The North Can Do More Than Design

Der Norden kann mehr als Design

During Stockholm Art Week, the Swedish capital showcases itself as a leading Nordic art destination. Highlights include textile sculptures by Diana Orving at Millesgården Museum, two concurrent art fairs—the independent Supermarket and the 20th edition of Market Art Fair—and numerous gallery exhibitions, artist talks, and studio visits. The Market Art Fair features 54 booths and over 150 artists, with a focus on Nordic positions, including works by Ólafur Elíasson and the duo Inka & Niclas. The city's art scene is growing, with many new galleries opening and strong private institutions like Bonniers Konsthall and Fotografiska participating.

Heir of Goya and Abstract Expressionism, the painting of Roger-Edgar Gillet finally rediscovered in an unprecedented retrospective

Héritière de Goya et de l’expressionnisme abstrait, la peinture de Roger-Edgar Gillet enfin redécouverte dans une rétrospective inédite

A major retrospective at the Musée Estrine in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence finally brings long-overdue recognition to French painter Roger-Edgar Gillet (1924–2004), an artist who emerged from the post-war abstraction scene of the Nouvelle École de Paris but later forged a singular figurative style blending Goya, Delacroix, and Northern grotesque traditions. The exhibition follows two important donations—to the Centre Pompidou in 2017 and the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rennes in 2022—that helped revive institutional interest in Gillet, whose work had been marginalized since the 1960s.

At the Centre Pompidou-Metz, 100 Works to Understand the Double Face of François Morellet

Au Centre Pompidou-Metz, 100 œuvres pour comprendre le double visage de François Morellet

The Centre Pompidou-Metz presents a centenary retrospective of French artist François Morellet (1926–2016), featuring 100 works that explore the dual nature of his practice. Curator Michel Gauthier has divided the exhibition into two mirrored halves—one dedicated to reason and geometric rigor ("the Mondrian side"), the other to disorder and irrationality ("the Picabia side")—reflecting Morellet's own description of himself as the "monstrous son of Mondrian and Picabia." The show traces his evolution from early figurative works and self-taught experiments to his embrace of concrete art, Islamic decorative systems, and systematic absurdity.

Georg Baselitz (1938-2026)

Georg Baselitz, born Hans-Georg Kern in 1938, has died at age 88. The German painter and sculptor, who changed his name in 1961, built a career on aesthetic dissent. Expelled from art school in East Berlin, he first gained notoriety with a 1963 exhibition at Galerie Werner and Katz in Berlin, where two works were seized for obscenity. His signature gesture—inverting his images, beginning with "Der Wald auf dem Kopf" in 1969—became his most recognizable trademark, shifting focus from subject to the act of painting itself. Baselitz also produced significant sculptures, often carved with a chainsaw and axe, and his work was the subject of major retrospectives at the Centre Pompidou (2021-2022) and the Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris (2011-2012).

11 Contemporary Emirati Artists To Know

The article highlights 11 contemporary Emirati artists, providing an overview of their practices and significance within the Gulf's evolving art scene. It contextualizes this list against recent major events in the region, including the debut of Art Basel Qatar in early February and the subsequent U.S. attacks on Iran, which caused turmoil across the Gulf, disrupted airline operations, and forced Art Dubai to scale back its event to a smaller fair in mid-May. Artists and galleries in the Gulf also had to temporarily close.

5 Standout Artworks at Carnegie International 2026

The Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, has unveiled the 59th edition of its Carnegie International exhibition, featuring a monumental series of murals titled *Orogenic* (2026) by Abraham González Pacheco. The newly commissioned work, made of concrete, metal, and pigment, depicts a maelstrom of archaeological objects inspired by the museum’s collection and sets the tone for the exhibition.

