From Agnès Varda to Giuseppe Penone, the strange passion of artists for potatoes deciphered in Aubenas

D’Agnès Varda à Giuseppe Penone, l’étrange passion des artistes pour les patates décryptée à Aubenas

The article explores the exhibition "Des patates" at Le Château – Centre d'Art Contemporain et du Patrimoine in Aubenas, France, which celebrates the humble potato as an artistic subject. It highlights how filmmaker and visual artist Agnès Varda turned potatoes into art with her 2003 Venice Biennale project "Patatutopia," dressing as a potato and scattering 700 kilos of tubers, inspired by her documentary *Les Glaneurs et la glaneuse*. The show also features works by Giuseppe Penone, Michel Blazy, Valérie Geissbühler Pacheco, and Lucas Chanoine, all using potatoes to explore themes of consumption, waste, colonialism, and the cycle of life.

L’œuvre « indocile » du photographe Guido Guidi exposée au BAL

The article announces the exhibition of photographer Guido Guidi's work at Le BAL in Paris, curated by Simona Antonacci, Pippo Ciorra, and Antonello Frongia, with scenography by Cyril Delhomme. The show, titled "Col tempo, 1956-2024," runs from February 20 to May 24, 2026, and was previously presented in a larger version at the MAXXI museum in Rome. Guidi, now 85, is described as the last of a generation of Italian photographers—alongside Luigi Ghirri and Ugo Mulas—who radically redefined photographic language through patient, obstinate reflection on the act of seeing.

5 Exhibitions in Avignon and its Surroundings to Shine from Spring to Summer

5 expos à Avignon et ses environs pour rayonner du printemps à l’été

A series of five art exhibitions are scheduled from spring to autumn 2026 in and around Avignon, France. The program includes a refreshed permanent display of 1980s art at the Collection Lambert featuring Jean-Michel Basquiat and Nan Goldin, a solo show by Julien Prévieux critiquing artificial intelligence at Le Grenier à Sel, a photography exhibition of South Korean landscapes by Michael Kenna at Galerie Rousset, and other shows focusing on artists from Asia and the Middle East.

In Rodez, the haunting shadows of Sugimoto and Soulages meet in a cosmic exhibition

À Rodez, les ombres envoûtantes de Sugimoto et de Soulages se rencontrent dans une exposition cosmique

The Musée Soulages in Rodez is hosting a major exhibition titled "Hiroshi Sugimoto. Reprendre la mélodie," which creates a visual dialogue between the Japanese photographer and the late French master of black, Pierre Soulages. Curated and scenographed by Sugimoto himself, the show pairs iconic series such as "Theaters," "Seascapes," and the colorful "Opticks" with Soulages’ "Outrenoir" paintings. The exhibition highlights their shared fascination with the horizon, the origins of humanity, and the architectural presence of art within a space.

8 Artists to Follow if You Like Elsa Schiaparelli

The article profiles eight contemporary artists whose work resonates with the legacy of fashion designer Elsa Schiaparelli. It highlights creators like Shona McAndrew, whose soft sculptures explore the body's interior, and Kiki Smith, known for visceral, anatomical forms, drawing direct parallels to Schiaparelli's surrealist and corporeal inspirations.

Willem de Rooij at Lumiar Cité

Artist Willem de Rooij presents a new exhibition titled "Hut Hut" at Lumiar Cité in Lisbon. The show, curated by Jürgen Bock, runs from February 21 to May 17, 2026, and is documented with 11 images on the Contemporary Art Daily platform.

Beatriz González at the Barbican: Images Against Oblivion

BEATRIZ GONZÁLEZ EN EL BARBICAN: IMÁGENES CONTRA EL OLVIDO

The Barbican Centre in London is hosting a major retrospective of the late Colombian artist Beatriz González, marking her first solo exhibition in the United Kingdom and her most extensive show in Europe to date. Featuring over 150 works, the exhibition traces her six-decade career, from her early experiments with pop-inflected figuration to her iconic use of domestic furniture as canvases. Central to the show is her 1965 masterpiece 'Los suicidas del Sisga,' which exemplifies her method of translating degraded press photographs into vibrant, critical paintings that challenge historical erasure.

