It's full of artworks behind the looks seen on the Met Gala 2026 red carpet

È pieno di opere d’arte dietro ai look visti sul red carpet del Met Gala 2026

The Met Gala 2026, held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, adopted the dress code "Fashion Is Art," prompting designers and celebrities to transform their bodies into living canvases and sculptures. Notable looks included Emma Chamberlain in custom Mugler evoking Vincent van Gogh, Anne Hathaway wearing a Michael Kors Collection dress hand-painted by artist Peter McGough with ancient Greek iconography, and Madonna in a Saint Laurent by Anthony Vaccarello ensemble inspired by Leonora Carrington's surrealist work. Other celebrities like Kendall Jenner and Kylie Jenner referenced classical sculptures such as the Nike of Samothrace and Venus de Milo, while Anok Yai, in collaboration with Pierpaolo Piccioli for Balenciaga, created a metallic bronze effect honoring the Black Madonna.

Fotografia Europea returns to Reggio Emilia. Program, appointments, hundreds of widespread exhibitions

A Reggio Emilia torna la grande rassegna Fotografia Europea. Programma, appuntamenti, centinaia di mostre diffuse

Fotografia Europea, the major photography festival in Reggio Emilia, returns for its 21st edition from April 30 to June 14, 2026, under the theme "Fantasmi del quotidiano" (Ghosts of the Everyday). The official circuit features twenty exhibitions across historic venues such as Chiostri di San Pietro, Palazzo da Mosto, and Palazzo dei Musei, as well as modern spaces like Spazio Gerra and Collezione Maramotti. Highlights include works by Felipe Romero Beltrán (winner of the KBr Photo Award 2025), Mohamed Hassan, Salvatore Vitale, Marine Lanier, Ola Rindal, Tania Franco Klein, Giulia Vanelli, Frédéric D. Oberland, and Simona Ghizzoni, with curatorial contributions from Tim Clark and Luce Lebart. Over three hundred off-circuit exhibitions will also be held throughout the city.

Vincenzo Trione's new book aims to redefine the concept of the avant-garde (reviews by his students)

Il nuovo libro di Vincenzo Trione vuole ridefinire il concetto di avanguardia (le recensioni dei suoi allievi)

On March 9, 2026, at IULM University in Milan, Vincenzo Trione presented his new book *Rifare il mondo. Le età dell’avanguardia* (Einaudi, 2025). The event was part of the cultural program *Leonardo alla IULM*, which also featured pages from the Codex Atlanticus on loan from the Biblioteca Ambrosiana. Trione, a professor at IULM, discussed the book with four of his students: Anna Luigia De Simone, Vincenzo Di Rosa, Anna Calise, and Alessia Scaparra Seneca. The talk, titled "Nessuna parola caratterizza l’arte contemporanea più di avanguardia," explored the concept of the avant-garde, its historical legacy, and its contemporary reactivation through movements, manifestos, collectives, and cultural phenomena.

"The Palestine Pavilion Exists, and It's in Turin": Interview on the Exhibition Dedicated to the History of Gaza at the Merz Foundation

“Il Padiglione della Palestina esiste, ed è a Torino”. Intervista sulla mostra dedicata alla storia di Gaza alla Fondazione Merz

The Merz Foundation in Turin is hosting the exhibition 'Gaza, il futuro ha un cuore antico. Materie e memorie del Mediterraneo' (Gaza, the future has an ancient heart. Matters and memories of the Mediterranean). The show, created in collaboration with the Egyptian Museum and the MAH – Musée d’art et d’histoire in Geneva, juxtaposes ancient archaeological artifacts from Gaza with contemporary artworks. It aims to present Gaza's history as a Mediterranean crossroads, moving beyond its current wartime representation. The exhibition features artifacts from a collection of about 500 pieces, temporarily held in Geneva, alongside works by contemporary artists like Samaa Emad, Mirna Bamieh, and Wael Shawky.

The evolution of agriculture tells the story of the world in an unmissable exhibition at Fondazione Prada

L’evoluzione dell’agricoltura racconta il mondo in un’imperdibile mostra alla Fondazione Prada

The Fondazione Prada in Milan is hosting "Dash," a comprehensive solo exhibition by Chinese artist Cao Fei that explores the intersection of ancient agricultural rituals and cutting-edge technology. The exhibition features installations like 'Land Ceremony,' where an agricultural drone is treated as a ritualistic rice dragon, alongside VR experiences and documentary films that investigate the automation of farming in China and Southeast Asia.