A mind-bending Spaniard, an imagistic Puerto Rican and a lush Latvian – the week in art

This week's art roundup from The Guardian features a major exhibition on Spanish painter Francisco de Zurbarán at the National Gallery in London, described as a mind-bending and revelatory show with loans from the Prado and other top museums, positioning him alongside Goya and Picasso. Other highlights include Gilbert & George's tribute to their late homeless friend at their London centre, outdoor sculptures by Lynn Chadwick at Houghton Hall, thickly built-up paintings by Angel Otero at Hauser & Wirth Somerset, and abstract works by Latvian sculptor Daiga Grantina at Warwick Arts Centre. The article also covers a new Banksy statue in central London depicting a man marching with a flag, and a Masterpiece of the Week feature on Guido Reni's 'Saint Mary Magdalene'.

Katherine El-Salahi, anti-apartheid activist, anthropologist and publisher, 1945–2026

Katherine El-Salahi, an anti-apartheid activist, anthropologist, and publisher, has died at age 81. Born Katherine Levine, she studied at Cambridge and SOAS before joining the clandestine group London Recruits in 1970, carrying out leaflet bomb propaganda and running guns into South Africa. She later became instrumental in the career of her husband, Sudanese painter Ibrahim El-Salahi, organizing his landmark 2013 retrospective at Tate Modern, building his archive, and securing gallery representation with Vigo Gallery.

Ed Ruscha | Billy (1968) | Art & Prints

Ed Ruscha's 1968 exhibition catalogue 'Billy', designed for a show of works by his friend Billy Al Bengston, is being offered for sale. The catalogue features a flocked sandpaper cover, satin ribbon bookmark, and machine screw and hex nut binding, and was published by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art for an exhibition that traveled to the Corcoran Gallery of Art and the Vancouver Art Gallery. The work is listed on an art marketplace platform with a price of €62,600, and the listing includes details about its condition, provenance, and the artist's broader career.

Tate Britain will Exhibit ‘90s Art and Fashion, and Other News.

Tate Britain will stage "The 90s: Art and Fashion" in autumn 2026, guest curated by Edward Enninful, featuring nearly 70 artists, designers, and photographers including Steve McQueen, Damien Hirst, Alexander McQueen, and Vivienne Westwood. The exhibition explores how the decade reshaped British cultural identity through art, fashion, and social commentary, highlighting DIY anti-fashion aesthetics and themes of identity, race, class, and representation. Separately, Gagosian opened a new ground-floor flagship at 980 Madison Avenue in New York, replacing its longtime sixth-floor space after 37 years. A rare 17th-century Mughal astrolabe is heading to Sotheby's London with a £1.5–2.5 million estimate. Fondazione Sozzani launched an award for emerging creative talent. A Manhattan federal jury ordered art publisher Michael McKenzie to pay $102.2 million in damages to the Morgan Art Foundation for producing unauthorized works by Robert Indiana.

Aneta Grzeszykowska Shoots Poetic Portraits in a Mask of Herself at Age 14

Polish artist Aneta Grzeszykowska is presenting two photo series in New York: "Mama" (2018), featuring a life-like doll of herself played with by her young daughter, and "Daughter" (2025), for which she wears a mask of her 14-year-old self and poses with family members. "Mama" is included in the "New Humans" exhibition at the New Museum and previously appeared in the 2022 Venice Biennale's "Milk of Dreams." "Daughter" is on view at Lyles & King gallery on the Lower East Side through May 9, and also in the group show "Adolescence" at the Zachęta National Gallery of Art in Warsaw. The series extend Grzeszykowska's long-standing practice of manipulating family photographs, which began with her 2005 series "Album," where she removed herself from old family pictures.

Meet the Woman Who Curated the Art on Miranda Priestly’s Walls

Fanny Pereire, an art advisor specializing in film and television, curates the art seen on the walls of fictional characters like Miranda Priestly in *The Devil Wears Prada 2*, Logan Roy in *Succession*, and Bobby Axelrod in *Billions*. She works as a fine art coordinator, sourcing reproductions and original works to match character personalities and socioeconomic status, often overseeing the destruction of replicas after filming. Her role, created by producer Scott Rudin in 1999, involves clearing copyrights for every artwork shown on screen, from children's drawings to high-end pieces by artists like Wayne Thiebaud and Alex Katz.