7 Artists Discuss the Power and Urgency of Textiles

Louisiana Channel has released a new film titled "7 Artists on Soft Sculptures," featuring artists Sheila Hicks, Nick Cave, Shoplifter, and Kaarina Kaikkonen, among others. The film explores the tactile and emotional power of textiles in contemporary art, with each artist discussing their unique approach—from Hicks's call for softness in a hard world to Cave's use of found objects in identity-masking suits, Shoplifter's vibrant synthetic hair installations, and Kaikkonen's deeply personal incorporation of her late father's clothing.

“In the Presence of Others” at Nørrebro Teater, Copenhagen

Nørrebro Teater in Copenhagen is hosting its first major contemporary art exhibition, "In the Presence of Others," featuring works by Marina Abramović, Laurie Anderson, and Miranda July. The show focuses on the artists' engagement with sound and will be staged throughout the entire theatre building.

Reba Maybury “I Come in Peace” at Secession, Vienna

Reba Maybury presents her exhibition "I Come in Peace" at Secession in Vienna, an installation that spans four sites within the building—including the façade, foyer, and upstairs spaces. Maybury, an artist, writer, and political dominatrix, uses her multidisciplinary practice to explore themes of feminism, sexuality, labor, and power, directly engaging with the institution's history by questioning how to dominate the legacy of Gustav Klimt.

Did This Photographer’s Provocative Work Inspire a Key Plot Point in The Drama?

The new film *The Drama*, directed by Kristoffer Borgli and starring Zendaya and Robert Pattinson, features a central plot point involving a fictional photobook titled *Brainrot*. In the movie, Pattinson’s character, a museum curator, becomes obsessed with the book's provocative imagery of young women with firearms after learning of his fiancée’s past violent intentions. While *Brainrot* is a fictional creation, its aesthetic and subject matter draw significant parallels to Lindsay McCrum’s 2011 photography book, *Chicks with Guns*, which documented the diverse demographics of female gun owners in America.

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The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum has acquired a rare original copy of Captain America Comics No. 1, donated by Riot Games co-founder Brandon Beck. Published in 1940 by Jewish creators Jack Kirby and Joe Simon, the issue is iconic for its cover art depicting Captain America punching Adolf Hitler. The acquisition also includes Captain America Comics No. 46, which features one of the earliest pop-culture depictions of a concentration camp liberation.

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A petition with over 600 signatures is protesting the selection of Prague-based artist Predrag Đaković to represent Serbia at the 2026 Venice Biennale with a project titled “Across Golgotha to Resurrection.” The petition, created by the ZUK Informal Art and Culture Collective, alleges that the selection process was unprofessional and non-transparent, and that commission members are closely linked to President Aleksandar Vučić’s Serbian Progressive Party (SNS). The announcement was reportedly made via Đaković’s Instagram rather than through official channels, and neither the artist nor Serbia’s Ministry of Culture has responded to requests for comment.

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Olivia Laing's novel "The Silver Book" is set in 1974 Italy during the Years of Lead, following Nicholas Wade, a young Slade graduate who becomes the lover and apprentice of costume and set designer Danilo Donati. Donati is working on Federico Fellini's "Casanova" and Pier Paolo Pasolini's "Salò," and the story explores their creative and erotic relationship against a backdrop of political turmoil. Laing's prose is vignetted and elliptical, focusing on daily acts of filmmaking and the sensual world of the characters.

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The Park Avenue Armory in New York is hosting the North American premiere of *11,000 Strings*, an orchestral piece by composer Georg Friedrich Haas featuring 50 black pianos arranged in a ring. The performances began last night and run through October 7, with the 55,000-square-foot Drill Hall providing a dramatic setting for the microtonally tuned pianos and a 25-member ensemble from Klangforum Wien. The piece explores texture and tone over melody, evoking composers like Ligeti, Penderecki, and Stockhausen.

