The New Museum in New York has announced a major $80 million capital campaign to double its physical footprint on the Bowery. The expansion will utilize an adjacent building already owned by the institution, increasing the total space from 58,000 to over 100,000 square feet. The museum has already secured $43 million of its goal, bolstered by a record-breaking undisclosed donation from longtime supporter Toby Devan Lewis.
An anonymous graffiti artist known as Acer 444 successfully tagged the third-story facade of the New Museum on New York’s Bowery. The large-scale piece, featuring black lettering against a red background, was placed in a precarious, high-visibility location directly above Glenn Ligon’s neon installation. Despite the museum's security measures and its specialized aluminum mesh exterior, the artist managed to complete the work undetected before maintenance crews began removal efforts the following morning.
This Masterpiece by Rembrandt’s Star Pupil Has a New Owner
Willem Drost's 1654 painting *Man With a Plumed Red Beret* has been acquired by the Leiden Collection, a private museum focused on Dutch Golden Age art. The sale was conducted privately through Agnews Gallery at the TEFAF Maastricht fair for an undisclosed sum, with the collection's founder calling it a "capstone acquisition."
A high-profile fundraising campaign led by the Art Fund is underway to save Prospect Cottage, the former home of artist and filmmaker Derek Jarman. Supported by figures like Tilda Swinton and Jeremy Deller, the initiative seeks to raise £3.5 million to preserve the site and its archive for public tours and artist residencies. Meanwhile, the Philadelphia Museum of Art's CEO, Timothy Rub, has issued an apology regarding the institution's handling of sexual harassment allegations against former manager Joshua Helmer.
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The Catedral de Santa María in Burgos is hosting "Picasso: Biblical Roots," an exhibition exploring the enduring influence of Christian iconography on Pablo Picasso. Featuring 44 works loaned from major institutions like the Reina Sofía and the Thyssen-Bornemisza, the show traces the artist's journey from his early academic religious paintings in Spain to the subtle theological motifs found in his later Cubist and post-war works.
The longtime New York City residence and studio of legendary photographer Robert Frank and sculptor June Leaf has been listed for sale at $6.5 million. Located at 7 Bleecker Street in NoHo, the 209-year-old Federal-style townhouse served as the couple's creative base for over four decades, maintaining a raw, unfinished aesthetic that mirrored their artistic sensibilities. Despite its significant art-historical pedigree, the real estate listing omits the artists' names, instead marketing the property as a redevelopment opportunity with significant buildable square footage.
its time to give annibale carracci some of rembrandts spotlight 2742854
This article advocates for a critical re-evaluation of the Italian Baroque painter Annibale Carracci, arguing that his historical significance and artistic influence rival that of the more widely celebrated Rembrandt van Rijn. While Rembrandt has dominated recent museum headlines and auction records, the author highlights Carracci’s foundational role in establishing the Accademia degli Incamminati in Bologna, which revolutionized art education by prioritizing life drawing and elevating the social status of artists from mere craftsmen to intellectual creators.
The Museum of Fine Arts (MSK) in Ghent has launched "Unforgettable," a landmark exhibition recovering the histories of over 40 women artists who were active in Belgium and the Netherlands between 1600 and 1750. The show highlights the professional success of figures like Princess Louise Hollandine and Maria Schalcken, while also acknowledging the anonymous working-class women who fueled the luxury economy through lacemaking. It challenges the long-held myth that female artists were rare exceptions during the Flemish Golden Age.
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The Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam has launched a major exhibition centered on Vincent van Gogh’s profound obsession with the color yellow. The show explores how the artist utilized the hue—from the 'pale sulfur' of his Arles landscapes to his iconic sunflowers and the famous Yellow House—as a symbol of life-giving sunshine and modernity. Beyond Van Gogh’s own masterpieces, the exhibition features works by 19th- and 20th-century masters like Wassily Kandinsky and Hilma af Klint, as well as a contemporary light installation by Olafur Eliasson.
SBI Art Auction is set to host a major two-day auction event in Tokyo this March, coinciding with Art Fair Tokyo. The first sale, "Modern Legacy," features a prestigious single-owner Japanese collection including masterpieces by Léonard Tsuguharu Foujita, Edvard Munch, and Egon Schiele. The second sale, "Bloom Now," focuses on contemporary and Pop art, highlighting works by Roy Lichtenstein and Takeda Teppei, with the combined events carrying a low estimate of JPY 1.25 billion ($7.9 million).
Advanced imaging and material analysis have officially reattributed the 1633 painting "Vision of Zacharias in the Temple" to Rembrandt van Rijn. The work, which had been dismissed by scholars in the 1960s as the product of a collaborator, underwent a rigorous two-year study by the Rijksmuseum’s conservation department. Using macro-XRF scanning and dendrochronological analysis, researchers identified characteristic pentimenti and period-accurate materials that confirm it as a masterpiece from the artist's early Amsterdam period.
Billionaire Ari Emanuel, whose company Endeavor recently acquired the Frieze art fairs, kicked off the VIP opening of Frieze Los Angeles by acquiring three works by 86-year-old Black quiltmaker Yvonne Wells. Emanuel entered the Santa Monica Airport venue ahead of the general VIP crowd, purchasing textile portraits of Michael Jackson, Marilyn Monroe, and Elvis Presley from New York gallery Fort Gansevoort. The transaction, facilitated by Emanuel's long-time advisor Jeffrey Deitch, set a high-energy tone for an opening day that saw brisk sales, including a $3.75 million Ed Ruscha painting at Gagosian.