Jarvis Cocker Is Bringing His Eclectic Eye to the Hepworth Wakefield

Musician Jarvis Cocker and his wife, creative consultant Kim Sion, will curate an exhibition titled “The Hodge Podge” at the Hepworth Wakefield in the U.K., opening in May 2027. The show will feature artworks selected by the couple that challenge conventional definitions of art, spanning diverse media and time periods, with artists including Peter Doig, Barbara Hepworth, Jeremy Deller, and Emma Kunz. The exhibition will be bookended by an immersive Dreamachine, a 1959 light-art device by Brion Gysin and Ian Sommerville. Cocker and Sion have outlined their curatorial philosophy in a Hodge Podge Manifesto, celebrating beauty in chaos and disorder.

Secretive LA art dealer Larry Gagosian to be subject of 'juicy' unauthorized doc

An unauthorized documentary about mega-gallerist Larry Gagosian is in the works, directed by Barry Avrich, who previously helmed the Netflix hit "Made You Look: A True Story About Fake Art." Titled "Shadow Man: Inside The Secret World of Larry Gagosian," the film promises to feature former employees and artists sharing insider stories about Gagosian's empire. Avrich has a track record of documentaries on high-profile figures, including Lew Wasserman and Harvey Weinstein.

First Look: See What’s Inside the Met Gala’s “Costume Art” Exhibition

Vanity Fair art and style correspondents Nate Freeman and José Criales-Unzueta preview the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute spring exhibition "Costume Art," which inaugurates the Condé M. Nast Galleries. The exhibition arrives amid controversy over the Met Gala being sponsored by Lauren Sánchez Bezos and Jeff Bezos, leading to boycott calls and New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani skipping the event. Despite this, Anna Wintour and Met director Max Hollein announced the gala raised a record $42 million. Head curator Andrew Bolton presents fashion as art, pairing garments with artworks like Warhol's Skull and Sarah Lucas's Nud Cycladic 9.

Yayoi Kusama Infinity Room Coming to Cincinnati Art Museum This Summer

The Cincinnati Art Museum has announced it will host Yayoi Kusama’s immersive installation, "All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins," from July 17 through October 18, 2026. On loan from the Dallas Museum of Art, the exhibition features one of the artist's signature Infinity Mirror Rooms filled with polka-dotted acrylic pumpkins, accompanied by twelve of her pumpkin paintings created between 1990 and 2004.

Amanda Carneiro and Raphael Fonseca to curate 2027 Bienal de São Paulo

Amanda Carneiro and Raphael Fonseca have been named curators of the 2027 Bienal de São Paulo. Carneiro, a curator at MASP since 2018, has organized solo exhibitions for artists including Santiago Yahuarcani, Beatriz Milhazes, and Sonia Gomes, and was part of Adriano Pedrosa’s curatorial team for the 2024 Venice Biennale. Fonseca, visual arts programmer at Culturgest and curator-at-large at the Denver Art Museum, is currently curating the Taiwan Pavilion for the 2026 Venice Biennale and co-curating the 3rd Counterpublic Triennial. He also curated the 2025 Bienal do Mercosul.

Liu Ding and Carol Yinghua Lu to curate 2027 Istanbul Biennial

The Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (ISKV) has announced that Liu Ding and Carol Yinghua Lu will curate the 2027 Istanbul Biennial. Liu Ding is a Beijing-based artist and curator who has participated in numerous international biennials and taught at NABA Milan, while Carol Yinghua Lu is an art historian and director of the Inside-Out Art Museum in Beijing, with a background at OCAT Shenzhen, Museion Bolzano, and Asia Art Archive. The pair, who have collaborated since 2007, most recently served as artistic directors of the 2024 Yokohama Triennale. The 19th edition of the Istanbul Biennial is scheduled for 18 September to 14 November 2027.