Met Gala guests take artistic liberties with dress code

Guests at the 2025 Met Gala embraced the dress code 'Fashion is art' with bold, artistic ensembles. Beyoncé wore a custom Olivier Rousteing sculptural skeleton dress with a feathered train and diamond crown. Naomi Osaka stunned in a Robert Wun white sculptural dress that revealed a red beaded gown underneath. Emma Chamberlain arrived in a hand-painted Mugler dress by Miguel Castro Freitas. Co-chairs Anna Wintour, Nicole Kidman, and Venus Williams also made statements, with Williams wearing a sparkling gown in homage to her own portrait by Robert Pruitt. Many guests referenced famous artworks, such as Lena Dunham channeling Artemisia Gentileschi's 'Judith Slaying Holofernes' through a Valentino design by Alessandro Michele, and Lauren Sánchez Bezos wearing a Schiaparelli gown inspired by John Singer Sargent's 'Madame X.'

What else is happening

Was sonst noch geht

Ahead of the Gallery Weekend Berlin (May 1–3), the city is buzzing with parallel exhibitions that extend far beyond the official gallery circuit. The fourth edition of the Sellerie Weekend opens over 75 independent Off-Spaces from April 30 to May 3, featuring performances, curated tours, and a kickoff event with artist Sophia Süßmilch at the Spoiler project space. The Paper Positions art fair returns to Tempelhof Airport (April 30–May 3) with 70 international galleries specializing in works on paper, including artists like Annegret Soltau, Una Ursprung, and Stefanie Moshammer. Meanwhile, the art initiative House presents the group show "Gravity Ease Contract" in the Berghain heating plant hall (May 1–24), curated by David Douard, with works by Susan Philipsz, Julia Scher, and others. Finally, collectors Karen and Christian Boros unveil "Berlin Bunker #5" in their bunker-turned-museum, featuring recent acquisitions by Pol Taburet, Sung Tieu, and Jill Mulleady.

Joan Miró | Miró Sculptor (1974) | For Sale

A lithograph by Joan Miró titled "Miró Sculptor" (1974) is being offered for sale by Bernardini Art Gallery & Auction House in San Pedro Garza García, Mexico. The work, sized 20 × 40 cm, is priced at $2,200 and comes framed with a certificate of authenticity. The listing includes a brief biography of Miró, noting his association with Surrealism, his pioneering role in automatism, and his major career milestones including the Grand Prize for Graphic Work at the 1954 Venice Biennale and exhibitions at the first Documenta in 1955.

More than 30 exhibitions on display in May at art centers from Marco Island to Sarasota

More than 30 exhibitions are on display in May at art centers across Southwest Florida, from Marco Island to Sarasota. Venues like Art Center Sarasota host shows featuring member, regional, and nationally renowned artists, including the "North Sarasota County Schools Spring Art Show" with over 1,500 student artists, solo exhibitions by Anja Palombo and Cat Tesla, and the "Architects Who Art" show co-curated by Morris Hylton III.

Turkey Notches Another Successful Restitution After Denver Art Museum Returns 1500-Year-Old Marble Head

The Denver Art Museum has repatriated a 1,500-year-old marble head of a bearded man to Turkey, following a successful restitution claim. The sculpture, which dates back to the fifth century BCE, was originally unearthed in the agora of the ancient city of Smyrna (modern-day Izmir) and was likely trafficked illicitly before entering the museum's collection. The artifact is now on public display at the İzmir Archaeology Museum.

In 2026, DeviantArt Is Helping Artists Cut Through The Noise and Fuel Sustainable Careers

DeviantArt has undergone a significant resurgence, reaching over 108 million users by 2026 following a multi-year modernization effort. The platform has pivoted away from traditional advertising models to a creator-centric ecosystem that prioritizes artist monetization through subscriptions, digital tip jars, and low-fee sales. By removing third-party ads and implementing advanced image protection technology, the site has positioned itself as a secure alternative to mainstream social media for digital creators.

Walker Art Center Severs Ties with Restaurant for Laying Off Workers in Favor of QR Codes

The Walker Art Center in Minneapolis has announced it is severing ties with its on-site restaurant, Cardamom, following the establishment's sudden decision to lay off its front-of-house staff. The restaurant, operated by chef Daniel del Prado, intended to replace 16 servers and hosts with a QR code ordering system to combat financial losses. Museum director Mary Ceruti stated that the move caught the institution by surprise and does not align with the museum's commitment to providing a welcoming, full-service environment for its visitors.

How did a 16th-century European basin end up as a sacred object in West Africa?

The Aya Kese, a massive 16th-century northern European brass basin, is currently on display at the British Museum while its complex history remains under scrutiny. Looted by British officer Robert Baden-Powell in 1896 from the Asante kingdom’s royal mausoleum in present-day Ghana, the object was long sensationalized by colonial accounts as a vessel for human sacrifice. Recent scholarship and historical records from Asante King Prempeh I contest these claims, asserting the basin’s sacred role as a spiritual repository for the souls of the Asante people.

