Art News. Vasari Codex

museum exhibitions schedule Jan 13, 2026 visibility 37 link 24 artists

new museum reopening march 21 2026 1234769578

The New Museum in New York will reopen on March 21, 2026, after a two-year closure for a major expansion. Designed by OMA / Shohei Shigematsu and Rem Koolhaas, the project adds 60,000 square feet to the existing SANAA-designed building, bringing the total footprint to nearly 120,000 square feet. New features include expanded exhibition space, a 74-seat Forum, an enlarged Sky Room, artist commissions by Tschabalala Self, Klára Hosnedlová, and Sarah Lucas, a larger bookstore, and a restaurant by Henry Rich with executive chef Julia Sherman. The reopening weekend will offer free admission funded by trustee Charlotte Feng Ford, and the museum will debut the exhibition “New Humans: Memories of the Future,” featuring over 200 artists including Francis Bacon, Salvador Dalí, and contemporary figures like Meriem Bennani and Hito Steyerl.

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museum exhibitions schedule Jan 12, 2026 visibility 16 link 3 artists

esphyr slobodkina louise nevelson arkansas museum 2733735

The Arkansas Museum of Art in Little Rock is presenting "Architects of Being," an exhibition pairing the work of Esphyr Slobodkina and Louise Nevelson through January 11, 2026. Slobodkina, a Russian-born Jewish immigrant and founding member of the American Abstract Artists, was a painter, sculptor, writer, and fashion designer who also authored the classic children's book *Caps for Sale*. Nevelson, also an Eastern European Jewish immigrant, is renowned for her monochromatic wood assemblages. The show juxtaposes their geometric abstractions, collages, sculptures, and personal fashion, curated as a hypothetical dialogue between two kindred spirits who never met. The exhibition will travel to the Chrysler Museum of Art in Norfolk, Virginia, and the New Britain Museum of American Art.

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trending_up market schedule Jan 9, 2026 visibility 12 link 4 artists

peter paul rubens drawing attribution klaas muller 1234769375

Belgian art dealer Klaas Muller has identified a previously unattributed oil-on-paper study as a work by Flemish master Peter Paul Rubens, titled "Bearded old man, looking down to his left" (ca. 1609). Muller purchased the piece for under €100,000 at a lesser-known northern European auction house three years ago, where it was listed as an unknown artist from the "Flemish school." After recognizing the bearded figure as Saint Thomas from Rubens's "Apostolado Lerma" series at the Prado, Muller commissioned research from art historian Ben van Beneden, former director of Rubenshuis, who confirmed the work's exceptional quality and likely attribution to Rubens. The study also features a ghostly woman's face visible when turned upside down, reflecting Rubens's playful reuse of materials.

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article culture schedule Jan 7, 2026 visibility 18 link 4 artists

monas eyes book cover vermeer painting controversy 1234769003

Thomas Schlesser's novel *Mona's Eyes* has been named Barnes & Noble's book of the year for 2025, but its cover has sparked controversy online. The cover features Johannes Vermeer's *The Girl with the Pearl Earring*, even though the story is about a girl named Mona who visits Paris museums with her grandfather, and the painting is not held in Paris—it resides at the Mauritshuis in The Hague. A viral Reddit thread on an art history subreddit accused the publisher of "ragebait," noting the mismatch between the cover image and the book's content. Schlesser, an art historian who teaches at the École Polytechnique and runs the Hartung Bergman Foundation, defended the choice, saying he wanted an iconic work symbolizing light and darkness rather than highlighting any of the 52 artworks featured in the story.

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article culture schedule Jan 6, 2026 visibility 21 link 16 artists

parlez vous le francais french old masters glossary and museum list 32155

Artnet News published a French-language glossary of Old Masters terminology and a list of French museums dedicated to Old Masters. The article defines an Old Master as a European painter who worked before 1800, then provides an A–Z bilingual glossary covering terms from Baroque to Venetian Renaissance. It also profiles two museums: the Musée du Louvre in Paris, highlighting its history, collection size, and a wartime anecdote about Théodore Géricault's "Le Radeau de la Méduse," and the Musée du Louvre-Lens, a branch museum opened in 2012 on a former mining site.