Venice Biennale Strike Makes History

On May 8, thousands marched through Venice and more than two dozen national pavilions were partially or fully shuttered during a 24-hour strike organized by the Art Not Genocide Alliance and local activist groups. The strike, which included Palestinian flags draped over artworks, marks the first cultural strike in the Venice Biennale's 131-year history. Italian police beat back protesters as Editor-in-Chief Hakim Bishara reported from the scene. Separately, a nesting seagull near the Polish pavilion became an unexpected star, and the LA Art Book Fair opened with a focus on archival materials.

Joan Semmel & Rama Duwaji

MoMA PS1 has opened its major quinquennial exhibition "Greater New York," a sprawling survey featuring early-career artists based in the city. The show, which fills three floors of the former public school, is noted for its gritty, immersive portrayal of contemporary New York life, capturing everyday textures from delivery drivers to urban wildlife.

The Big Review | Lacma's David Geffen Galleries ★★★★

The Swiss architect Peter Zumthor's new $724 million building for the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Lacma), now called the David Geffen Galleries, has opened after nearly two decades of anticipation. The swooping concrete-and-glass structure is praised for its harnessing of natural light and horizontality, creating a stunning showcase for antiquities and inviting the city inside with floor-to-ceiling windows offering views of the La Brea Tar Pits and Wilshire Boulevard. The building performs best with sculpture and decorative objects, with standout works including Liz Glynn's "The Futility of Conquest" (2023) and Manjunath Kamath's "Vikatonarva" (2024).

Refik Anadol’s Dataland Museum Sets an Opening Date

Refik Anadol's Dataland, billed as the world's first A.I. art museum, will open on June 20 in Los Angeles after more than two and a half years of planning. Founded by Anadol and his partner Efsun Erkiliç, the museum is housed inside the Frank Gehry-designed Grand L.A. complex and features five galleries. Its debut exhibition, "Machine Dreams: Rainforest," uses ecological data processed through Anadol's Large Nature Model to create digital sculptures simulating possible rainforests. The museum, designed by Gensler, dedicates nearly a third of its 35,000 square feet to operational hardware and runs on 87 percent carbon-free energy.

Art Dubai Marks 20 Years with Special Edition Focused on Collaboration and Cultural Exchange – Friday, 15-17 May 2026.

Art Dubai returns to Madinat Jumeirah from 15–17 May 2026 for a special 20th-edition programme that reflects on the fair's evolution and reaffirms Dubai's role as a global cultural hub. Presented in partnership with A.R.M. Holding and Dubai Culture, the fair features approximately 75 presentations from commercial galleries, institutional partners, and cultural initiatives, with around 60% of participating galleries drawn from the region. Highlights include the Made Forward presentation from Dubai Collection, the 20th edition of the Global Art Forum titled 'Before and After Everything', and an exhibition of modern Arab art from the Barjeel Art Foundation. The fair also introduces an innovative risk-sharing model where booth costs are payable based on sales performance, and entry is free for all visitors.

New fund helps museums make purchases at Frieze New York

The Sherman Family Foundation Acquisition Fund has launched at Frieze New York, providing $50,000 annually to help US museums acquire works from the fair's Focus section, which features solo stands by galleries under 12 years old. In its first year, the Baltimore Museum of Art acquired works by Reika Takebayashi, Seba Calfuqueo, and Joanne Burke, while the Brooklyn Museum acquired two works by Bettina (Bettina Grossman). Each artist also receives an unrestricted $5,000 award.