Rosy Simas on Creating a Space for Peace in Minneapolis

Minnesota-based interdisciplinary artist Rosy Simas opened a contemplative installation titled "A:gajë:gwah dësa’nigöëwë:nye:' (i hope it will stir your mind)" at the Walker Art Center on the same day that Trump-appointed border czar Tom Homan announced the end of Operation Metro Surge, a federal immigration enforcement operation in the Twin Cities. The installation features salt bottles made from woven corn husks, each honoring one of Simas's relatives, and is inspired by the teachings of Handsome Lake (Ganyodaiyo’), her fifth great-grandfather’s half-brother, who promoted the Seneca concept of a "good mind." The exhibition, on view through July 5, is part of a two-part project that also includes performances in May. Simas, known primarily for choreography, has increasingly gained recognition as a visual artist, recently receiving a Creative Capital Award.

The Newest Docent at This Historic Italian Palace Is a Robot

Palazzo Madama in Turin, Italy, has introduced a four-foot-tall robot named R1 as a docent for its Baroque collection. The robot, developed by the Italian Institute of Technology (IIT) under Project Convince with €4 million in EU funding, guides visitors through the former royal apartments, narrating the history of the House of Savoy and detailing paintings, tapestries, and furniture. R1 can interact with visitors via LED eyes, answer questions, and autonomously navigate the museum's first floor, though it cannot climb stairs. It has been learning on the job since 2025, completing 30 tours in December 2025, and uses corrective software to relocalize itself if lost.

Tale of a Riderless Horse

The National Gallery in London is hosting an exhibition titled "Stubbs: Portrait of a Horse," focusing on the 18th-century artist George Stubbs and his masterful equine paintings. The show features studies, drawings, and key works like "Whistlejacket" (c. 1762) and "Scrub" (c. 1762), highlighting Stubbs's unique anatomical knowledge gained from dissecting horses.

MoMA PS1’s “Greater New York” Is Gritty, Stunning, and Gutting

MoMA PS1 has launched the sixth edition of "Greater New York," a quinquennial survey featuring over 50 artists living and working in the city. Coinciding with the museum’s 50th anniversary, the 2026 iteration focuses on artists in the formative stages of their careers, emphasizing a gritty, raw aesthetic over the polished, market-driven surfaces often found in major biennials. The exhibition highlights photography and installation work that reflects the city's complex immigrant narratives and evolving urban identity.

Lost-Lost Film by French Cinema Pioneer Turns Up in Michigan

A long-lost film by French cinema pioneer Georges Méliès has been discovered in a garage in Grand Rapids, Michigan, after sitting in a trunk for two decades. The 45-second silent short, titled 'Gugusse and the Automaton' (1897), was identified by specialists at the Library of Congress after the owner, Bill McFarland, donated a collection of nitrate reels that had belonged to his showman great-grandfather.

Stick a euro in the slot for the lights! The mesmerising, strictly Venetian works of Lydia Ourahmane

British-Algerian artist Lydia Ourahmane has created a new exhibition in Venice, opening alongside the Venice Biennale, that is deeply rooted in the city itself. Rather than shipping in materials, she built a pier for the island of Poveglia in collaboration with a local cooperative that saved the island from development, and she acquired a coin-operated light machine from the church of San Giovanni Crisostomo, which visitors must feed with a euro to illuminate the show. The exhibition is presented at the Nicoletta Fiorucci Foundation.

Mark Gerson obituary

Mark Gerson, a British photographer renowned for his intimate portraits of literary figures, has died at age 104. Over a career spanning half a century, Gerson captured iconic images of authors including Evelyn Waugh, Doris Lessing, William Golding, Tom Stoppard, and Martin Amis, often photographing them in their own homes to put them at ease. His most famous picture is of a grumpy Waugh on his 60th birthday, taken after Gerson was plied with wine. Gerson's work was championed by National Portrait Gallery director Roy Strong, and in 1996 the gallery held a major exhibition of his portraits titled "Literati."

art abbas akhavan venice biennale canadian pavilion

Abbas Akhavan has transformed the Canadian Pavilion at the Venice Biennale into a greenhouse-like installation titled "Abbas Akhavan: Entre chien et loup." The pavilion's wooden doorway has been replaced with glass, revealing a pond with pinkish water illuminated by sunlight and LED grow-lamps. Visitors encounter mossy boulders, a vintage fur coat sprayed with water, sharpened bronze sticks, and custom frosted mirrors that blur the architecture. The centerpiece will be three giant Bolivian water lilies, grown from seeds sent from Kew Gardens to Padua, which will gradually take over the pond over the summer. The exhibition is curated by Kim Nguyen, commissioned by the National Gallery of Canada, and supported by the Canada Council for the Arts.