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article policy schedule Jan 6, 2026 visibility 25 link 10 artists

m hka flemish government plan legal review 1234768894

The Flemish government's plan to dissolve M HKA, a contemporary art institution in Antwerp, has been met with legal opposition after the museum initiated a legal review that claims the move would be illegal. The review, presented to the press on Tuesday with artists Luc Tuymans and Otobong Nkanga in attendance, argues that the government's proposal—which would close M HKA, transfer its collection to Ghent, and rebrand S.M.A.K. as the Flemish Museum of Contemporary and Current Art by 2028—contains "flagrant illegalities." The plan has drawn widespread condemnation from museum directors and artists, including Anish Kapoor, who demanded the removal of his work from M HKA's website.

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person people schedule Jan 5, 2026 visibility 18 link 1 artist

suzanne landau step down as director israel museum 1234768721

Suzanne Landau, 80, will step down as director of the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, having informed staff at the museum’s end-of-year party. She has served as director since September 2023, initially as acting director after Denis Weil resigned amid board disagreements. The museum’s search for a new CEO is in advanced stages, and Landau will assist during a transition period. Her tenure included the installation of Anselm Kiefer’s "Ages of the World" and a restructuring that saw Dganit Sanker-Lange appointed deputy director.

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trending_up market schedule Jan 1, 2026 visibility 16 link 3 artists

sothebys abu dhabi collectors week results 1234766109

Sotheby's held its inaugural Abu Dhabi Collectors' Week at the St. Regis Island Resort on Saadiyat Island, transforming the venue into a luxury showcase with handbags, diamonds, watches, a non-selling art display worth $500 million, and rare cars. The week culminated in open-air auctions under a full moon, netting $133 million—far exceeding the $17 million from Sotheby's first Middle East luxury sale in Saudi Arabia earlier this year. Highlights included a 1994 McLaren Formula 1 car sold for $25.3 million, a Jane Birkin Hermès handbag that fetched $2.9 million, and a 31.68-karat pink diamond called The Desert Rose that went for $8.8 million. A jewelry and timepieces sale achieved white-glove status, taking $25.4 million.

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article culture schedule Dec 31, 2025 visibility 14 link 8 artists

art bites robert rauschenberg talking heads album cover 2709771

Robert Rauschenberg designed the cover for Talking Heads' 1983 album *Speaking in Tongues*, creating a limited-edition LP package with three plastic discs featuring cyan, magenta, and yellow designs that produced a full-color, kinetic composition when overlaid on the spinning record. The project stemmed from a friendship between Rauschenberg and frontman David Byrne, who met after Byrne saw Rauschenberg's photo collages in a New York gallery. Despite production challenges that limited the design to a special edition, the album won a Grammy for best album cover.

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article culture schedule Dec 26, 2025 visibility 18 link 6 artists

art bites mona lisa louvre heist 2708512

On October 19, 2025, thieves disguised as construction workers stole $102 million in French crown jewels from the Louvre, but the article contrasts this with the far more infamous 1911 heist of Leonardo da Vinci's *Mona Lisa*. The 1911 theft was carried out by Vincenzo Peruggia, an Italian handyman and museum employee who hid in a supply closet, removed the painting's glass casing (which he had installed), and fled with two accomplices via subway. The theft went unnoticed for 28 hours, and the French press sensationalized the story, even accusing figures like J.P. Morgan and Pablo Picasso.

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article news schedule Dec 26, 2025 visibility 25 link 4 artists

collector leslie wexner denies being jeffrey epsteins co conspirator 1234768161

A recently released set of files related to convicted sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein has implied that his ties to collector Leslie Wexner, the former Victoria's Secret CEO, ran deeper than previously thought. An FBI email released by the Department of Justice referred to potential “co-conspirators” who worked with Epstein, and while heavily redacted, the message clearly references Wexner, the namesake collector behind the Wexner Center for the Arts in Columbus, Ohio. Wexner's spokesperson denied the implication, stating that he was “neither a co-conspirator nor target in any respect” in the inquiry.

