Art News. Vasari Codex

article news schedule Dec 10, 2025 visibility 13 link 8 artists

zohran mamdani best museum new york subway system 1234766037

New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani declared in a New York Times interview that the city's best museum is its subway system, citing the public artworks by artists like Vito Acconci, Nick Cave, Yoko Ono, Faith Ringgold, and Jeffrey Gibson that are accessible to all riders. He praised the MTA for making art available regardless of income, while also expressing interest in visiting the Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria, Queens, and crediting his wife, illustrator Rama Duwaji, for expanding his appreciation of art beyond formal settings.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 9, 2025 visibility 27 link 13 artists, 4 galleries

emma mcintyre 2025 2717629

Emma McIntyre, a New Zealand-born painter known for her oxidation technique using rust on canvas, has rapidly ascended in the art world. After earning MFAs in Auckland and Pasadena, she joined mega-gallery David Zwirner in 2024, with additional representation by Château Shatto in Los Angeles and Air de Paris. Her auction record was set at Phillips London in October 2025, with her work "Seven types of ambiguity" selling for $225,100. McIntyre's practice blends material experimentation—including iron oxide pigments and bubble wrap—with references spanning Greek myth to Rococo art.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 9, 2025 visibility 24 link 20 artists

helen frankenthaler facts 2715248

Helen Frankenthaler, the pioneering Color Field painter known for her luminous, stain-soaked canvases, is the subject of a renewed wave of exhibitions. The Palazzo Strozzi in Florence and the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao recently hosted a major survey of her work, while the Museum of Modern Art in New York is currently presenting "Helen Frankenthaler: A Grand Sweep" in its atrium. Next year, the Kunstmuseum Basel will open the largest exhibition of her art in Europe to date, marking her first solo museum show in Switzerland. The article also recounts her biography—her privileged upbringing on the Upper East Side, her studies at the Dalton School and Bennington College, her relationships with Clement Greenberg and Robert Motherwell, and her invention of the soak-stain technique in 1952, which helped birth Color Field painting.

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article news schedule Dec 9, 2025 visibility 9 link 5 artists

louvre leak strike 2725275

A water pipe burst at the Musée du Louvre in Paris on November 26, damaging 300 to 400 archival documents related to Egyptian history in the Mollien Pavilion. The leak, which also posed a fire risk due to a nearby electrical cabinet, was followed by a smaller leak days later. Employees, represented by a coalition of unions including CGT, CFDT, and Sud, have voted unanimously to begin a rolling strike next Monday, demanding urgent renovations and the hiring of 200 new staff to restore the workforce to 2014 levels. The Louvre's director Laurence des Cars had previously warned that the museum's buildings were in "poor condition" and "no longer water tight," and a major renovation was announced, but pipe repairs were not scheduled until September 2026.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 9, 2025 visibility 14 link 12 artists

studio museum harlem reopening 2709803

The Studio Museum in Harlem reopened its newly rebuilt, seven-story space on 125th Street after nearly eight years without a permanent home. A press preview on November 6, 2025, showcased the $300 million, 82,000-square-foot building designed by Adjaye Associates with Cooper Robertson, which more than doubles the museum's exhibition space. The public reopening is set for November 15 with a free community celebration. Inaugural exhibitions include "From Now: A Collection in Context," works by over 100 alumni of the artist-in-residence program, and a solo show of Tom Lloyd, whose work was featured in the museum's first exhibition in 1968. The building features a grand staircase, a cantilevered auditorium called the "Stoop," a roof terrace, and prominent works by David Hammons and Glenn Ligon.

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candle obituary schedule Dec 8, 2025 visibility 24 link 6 artists

cultural figures remember late frank gehry internationally renowned museum starchitect 1234765638

Frank Gehry, the visionary architect behind iconic cultural landmarks such as the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris, and Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, died on December 5 at age 96. Over the weekend, art and architecture figures including artist Rob Pruitt, Serpentine Galleries artistic director Hans Ulrich Obrist, and leaders of institutions like the Guggenheim Bilbao, LACMA, and the J. Paul Getty Trust shared personal remembrances and tributes, highlighting his groundbreaking designs, enduring friendships, and profound influence.

