and one of just three outside Italy.

black portraiture peregrine tyam letter

A 17th-century British portrait at Claydon House, a National Trust property, depicts Mary Lawley and Peregrine Tyam, a Black enslaved attendant whose identity is known—one of the earliest such examples. Historian Hannah Lee published research in British Art Studies revealing new details about Tyam, including a rediscovered letter he wrote in 1699 to his enslaver John Verney, offering rare firsthand insight into the lives of enslaved people in aristocratic households. The portrait, attributed to the little-known artist Lenthall, was commissioned by Verney to mark his marriage in 1692 and shows Tyam wearing a silver collar, a symbol of enslavement.

artemisia gentileschi rediscovered works paris

A new exhibition in Paris, "Artemisia Gentileschi: Heroine of Art," at the Musée Jacquemart-André, presents around 40 paintings by the Italian Baroque painter, including four recently rediscovered works. Curator Patrizia Cavazzini deliberately shifts focus away from Gentileschi's rape and trial, instead highlighting her artistic development and achievements. Among the rediscovered pieces are "Virgin of the Annunciation" (c. 1609-10), one of her earliest known works, and a signed portrait of a Knight of the Order of Saint Stephen (c. 1619-20), previously misattributed to Justus Sustermans.

clara peeters only self portrait comes to auction

Sotheby’s London will auction what is believed to be the only known self-portrait by Clara Peeters, a pioneering Flemish still life painter from the early 17th century. The painting, a vanitas still life featuring a presumed self-portrait and a still life of flowers in a glass vase, carries a presale estimate of £1.2 million to £1.8 million ($1.6 million–$2.4 million) and will be offered in the “Old Master and 19th Century Paintings Evening Auction” on July 2. The work was previously downgraded to the artist’s circle but is now accepted as an autograph Peeters, with a provenance dating back to 1767.

hilmas ghost feminist witch collective

At the Armory Show in New York, psychic medium Sarah Potter is offering tarot card readings at the booth of Chicago's Carrie Secrist Gallery using a deck designed by the feminist art collective Hilma's Ghost. The collective, formed during lockdown by abstract artists Dannielle Tegeder and Sharmistha Ray, created "Abstract Futures Tarot," a series of 78 gouache, ink, and colored pencil paintings inspired by pioneering abstractionist Hilma af Klint and the Rider–Waite tarot deck by Pamela Colman Smith. The works, priced at $4,000 each, are the result of 500 hours of collaborative painting, and the deck is also sold in a limited edition of 300, with 215 already sold.

dar kuen wu taiwan digital art

The article examines the rise of Taiwanese contemporary art on the international stage, focusing on its growing prominence in digital and technological art. It traces the evolution of digital art in Taiwan through three phases: video art in the 1990s with pioneers like Wang Jun-Jieh and Yuan Goang-Ming, digital media experimentation in the 2000s driven by the tech sector, and a recent phase of internationalization and interdisciplinary integration fueled by the semiconductor industry and government support. Key factors include Taiwan's hardware industry, cultural liberalization after the lifting of martial law in 1987, and sustained policy support from institutions like the National Culture and Arts Foundation (NCAF), the Taiwan Contemporary Culture Lab (C-LAB), and the Taiwan Creative Content Agency (TAICCA).

Simply divine: the extraordinary supernatural visions of Francisco de Zurbarán

Francisco de Zurbarán, one of the three great Spanish 17th-century painters alongside Velázquez and Murillo, is finally receiving his first solo exhibition in the UK at the National Gallery in London. The show highlights his distinctive style of religious painting, characterized by stark chiaroscuro, sculptural realism, and a meditative stillness that makes the immaterial seem tangible. Works such as his crucified Christ and The Apparition of Saint Peter to Saint Peter Nolasco exemplify his ability to depict visions and inner spirituality, often commissioned by powerful religious foundations in Seville during the Counter-Reformation.

After three years, investigations and now a $4.4m lawsuit, Australia’s most controversial art exhibition finally opens

The National Gallery of Australia has finally opened 'Ngura Puḻka – Epic Country,' a landmark exhibition of 30 large-scale paintings by Indigenous artists from the Aṉangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) Lands. The show’s debut comes after a three-year delay caused by explosive allegations in the media suggesting that white studio assistants had improperly intervened in the creation of the artworks. These claims sparked multiple independent investigations, a $4.4 million defamation lawsuit, and a previous last-minute cancellation of the exhibition in 2023.