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The Dorothea & Leo Rabkin Foundation in Portland, Maine, has named eight recipients of its 2025 Rabkin Prize for visual arts journalists. Each winner receives an unrestricted $50,000 grant. This year's honorees are Tempestt Hazel, Jessica Lynne, Nicole Martinez, Brandy McDonnell, America Meredith, Eva Recinos, Paul Chaat Smith, and J Wortham. The foundation also commissioned portraits by photographer Kevin J. Miyazaki and will publish a series of interviews with the winners starting September 10.

How the adoption of canvas in Venice changed the way artists painted

Art historian Cleo Nisse has published a new book, *Venetian Canvas and the Transformation of Painting*, examining how 16th-century Venetian painters such as Titian, Veronese, and Tintoretto pioneered the use of canvas as a painting support. Nisse reveals that canvas was not a uniform material—artists experimented with different weaves, including tabby and herringbone patterns, and even repurposed sailcloth and tablecloth-quality fabrics to achieve specific visual effects. The book argues that canvas was already familiar in the late Middle Ages for banners and alternatives to tapestry, and that Vittore Carpaccio was the first master of the medium, varying canvas types for expressive purposes in his *Legend of St Ursula* series.

Comment | Degenerate art all over again? Nazi attack on Modern art is not far away from trends in today’s world

The article draws a provocative parallel between the Nazi regime's attack on modern art—epitomized by the 1937 "Degenerate Art" (Entartete Kunst) exhibition—and contemporary political aesthetics, particularly around President Donald Trump. It traces the Nazi party's early use of visual spectacle, mass rallies, and monumental art to forge a national identity, contrasting this with Trump's proposed National Garden for American Heroes and stalled White House Ballroom, which the author dismisses as kitsch but lacking the cohesive fascist aesthetic of Albert Speer's masterplans.

Venice exhibition of site-specific films aims to capture the hyper stimulating times we are living in

The Fondazione In Between Art Film presents "Canicula," the third and final exhibition in its Trilogy of Uncertainties, opening on 6 May at the Complesso dell’Ospedaletto in Venice. Curated by Leonardo Bigazzi, the show features eight newly commissioned site-specific films that explore themes of excess, sensory overload, and geopolitical tension. Works include Roman Khimei and Yarema Malashchuk's "Affirmations" (2026), depicting fictional deathbed testimonies of Russian soldiers, Lawrence Abu Hamdan's "450XL: The Story of a Fugitive Sound" (2026) about a sonic attack in Belgrade, and Maya Watanabe's "Jarkov" (2025-26) reflecting on Arctic ice melt and Pleistocene remains.

Oleg Prokofiev’s Lost Trove of Paintings Comes to Light After Decades in Hiding

A trove of abstract paintings and sculptures by Russian artist Oleg Prokofiev, hidden for decades in Moscow after he fled the Soviet Union, has been rediscovered and is now on public display for the first time. Prokofiev concealed the works in the 1950s and 1960s to avoid state persecution—abstract art was banned in the USSR, and his relationship with British scholar Camilla Gray made marriage impossible until 1969. After Gray's death and his move to England, the artworks remained safely stored in Moscow, where he found them intact after the Soviet collapse. The collection, including paintings, sculptures, sketchbooks, and letters, is now exhibited at the newly founded Prokofiev Studio in Hackney, London, established by his four children and curator Anzhela Popova.

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Astronaut Scott Kelly is utilizing his record-breaking year-long mission aboard the International Space Station to capture high-altitude photography of Earth's surface. Dubbing his work #EarthArt, Kelly shares abstract, vividly colorful images of terrestrial landscapes—ranging from the Australian outback to the Himalayas—with his massive social media following. His approach favors formal abstraction over traditional documentation, highlighting the planet's diverse topography through a lens that blurs the line between science and fine art.

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MASS MoCA has launched "Technologies of Relation," a group exhibition featuring 12 artists who explore the complex, non-binary relationship between humanity and artificial intelligence. Curated by Susan Cross, the show moves beyond dystopian narratives to investigate how artists can reclaim agency over corporate-produced technologies. Featured works range from Roopa Vasudevan’s hand-drawn QR codes that mimic textiles to Neema Githere’s hammock installations that literalize the concept of a digital network.