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person people schedule Dec 8, 2025 visibility 20 link 6 artists

ralph lemon artnews awards 2025 lifetime achievement 1234763082

Ralph Lemon has been awarded the 2025 ARTnews Lifetime Achievement Award for his multidisciplinary practice spanning dance, drawing, painting, installation, sculpture, and writing. The article highlights his career trajectory from founding the Ralph Lemon Dance Company to disbanding it in 1995 to focus on broader artistic collaborations. Central to his work is the Geography Trilogy (1996–2004) and his long-term collaboration with Walter Carter, a former Mississippi sharecropper, whose life and family became a recurring subject. Lemon's recent exhibition "Ceremonies Out of the Air: Ralph Lemon" at MoMA PS1 (November 14, 2024–March 24, 2025), curated by Connie Butler and Thomas Lax, featured videos, found African sculptures, drawings, and a four-channel performance piece, Rant (redux), with Kevin Beasley and Okwui Okpokwasili.

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article news schedule Dec 8, 2025 visibility 25 link 38 artists

artnews awards 2025 jury 1234764592

The second annual ARTnews Awards have announced their 2025 winners, selected by a jury of five esteemed US-based curators: Ryan N. Dennis (Co-Director & Chief Curator, Contemporary Arts Museum Houston), Anne Ellegood (Executive Director, Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles), Rosario Güiraldes (Curator of Visual Arts, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis), Ruba Katrib (Chief Curator and Director of Curatorial Affairs, MoMA PS1, New York), and Victoria Sung (Phyllis C. Wattis Senior Curator, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive). These jurors reviewed exhibitions held between August 2024 and July 2025, meeting twice alongside two ARTnews senior editors to nominate and select winners across six categories.

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article news schedule Dec 8, 2025 visibility 16 link 10 artists

chief curator leaves george lucas museum 2724582

Pilar Tompkins Rivas, chief curator and deputy director of curatorial and collections at the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles, has left the museum less than a year before its scheduled September 2026 opening. The museum stated it has no immediate plans to replace her, with George Lucas continuing to oversee curatorial direction. This departure follows a series of staffing issues, including the exit of director and CEO Sandra Jackson-Dumont in March 2025, layoffs of 22 staff members in May, and the earlier losses of curator Amanda Hunt and curator-at-large Dan Nadel. The $1-billion museum, first announced in 2017, has faced repeated delays due to the pandemic and supply-chain shortages.

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candle obituary schedule Dec 5, 2025 visibility 17 link 7 artists

frank gehry dead guggenheim bilbao 1234765549

Frank Gehry, the award-winning architect whose revolutionary museum designs reshaped the art world, died on Friday in Santa Monica, California, at age 96 due to a brief respiratory illness. Best known for the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao (1997), Gehry's signature style—featuring sloping, incongruous forms clad in titanium—transformed the architectural landscape of art institutions worldwide. His other major museum projects include the Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris, the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, and an upcoming Guggenheim museum in Abu Dhabi.

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article news schedule Dec 5, 2025 visibility 12 link 5 artists

lucas museum of narrative art pilar tompkins rivas departs 1234765433

Pilar Tompkins Rivas, chief curator and deputy director of curatorial and collections at the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles, has left her post, as first reported by the Los Angeles Times. Her departure is the latest in a series of leadership exits at the institution, which is set to open on September 22, 2026. The museum was founded by George Lucas and Mellody Hobson, and Rivas was one of six women of color appointed to high-ranking roles in 2020 by then director and CEO Sandra Jackson-Dumont, who left in February. The museum laid off 15 employees in May, and CEO duties are now held on an interim basis by Jim Gianopulos, while Lucas himself oversees curatorial content.