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article news schedule Dec 22, 2025 visibility 45 link 31 artists, 36 galleries

contemporary art galleries 2025 2731623

The article reflects on the closure of several notable contemporary art galleries in 2025, including Clearing, Blum, High Art, Venus Over Manhattan, Sperone Westwater, Galerie Francesca Pia, Tilton Gallery, Altman Siegel, Kasmin, Rena Bransten Gallery, L.A. Louver, and Canal Projects. It opens with a eulogy for Florine Stettheimer by Georgia O'Keeffe, drawing a parallel between the artist's unique way of life and the distinctive, charismatic spirit of galleries that have shuttered. The author recounts personal experiences at now-closed spaces like Metro Pictures, JTT, and Clearing, and quotes dealer Olivier Babin and the legendary Leo Castelli on the fleeting importance of galleries.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 22, 2025 visibility 17 link 10 artists

sargent monet rodin 2718390

The Musée d'Orsay has launched a landmark exhibition titled "Sargent: Dazzling Paris," marking the centenary of John Singer Sargent's death and focusing on his formative decade in 19th-century Paris. The show highlights Sargent's early friendships with artists like Monet and Rodin, his training under Carolus-Duran, and key portraits such as those of Fanny Watts and Madame X, the latter of which caused a scandal that drove him to London. The article also features five portraits that illuminate Sargent's artistic circles in Paris.

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article policy schedule Dec 22, 2025 visibility 13 link 1 artist

smithsonian content review white house threatens funding 1234767747

The Trump administration has threatened to withhold funding from the Smithsonian Institution, accusing it of failing to comply with a content review demanded by the White House. In an email obtained by the Washington Post, budget director Russell Vought and Domestic Policy Council director Vince Haley alleged that the Smithsonian had not turned over all requested documents and exhibition materials, citing a prior executive order in which President Trump claimed the institution promoted “corrosive ideology” by portraying the U.S. as inherently racist. Smithsonian secretary Lonnie G. Bunch III defended the network’s independence, stating it remains committed to sharing information but that a government shutdown had slowed efforts. The administration set a January 13 deadline for full compliance, specifically targeting programming for America’s 250th anniversary.

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article news schedule Dec 22, 2025 visibility 18 link 17 artists

10 art restorations in 2025 2725850

In 2025, a series of major art restorations unveiled transformative discoveries in masterpieces by Caravaggio, Raphael, and Artemisia Gentileschi, among others. Caravaggio's final work, *The Martyrdom of St. Ursula* (1610), owned by Intesa Sanpaolo, was cleaned ahead of Rome's "Caravaggio 2025" exhibition, revealing hidden faces and a soldier's helmet previously only visible by x-ray. At the Vatican Museums, a decade-long restoration of the Raphael Rooms concluded with the revelation that two allegorical figures in the Hall of Constantine were painted by Raphael himself, not just his assistants, rewriting art history. Meanwhile, Artemisia Gentileschi's *Hercules and Omphale* (ca. 1635–37), damaged in the Beirut explosion, underwent emergency conservation by the Getty.

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article local schedule Dec 22, 2025 visibility 16 link 13 artists

detroit institute of arts dia 1976 ad spot remake 2732440

The Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA) has released a 50th-anniversary remake of its iconic 1976 television commercial, "You Gotta Have Art." The original spot, created by advertising agency W.B. Doner & Co., featured museum staff, volunteers, and local performers singing and dancing among masterpieces. The new version, directed by DIA's Director of Visual Media Adam Kosberg, recreates the original shot-for-shot, incorporating updated choreography, a Motown-influenced arrangement by Detroit musicians Marion Hayden and Alvin Waddles, and appearances by local artists including Carole Harris and Allie McGhee, who reprised their roles from the 1976 film. Over 200 museum employees and performers from Wayne State University participated in the production.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 22, 2025 visibility 17 link 10 artists

auctioneers jewelry evening sales 1234763909

Sotheby's held its inaugural evening sale at the Breuer building, featuring the Contemporary and the Now sale. Auctioneer Oliver Barker achieved $527.5 million in sales, surpassing the pre-sale low estimate of $379 million. The highlight was Gustav Klimt's portrait of Elisabeth Lederer, which sold for $236.4 million, setting an auction record for Klimt and becoming the second most expensive work ever sold at auction. During the sale, auctioneer Phyllis Kao wore a David Webb necklace from the mid-1980s, featuring carved emeralds, rubies, and cabochon sapphires, which was on view and available for private sale at Sotheby's retail salon in the Breuer lobby.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 22, 2025 visibility 21 link 13 artists

baku azerbaijan art week 2731495

The article recounts the author's experience attending Baku Art Weekend in Azerbaijan, a festival centered at the Zaha Hadid-designed Heydar Aliyev Centre. The event featured a major exhibition of Fernando Botero's work, "The Triumph of Form," alongside kinetic installations by Daniel Wurtzel and sculptures by Jorge Marín. The festival is shaped by Leyla Aliyeva, vice president of the Heydar Aliyev Foundation and daughter of Azerbaijan's president, who aims to position Baku as a global cultural capital.