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Chinese artist Zhang Shangfeng presents a solo exhibition titled “The Discourse of Neo-Mythmaking” at Beijing’s Bonian Space, curated by Yang Xi. The show features recent paintings that blend personal experience with contemporary archetypes to create what the artist calls “neo-myths.” Zhang’s work draws on his time in Xi’an, China, and an exchange program at the University of Arts in Belgrade, using stylized, modernist-influenced imagery to explore themes of self, otherness, loneliness, and interpersonal relationships.

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New York Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani visited President Donald Trump at the White House on November 21, where the two former online adversaries found common ground on issues like crime, rent, and affordable housing. They posed together in front of Frank O. Salisbury's portrait of Franklin D. Roosevelt, which Trump claimed to have rediscovered in White House vaults, though it was previously hung by President Joe Biden. The article traces the history of Salisbury's 1935 painting and its copies, including the official White House version commissioned by Harry S. Truman in 1947.

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Gian Lorenzo Bernini's iconic Baroque sculpture *The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa* (1647–1652) is examined in detail, depicting the Spanish Carmelite nun Saint Teresa of Ávila in a moment of divine rapture as an angel pierces her heart with a golden arrow. The artwork, housed in the Cornaro Chapel at Santa Maria della Vittoria in Rome, was commissioned by Cardinal Federico Cornaro and remains one of Bernini's most celebrated and controversial masterpieces, blending theatricality, religious fervor, and virtuosic marble carving.

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The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) posted a painting by the late artist Thomas Kinkade titled *Morning Pledge* on social media platforms Facebook, Instagram, and X, with the caption “Protect the Homeland.” The painting depicts an idealized American small town with midcentury cars, a schoolhouse, and an American flag. Kinkade, known for mass-producing sentimental, conservative scenes and dubbed the “painter of light,” was widely dismissed by the mainstream art world as kitschy. The DHS post coincided with the opening of a new ICE detention center in the Florida Everglades, nicknamed “Alligator Alcatraz,” built to imprison immigrant detainees, and with the passage of a controversial bill expanding ICE funding while cutting healthcare and food benefits.

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On Saturday, demonstrators across the United States took part in No Kings rallies protesting President Donald Trump, with artists playing a key role in creating protest visuals. In New York City, activists including Susan Sarandon and Mark Ruffalo carried a yellow banner by graphic designer Ange Tran reading “People Over Billionaires,” while Brooklyn artist Julie Peppito led an art build with Indivisible Brooklyn, producing around 100 signs featuring slogans like “people power” and a red sun design. The protests, organized by the 50501 movement alongside Indivisible and MoveOn, drew an estimated 5 to 13 million participants nationwide, making it the largest action since Trump took office in January.

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Trend forecaster and writer Sean Monahan, known for coining the term "vibe shift" and popularizing "normcore" through the collective K-HOLE, reflects on cultural trends, platform fatigue, and the possibility of a long-awaited cultural shift. In an interview with Artnet News, Monahan discusses his journey from art school to brand consulting, the legacy of post-internet art, institutional decay, and why the 2020s may finally be congealing into a definable decade. He currently runs the Substack newsletter 8Ball, which decodes contemporary aesthetics and social dynamics.

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British photographer Polly Penrose documented her changing body over seven years in a nude self-portrait series titled "A Body of Work." The project involved physically demanding poses taken on self-timer, leaving her bruised and aching, as she hammered her body into various spaces. Penrose described the process as a punishing, repetitious fight to fit into each setting, with the resulting images capturing both visible physical transformations and concealed emotional changes.

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A 4.9-meter stainless steel sculpture titled "Chaînes de Lumière" was unveiled on March 15, 2025, in Bikfaya, Lebanon, by artist duo Pierre and Cedric Koukjian. The work, composed of seven monumental links, was inaugurated in the presence of local officials including Bikfaya Mayor Nicole Gemayel, former President Amine Gemayel, Swiss Ambassador Marion Weichelt, and several UN envoys. It is part of a series of chain-motif sculptures installed globally, with previous works like "X-Link" (2022) in Geneva, Switzerland, and future installations planned for London and Bristol.