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article news schedule Dec 4, 2025 visibility 10 link 1 artist

claes oldeburg yale lipstick sculpture vandalized 1234765176

Claes Oldenburg's 1969 sculpture *Lipstick (Ascending) on Caterpillar Tracks* was vandalized in October when the letters "ATB" were etched into its metal base. Yale University is relocating the 24-foot-tall work from the Morse College courtyard to the Yale University Art Gallery for conservation and care, following the discovery of the defacement. The sculpture, a beloved campus landmark originally installed in Beinecke Plaza, has a history of being removed and restored due to weather damage and graffiti.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 2, 2025 visibility 13 link 10 artists

okeeffe seurat phillips collection deaccession 2715082

The Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C. has deaccessioned eight major works by artists including Georges Seurat, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Anish Kapoor at Sotheby's fall sales. O'Keeffe's "Large Dark Red Leaves on White" (1927) sold for $7.9 million, a Seurat drawing fetched $4.9 million, while a painting by Arthur Dove fell short of expectations and a Kapoor sculpture failed to sell. The plan, devised by director Jonathan Binstock, aims to fund future contemporary art commissions and collection care, but has sparked an 18-month dispute between museum leadership and the Phillips family descendants over the interpretation of founder Duncan Phillips's legacy.

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article culture schedule Dec 2, 2025 visibility 23 link 21 artists

artists studios google street view part 2 1601083

Artnet News continues its exploration of famous artists' studios via Google Maps Street View, featuring nine historic homes and workspaces. Among them are Max Liebermann's lakeside Berlin villa, now a memorial museum; the modernist compound of Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo in Mexico City, designed by Juan O'Gorman; Dora Gordine's eclectic Dorich House in South London; and Ben Nicholson's studio in the historic Porthmeor Studios building in Cornwall, which once housed Francis Bacon and other artists. Each entry includes the location, historical context, and an interesting fact about the site.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 2, 2025 visibility 21 link 4 artists

elephant sculptures migrate to art basel miami beach 2579113

A herd of 100 life-size elephant sculptures, handcrafted by 200 Indigenous artisans from South India, has arrived at Art Basel Miami Beach as part of "The Great Elephant Migration," a global public art and conservation project. The sculptures are made from lantana camara, an invasive plant, and are modeled after individual elephants from the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve. Organized by Ruth Ganesh and the Coexistence Collective, the installation aims to promote coexistence between humans and wildlife, with proceeds from sculpture sales funding 22 conservation NGOs. The elephants have toured the U.S., appearing in Newport, Rhode Island, Manhattan's Meatpacking District, and now Miami Beach, where they have drawn enthusiastic crowds—and even a reported incident of a couple having sex on one of the sculptures, prompting police patrols.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 1, 2025 visibility 20 link 3 artists

richard hunt sculptor survey ica miami 1234764002

The Institute of Contemporary Art Miami is opening "Richard Hunt: Pressure," the first institutional survey of the late sculptor since his death in 2023 at age 88. The exhibition, running through March during Miami Art Week, features 28 sculptures from 1955 to 2010, drawn from Hunt's seven-decade career in which he completed over 160 public commissions and 170 solo exhibitions. The show highlights Hunt's innovative use of industrial materials and abstract forms, while also exploring the dual meaning of "pressure"—both the physical force used in his metalworking and the societal pressures he faced as a Black artist during the Civil Rights era.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 1, 2025 visibility 14 link 10 artists

norton museum of art the leiden collection rembrandt 2720649

The Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach, Florida, is hosting "Art and Life in Rembrandt’s Time: Masterpieces from the Leiden Collection," an exhibition featuring 17 Rembrandt paintings from the largest private collection of his works. The show includes over 200 additional paintings and drawings by Dutch Golden Age artists such as Frans Hals, Carel Fabritius, and Johannes Vermeer, including the only Vermeer painting held in private hands. The exhibition marks the first major Rembrandt show in Florida and the largest U.S. exhibition of 17th-century Dutch paintings from a private collection, timed to coincide with the 400th anniversary of New Amsterdam's founding.

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article policy schedule Dec 1, 2025 visibility 13 link 4 artists

louvre ticket price hike 2721236

The Louvre will raise ticket prices by 45 percent for non-E.U. visitors starting January 14, 2026, with tickets increasing to €32 ($37) for travelers from the U.S., U.K., and China, while E.U. visitors continue to pay €22. The price hike, announced on November 27, is expected to generate €15–20 million annually to fund modernization plans, following intense criticism over aging infrastructure and a $102 million jewel heist in October. The museum also faces structural issues, including the temporary closure of parts of its Sully wing due to fragile support beams, and has implemented an €80 million security master plan.