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museum exhibitions schedule Dec 19, 2025 visibility 19 link 4 artists

mathaf museum campus expansion architect lina ghothem 1234767454

Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art in Doha has appointed Lebanese architect Lina Ghotmeh to lead a major campus expansion, announced as the institution celebrates its 15th anniversary. The project will redesign the ground floor lobby and library as an open majlis-inspired space, expand the cafe and shop, add a monumental portrait by Yan Pei-Ming, and later transform the plaza and parking area into artist studios, ceramics facilities, glass and material labs, and a sound studio in collaboration with Tarek Atoui. Mathaf director Zeina Arida called the plan 'a new chapter' for the museum.

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article news schedule Dec 18, 2025 visibility 19 link 13 artists

top ukrainian art historian believes italian museum holds 14 fake russian and ukrainian modernist works 1234767043

Konstantin Akinsha, a prominent curator and art historian of Russian and Ukrainian art, has identified 14 artworks in the collection of the Palazzo de Nordis museum in Cividale del Friuli, Italy, as likely forgeries. In a Substack post and interview with ARTnews, Akinsha scrutinized the De Martiis Collection, donated in 2015 by the late collector Giancarlo De Martiis, which includes works attributed to Russian and Ukrainian modernist painters. He points to suspicious provenances involving Jean Chauvelin, a disgraced French art dealer, and Boris Gribanov, a convicted forger. A specific still life attributed to Olga Rozanova (1915-17) is nearly identical to a 1999 painting by contemporary Russian artist Andrei Saratov, who confirmed he did not paint the museum's version. Elisabetta Gottardo, the municipal head of culture, acknowledged Akinsha's authority and pledged further investigation.

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article news schedule Dec 16, 2025 visibility 9 link 4 artists, 1 gallery

cai guo qiang arcteryx fireworks tibet 2691734

Artist Cai Guo-Qiang sparked a major controversy on Chinese social media after staging a fireworks display titled "Rising Dragon" in the Himalayas near Shigatse, Tibet, on September 19, 2025. The event, co-organized with outdoor brand Arc'teryx, drew dozens of art insiders and influencers but was quickly condemned by netizens, environmental scientists, and activists for threatening the fragile Tibetan plateau ecosystem and showing cultural insensitivity toward sacred Buddhist mountains. Both Cai and Arc'teryx issued apologies, and state media outlets like CCTV and Xinhua condemned the performance, leading to an investigation by local authorities.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 15, 2025 visibility 29 link 18 artists

malba acquires 1200 works 2728866

Eduardo F. Costantini, founder of the Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires (Malba), announced the acquisition of the Daros Latinamerica Collection in Zurich, adding 1,233 works by 117 artists to the museum's holdings. This roughly doubles Malba's collection to 3,000 works, with a major expansion project planned to accommodate the new pieces, set to begin next fall to mark the museum's 25th anniversary. Highlights include works by Doris Salcedo, Ana Mendieta, Julio Le Parc, Alfredo Jaar, Lygia Clark, and Jesús Rafael Soto, with 75 artists new to Malba.

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candle obituary schedule Dec 14, 2025 visibility 16 link 2 artists

guy cogeval obituary former director musee dorsay paris 1234761988

Guy Cogeval, the former director of Paris's Musée d'Orsay, died on November 13 at age 70 after a long illness. A specialist in 19th-century art and the Nabis, Cogeval led the Musée d'Orsay from 2008 to 2017, overseeing a major renovation of 80 percent of its galleries and merging it with the Musée de l'Orangerie. He previously directed the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and the National Museum of French Monuments, and curated acclaimed exhibitions including "Hitchcock and Art" and "Édouard Vuillard, Master of Post-Impressionism."