Melissa Chiu leaves Hirschhorn directorship for Guggenheim

Melissa Chiu has been appointed as the new director of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, effective September 1. She departs the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C., where she has served as director since 2014. This leadership transition follows a decade of growth at the Hirshhorn under Chiu’s tenure and marks a significant shift for the Guggenheim’s administrative structure.

Is A Random Unknown Artist More Valuable Than Picasso? AI Thinks So.

An experiment using a custom AI model to evaluate artistic value independent of market context found that the model assigned a seven-figure price to an unknown street artist's work while valuing a Picasso at under $1,000. The project, run by an art journalist with a data scientist and an AI expert, trained a Fine Art Large Vision Model on millions of images and price data. Without metadata like artist name or gallery affiliation, the model's predictions were technically interesting but commercially useless; only when those market signals were added did predictions align with real auction outcomes.

Claude Lalanne Mirror Ensemble Sells for $33.5 M., Breaking Design Auction Records

A custom ensemble of 15 mirrors by Claude Lalanne sold for $33.5 million at Sotheby's New York, shattering the artist's previous auction record and setting a new global benchmark for the most expensive design work ever sold at auction. The piece, commissioned in 1974 for Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Bergé's Paris home, far exceeded its $10-15 million estimate.

What You Need to Know About the Venice Biennale’s Russian Pavilion Controversy

The Russian pavilion is set to return to the Venice Biennale for the first time since the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, presenting an exhibition titled 'The tree is rooted in the sky.' This has sparked significant controversy, with artists, curators, and politicians from Ukraine and several European nations calling for the pavilion's exclusion, citing the ongoing war and sanctions. The Biennale organizers have refused to remove Russia, stating they lack the authority to exclude a state recognized by Italy and emphasizing the event's role as a neutral space for cultural dialogue.

Walker Art Center Severs Ties With Restaurant, Citing ‘Core Values’

The Walker Art Center in Minneapolis has announced it is severing ties with its in-house restaurant, Cardamom, following the eatery's decision to replace front-of-house staff with a QR code ordering system. The move by the restaurant would have resulted in the immediate termination of sixteen hosts and servers, sparking plans for worker protests and picketing.

Au Louvre, des directeurs de département entre responsabilités internes et rôle national

Maximilien Durand has been reappointed as head of the Department of Byzantine and Eastern Christian Arts at the Louvre Museum, a role that carries both internal museum responsibilities and national duties on behalf of the French state. Two decrees signed by Culture Minister Catherine Pégard formalize his renewal: one as head of the museum department, and another as head of the corresponding major heritage department, a status held by only nine of the Louvre's departments.

Gilles Bloch: "The Museum needs 1.1 billion euros"

Gilles Bloch : « Le Muséum a besoin de 1,1 milliard d’euros »

Gilles Bloch, president of the Muséum national d’histoire naturelle in Paris, has issued an urgent call for €1.1 billion in funding to address the critical state of the institution's infrastructure. Ahead of its 400th anniversary in 2026, a diagnostic report reveals that 74% of the museum's 120 buildings are in poor condition, with several galleries currently closed to the public or suffering from inadequate climate control. The requested funds would cover €500 million in emergency repairs to stabilize decaying structures and a further €600 million for long-term modernization and energy efficiency upgrades.

Marc Restellini’s ‘atom bomb’ of a Modigliani catalogue raisonné is finally published

After nearly three decades of legal disputes and intense research, Marc Restellini has finally published his definitive catalogue raisonné of Amedeo Modigliani’s oil paintings. Released through the Institut Restellini and Yale University Press, the six-volume work utilizes forensic scientific analysis, spectrometry, and archival evidence to authenticate the artist's oeuvre. The publication includes 100 newly authenticated works while excluding 15 previously accepted paintings due to a lack of definitive evidence, marking a shift from connoisseurship to a fact-based methodology.

Croissant, pigeon… At Nothing Serious gallery, artist Paa Joe transforms Parisian clichés into pop coffins

Croissant, pigeon… À la galerie Nothing Serious, l’artiste Paa Joe transforme les clichés parisiens en cercueils pop

Ghanaian artist Paa Joe has transformed iconic Parisian symbols into vibrant "fantasy coffins" for his solo exhibition, "From Paa Joe to Paaris," at Galerie Nothing Serious. The show features 25 large-scale sculptures, including a Café de Flore cup, a croissant, a Renault 4L, and a bottle of Pouilly-Fumé, all handcrafted in the tradition of Ga burial customs. Created alongside his son Jacob Tetteh-Ashong, these works reinterpret French clichés through a playful yet surreal lens, marking the gallery's return after a four-year hiatus.