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article policy schedule Nov 26, 2025 visibility 17 link 11 artists

museums finances 2689034

Museums worldwide are urgently searching for new financial models as government funding declines, wealthy patrons pull back, and corporate sponsors face pressure. A global study published in January by the International Research Alliance on Public Funding for Museums found that in 37 percent of responding countries, 71 to 100 percent of museums now receive most funding from private sources. Institutions are exploring endowments, new revenue streams, and collaborative approaches, with the Louvre becoming the first French museum to create an endowment fund in 2009, raising €175 million. The $85 trillion Great Wealth Transfer offers hope, but next-generation donors prioritize transparency and meaningful engagement over prestige.

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

guggenheim abu dhabi basquiat warhol 1234763670

The chairman of Abu Dhabi's department of cultural tourism, Mohamed Khalifa Al Mubarak, revealed at a recent briefing that the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, designed by Frank Gehry and set to open in 2026 on Saadiyat Island, will feature Western masters like Jean-Michel Basquiat, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, and Andy Warhol alongside lesser-known contemporary artists from Asia, Africa, and the Arab world. The museum, originally announced two decades ago and delayed multiple times, will also incorporate augmented reality and artificial intelligence to enhance visitor engagement, and will include music, food, and dance as part of its civic space concept.

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gavel restitution schedule Nov 25, 2025 visibility 16 link 1 artist

california revives nazi looted pissarro cassirer case 2717210

California Attorney General Rob Bonta filed a motion on November 17 to intervene in the Cassirer family's two-decade-long restitution case for a Camille Pissarro painting stolen by the Nazis. The artwork, *Rue Saint Honore, Apres Midi, Effet De Pluie* (1897), is owned by Spain's Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection Foundation. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit had previously ruled that Spanish law applied, allowing the museum to keep the painting, but California's Assembly Bill 2867, signed into law in September, now seeks to apply California law to protect victims of art theft. The case has been sent back to the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California for reconsideration.

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museum exhibitions schedule Nov 24, 2025 visibility 11 link 4 artists, 1 gallery

sylvia snowdens m street paintings command space at white cube new york 1234763293

Sylvia Snowden's exhibition "On the Verge" at White Cube New York showcases her "M Street" series of paintings, created between 1978 and 1997. The works feature thick, impasto surfaces and muscular, whiplashed figures that emerge from oil pastel and acrylic, depicting anatomical crises rather than symbolic or allegorical subjects. The show was organized by Sukanya Rajaratnam, who conserved and restored the paintings from Snowden's archive in Washington, D.C.

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museum exhibitions schedule Nov 21, 2025 visibility 20 link 9 artists

tinworks montana matthew barney redoubt 1234762840

Tinworks Art, the Montana-based nonprofit that revived Agnes Denes's "Wheatfield" land art in Bozeman last year, has acquired the historic Rialto theater in downtown Bozeman. The organization will inaugurate the venue with screenings of Matthew Barney's 2018 film "Redoubt," running from January 31 through February 1, with two showings daily Thursdays through Sundays. The Rialto, built in 1908 as a post office and converted to a theater in 1924, was donated to Tinworks and joins its two-acre complex of former warehouses and agricultural buildings that have hosted exhibitions by artists including Stephen Shore, Lucy Raven, and Theaster Gates.

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museum exhibitions schedule Nov 21, 2025 visibility 14 link 10 artists

louvre couture mfa houston fashion exhibition 2716957

The Louvre's blockbuster exhibition "Louvre Couture," which drew over one million visitors in Paris, has opened at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH). The show pairs high-fashion garments and accessories—from Yves Saint Laurent to Jacquemus—with artworks and decorative objects, illustrating how designers draw from art history. The Houston edition features 36 objects from 23 designers, including pieces by Jean Paul Gaultier, Iris van Herpen, Schiaparelli, and a John Galliano-designed Dior gown, displayed across two buildings and over a dozen galleries.