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person people schedule Dec 12, 2025 visibility 20 link 7 artists

maria balshaw tate 2728573

Maria Balshaw, the director of Tate, will step down in the new year after nine years at the helm, the museum announced Friday. Appointed in 2017, Balshaw was the first woman to lead the institutional network, which includes Tate Modern and Tate Britain. Her tenure was marked by a substantial diversification of Tate’s collection and programming to spotlight new art forms, indigenous artists, and artists from the Global South. She also oversaw the launch of a landmark £150 million endowment fund for Tate Modern to address financial woes. Memorable exhibitions included surveys of pre-internet digital artists, modern art in Nigeria, and retrospectives for Leigh Bowery, Isaac Julien, Yoko Ono, and Emily Kam Kngwarray.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 12, 2025 visibility 18 link 10 artists

tiffany magnolia lamp sothebys sale 2728111

Sotheby's sold a Tiffany Studios Magnolia floor lamp for $4.4 million at its Dreaming in Glass auction in New York, making it the most expensive leaded lamp by the decorative arts studio ever sold at auction. The lamp, manufactured around 1910, features a patinated bronze stand and a 28-inch colored glass dome depicting magnolias, and was crafted by Agnes Northrop, Tiffany's star designer, rather than Clara Driscoll. The bidding battle lasted 10 minutes, surpassing the $3 million high estimate.

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person people schedule Dec 11, 2025 visibility 20 link 13 artists

hamza walker winner 2026 audrey irmas award ccs bard 1234765931

The Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard College (CCS Bard) has awarded its 2026 Audrey Irmas Award for Curatorial Excellence to Los Angeles–based curator Hamza Walker. Walker, executive director of the Brick (formerly LAXART) since 2016, will receive $25,000 and be honored at CCS Bard’s spring gala in April. He is recognized for exhibitions featuring artists like Elizabeth Paige Smith, Gregg Bordowitz, and Postcommodity, and for cocurating the acclaimed "Monuments" exhibition with the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, which examines artists' responses to Confederate monument removals. Walker also secured a $1 million donation from collectors Jarl and Pamela Mohn to fund the Brick's move to a new Hollywood space and its rebranding.

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trending_up market schedule Dec 11, 2025 visibility 23 link 13 artists

ultra contemporary chinese artists market 2717404

The article analyzes the auction performance of Chinese artists born after 1990 (post-90s) in the first half of 2025, based on data from the Artnet Price Database and the Artnet Intelligence Report. It highlights a shift from short-term speculation to longer-term competition, with the market showing more robust structure including stratified pricing and wider transactional geography. Key figures include Li Hei Di, whose large-scale painting sold for HK$2.67 million at Sotheby’s Hong Kong, and other artists like Zhang Zipiao, Yuan Fang, and Wang Qianyao achieving consistent mid-range prices between HK$300,000 and HK$800,000. Sales in Hong Kong reached HK$12.4 million, while artists also entered Western markets in New York and London.

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article culture schedule Dec 11, 2025 visibility 15 link 5 artists

simon de pury photos art 2725895

The author recounts a visit to the Prado in Madrid, where his attempt to photograph a portrait by Alonso Sánchez Coello was blocked by a guard enforcing a strict no-photography policy. This experience leads him to reflect on the evolution of museum mementos, from postcards—which he used to buy and even had his children select as a curatorial exercise—to the role of social media in sharing art. He recalls his time as curator of the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection, where postcard sales were a key revenue and popularity gauge, and notes that Instagram now serves as a virtual window into exhibitions and art fairs like Art Basel Miami.

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article news schedule Dec 10, 2025 visibility 16 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 8, 2025 visibility 10 link 7 artists, 4 galleries

hauser and wirth sicily 2724527

Mega-gallery Hauser & Wirth is acquiring the historic Palazzo Forcella De Sata in Palermo, Sicily, as confirmed by president and cofounder Iwan Wirth. The property, a 19th-century eclectic architectural landmark that hosted Manifesta 12 in 2018, was purchased in mid-November, though Sicilian authorities and Italy’s Ministry of Culture have a two-month window to preempt the sale due to historical monument restrictions. The gallery plans to use the main floor as exhibition space, with renovations potentially completed by 2030.

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