The Top Collections Leading the May Marquee Auctions

The article reports that the May 2025 marquee auctions at Christie's and Sotheby's are being driven by a resurgence of major single-owner collections, reversing a period of trophy scarcity in the secondary market. Key collections include the $130 million Robert E. Mnuchin collection at Sotheby's, the personal collection of gallerist Marian Goodman at Christie's, and the S.I. Newhouse collection expected to generate around $450 million, featuring Jackson Pollock's 'Number 7A (1948)' and Constantin Brancusi's 'Danaïde (1913)'. The article notes that the ultra-high tier above $10 million rose 30% year-on-year, and single-owner collections in New York auctions totaled $730.9 million, an 89.9% increase from Q1 2025.

DOZIE KANU’S FIRST FORAY INTO MASS-PRODUCTION

Artist Dozie Kanu has debuted his first mass-production collaboration with Knoll, a line of leather-tasseled tables launched in 2026 during Milan's Salone del Mobile, shortly after the opening of his solo exhibition at Fondazione ICA Milano. The Texas-born, Portugal-based artist, who first appeared in PIN–UP magazine in 2018 as an emerging design wunderkind, has since expanded his practice beyond collectible design into art, exhibition-making, film, and music. His recent projects include a documentary short screened at South by Southwest, a two-person exhibition with László Moholy-Nagy at Meyer Voggenreiter's project space piece*unique in Cologne, and a solo show at ICA Milano that dialogues with Marc Camille Chaimowicz and Jean Cocteau, featuring works alongside selections from the Nicoletta Fiorucci Foundation collection.

art venice faustin linyekula the galeazze project dance

Congolese choreographer Faustin Linyekula is staging "The Galeazze Project," a performance commissioned by the Venice-based nonprofit Scuola Piccola Zattere (SPZ) in the 16th-century Galeazze shipyard complex, which has been inaccessible since World War II and never open to the public. The performance, a collateral event of the 2026 Venice Biennale, brings up to 500 people into the 32,291-square-foot open-air ruin for two nights, featuring local students, musicians from the Venetian label Cosmogram, and trumpeter Heru Shabaka-Ra, with a soundtrack composed collaboratively.

art venice biennale gallery exhibition guide

Cultured magazine has published a guide to art exhibitions during the Venice Biennale, highlighting several major shows across the city. Featured exhibitions include "If All Time Is Eternally Present" at Palazzo Nervi-Scattolin with works by Tai Shani, Meriem Bennani & Orian Barki, and Kandis Williams; "Michael Armitage: The Promise of Change" at Palazzo Grassi; "Amoako Boafo: It doesn’t have to always make sense" at Palazzo Grimani; "Transforming Energy" by Marina Abramović at Gallerie dell’Accademia; and "Helter Skelter" by Arthur Jafa and Richard Prince at Fondazione Prada. The guide provides details on dates, locations, and curatorial themes for each show.

The Met Teams Up with Band-Aid on Art-Themed Adhesive Bandages

The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Band-Aid have reunited for a second collaboration, releasing a new set of art-themed adhesive bandages in 2026. The bandages feature details from three flower paintings in the Met's collection: Claude Monet's *Water Lilies* (1919), Vincent van Gogh's *Irises* (1890), and Odilon Redon's *Bouquet of Flowers* (ca. 1900–1905). The 50-count assortment includes small, medium, and large fabric bandages packed in a collectible tin, available exclusively at Target for $7.29. The 2025 Hokusai collection, which sold out quickly, is also back on sale at major retailers.

New Museum unveils Sarah Lucas's bawdy Bowery commission

The New Museum unveiled Sarah Lucas's sculpture "VENUS VICTORIA" (2026) on May 12 as the inaugural commission for its new public plaza on the Bowery in New York. The work features a pink-hued figure in yellow high heels straddling a giant cast-concrete washing machine, riffing on the classic reclining nude. Lucas's proposal was selected by an all-artist jury including Teresita Fernández, Joan Jonas, Julie Mehretu, Cindy Sherman, and Kiki Smith. The sculpture will remain on view for two years, after which another commission by a woman artist will take its place.