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article news schedule Nov 20, 2025 visibility 12 link 4 artists

frank lloyd wright usonian home jackson mississippi 2663742

The Mississippi Museum of Art (MMA) has acquired Fountainhead, a Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Usonian home in Jackson, Mississippi, for $1 million. The residence, built in 1954 for oilman J. Willis Hughes, is one of only four Wright homes in the state and the only one listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It was sold by the estate of late architect Robert Parker Adams, who had restored the property after purchasing it in 1980. The museum plans to preserve the home and open it to the public as a cultural destination.

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museum exhibitions schedule Nov 20, 2025 visibility 25 link 17 artists

black arts movement photogtaphy national gallery washington 1234758567

The National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., has opened "Photography and the Black Arts Movement, 1955–1985," a major survey featuring some 150 images by Black photographers who documented the civil rights and Black liberation movements. Curated by Deborah Willis and Philip Brookman, the exhibition includes works by Doris Derby, John W. Mosley, Ming Smith, and about 100 other artists, capturing both iconic protest imagery and quieter, intimate moments of Black life. The show runs through January 11, 2026.

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article culture schedule Nov 20, 2025 visibility 24 link 12 artists, 2 galleries

the push to preserve nina simones childhood home just got a 6 million boost thanks to venus williams and adam pendleton 2307161

The childhood home of legendary singer and activist Nina Simone in Tryon, North Carolina, has been fully restored after nine years of effort by an artist coalition led by Adam Pendleton, alongside Julie Mehretu, Rashid Johnson, and Ellen Gallagher. The restoration, completed with a $6 million boost from a charity auction and gala co-hosted by tennis star Venus Williams and Pace Gallery, preserved the 650-square-foot clapboard house to its 1933–1937 condition, including historically accurate materials, an ADA ramp, geothermal climate control, and a century-old magnolia tree named “Sweetie Mae.” The African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund announced the completion, and the property remains closed to the public while community programming and ethical cultural tourism are being planned.

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article news schedule Nov 20, 2025 visibility 9 link 5 artists

art bites barbie museum collection 2436091

Mattel and the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) have announced a five-year global partnership, launching their first collaborative collection of seven MoMA-inspired Barbie dolls. The debut lineup includes a Van Gogh Barbie featuring a gown inspired by *Starry Night* (1889), alongside other dolls drawing from iconic artworks. This new collection follows Mattel's earlier 2015 Museum Collection, designed by Linda Kyaw, which included Barbies styled after works by Gustav Klimt, Leonardo da Vinci, and Vincent van Gogh, such as a Da Vinci Barbie modeled after the *Mona Lisa* and a Klimt Barbie based on *Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I* (1907).

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trending_up market schedule Nov 20, 2025 visibility 16 link 12 artists, 1 gallery

phillips modern contemporary november dinosaur 2716370

Phillips’s Modern and Contemporary art evening sale in New York on Wednesday achieved $67.3 million, a 24.4% increase over last year’s total but far below the $154.6 million record set in 2023. The 33-lot sale landed at the top end of its pre-sale estimate, with Francis Bacon’s *Study for Head of Isabel Rawsthorne and George Dyer* (1967) selling for $16 million as the top lot. Notably, the auction included dinosaur bones for the first time—a juvenile triceratops skeleton nicknamed Cera—which proved a lucrative draw, while a painting by rising British artist Jadé Fadojutimi and a gold nugget called “The Thunderbolt” both failed to sell. Only one new artist record was set, for Firelei Báez at $645,000.

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article culture schedule Nov 19, 2025 visibility 15 link 6 artists

marina abramovic moma klaus biesenbach artist present 1234762185

In a podcast interview with Louis Theroux, Marina Abramović revealed that curator Klaus Biesenbach was initially skeptical of her landmark 2010 performance "The Artist Is Present" at MoMA. Biesenbach, then chief curator at large at the Museum of Modern Art, had invited Abramović for the institution's first performance art retrospective, proposing the title "The Artist Is Present." When Abramović suggested sitting silently in the museum's atrium every day for three months, Biesenbach reportedly called the idea "ridiculous," predicting no one would participate. Despite his doubts, the performance drew some 1,500 visitors, with one person sitting for an entire day, and became a defining moment in 21st-century art.

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