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Three major American art surveys—the Whitney Biennial, MoMA PS1’s Greater New York, and the Carnegie International—are set to define the artistic landscape of 2026. Early analysis of the artist lists reveals a significant overlap in curatorial interest for figures like Taína Cruz, Akira Ikezoe, and Jonathan González. These exhibitions appear to be moving away from rigid thematic structures in favor of "mood and texture," reflecting a broader institutional retreat from definitive political or social statements.
The Gulf region is rapidly transforming into a primary axis for the international art trade, marked by the upcoming debut of Art Basel Qatar and the rebranding of Abu Dhabi Art as a Frieze event. While state-led museum projects have long dominated headlines, a surge of commercial activity is now taking hold as blue-chip galleries like Pace and David Zwirner join local stalwarts. This expansion comes at a strategic time as traditional markets in the U.S., U.K., and China face contraction.
Newly released Department of Justice documents reveal that the New York Academy of Art (NYAA) actively courted Jeffrey Epstein for funding years after he was a known sex offender. In 2013, board chair Eileen Guggenheim invited Epstein to sponsor a scholarship program where he personally selected student recipients in exchange for commissioned portraits. One such commission resulted in a painting of the sons of billionaire Leon Black, further illustrating the interconnected web between Epstein and high-profile art world figures.
Four previously unseen artworks by Stuart Sutcliffe, the original bassist for The Beatles, have gone on display at the Liverpool Beatles Museum. The exhibition includes a collage and a sketch from his student days at Liverpool College of Art, as well as two monochromatic lithographs created later while he was studying in Hamburg after leaving the band.
Artnet News is searching for a permanent writer for its Wet Paint gossip column, with guest writers like Janelle Zara filling in temporarily. The column focuses on speculating about the identity of the anonymous Instagram account @artnotnet, which posts humorous, all-caps commentary on art world headlines, and notes the rise of art sales on platforms like Facebook Marketplace.
Lego has reversed its policy on bulk orders after facing international backlash for refusing to sell toy bricks to Chinese dissident artist Ai Weiwei. The artist had sought the bricks to create politically sensitive portraits of dissidents for an exhibition at the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne. Lego initially cited a policy against selling bricks for political statements, but after Ai Weiwei's social media campaign—including Instagram posts and a global donation drive—the company announced it will no longer ask bulk customers about their intended use.
A rediscovered 16th-century portrait by Sofonisba Anguissola, titled *Portrait of a Canon Regular* (1552), is being shown at the Winter Show at the Park Avenue Armory in New York. The painting was found in a private collection in Durham, North Carolina, after being known only through an old black-and-white photo at the Frick Art Reference Library. Old Master dealer Robert Simon is acting as the owners' agent, and the work is priced at $450,000.
A 450-year-old watermill in Wrexham, Wales, that was the subject of a J.M.W. Turner watercolor has been listed for sale at £1.5 million ($2.05 million). The Rossett Mill, built in 1588, has been converted into a four-bedroom home with modern amenities while retaining its historic features, including a restored corn mill. The property is listed with Currans Unique and was previously owned by Celia and Branden Wilson, who restored it after it was rescued from demolition in 1973.
The Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris has opened a new exhibition titled "The Empire of Sleep," curated by neurologist Laura Bossi and museum director Sylvie Carlier. The show gathers 130 artworks from the 19th and 20th centuries, exploring how artists have depicted sleep, dreams, nightmares, and the bed as a site of birth, love, illness, and death. Featured artists include John Everett Millais, Eugène Delacroix, Jean Cocteau, Giovanni Bellini, Gabriel von Max, Evelyn De Morgan, Odilon Redon, Gustave Courbet, Francisco de Goya, and Claude Monet, whose painting *Camille on Her Deathbed* is a centerpiece.
New York's Metropolitan Opera announced it may sell its two iconic Marc Chagall murals, *The Sources of Music* and *The Triumphs of Music*, which have adorned the building's Grand Tier since 1966. The proposal includes a caveat that the paintings must remain in place at the opera, with the owner recognized on a plaque. Sotheby's valued the artworks at a total of $55 million within the past year. The financially beleaguered institution has drawn $120 million from its endowment and reduced its performance schedule since the pandemic, and previously used the Chagalls as collateral for a $35 million loan from J.P. Morgan in 2009.
Nan Goldin used the opening of her retrospective “This Will Not End Well” at Berlin’s Neue Nationalgalerie to deliver a forceful 14-minute speech condemning the Israel-Gaza war and criticizing Germany’s censorship of pro-Palestinian voices. She called for a phone-free moment of silence for the dead in Palestine, Israel, and Lebanon, and framed her exhibition as a test case for artistic freedom. The event drew a large crowd, police presence, and was widely shared on social media by figures like Ai Weiwei and Wolfgang Tillmans.
Artist Ai Weiwei will unveil a new exhibition titled “Button Up!” at Factory International in Manchester, England, opening July 2. The show features monumental installations made from 30 tons of buttons he rescued from a shuttered British factory in 2019, along with over 3.5 million Lego pieces. Highlights include eight flags sewn with 9,000 buttons each, referencing the Eight-Nation Alliance that invaded China during the Boxer Rebellion, and a new version of his Lego work *History of Bombs*. The buttons were secretly shipped to China, where artisans assembled the works over 281 days.
Milan is briefly opening access to a rare Leonardo da Vinci mural inside the Sforza Castle during the 2026 Winter Olympics. From February 7 to March 14, visitors can climb a 20-foot scaffold in the Sala delle Asse to see conservators restoring the unfinished wall and ceiling painting, which was begun around 1498 and long hidden under plaster. The castle has also launched a new multimedia installation on the room's history and reopened a gallery dedicated to Leonardo's students and followers, the Leonardeschi.
Madrid's Prado Museum has announced it will cap visitor numbers after a record-breaking 3.5 million visits in 2025, with director Miguel Falomir declaring the institution does not want or need 'a single visitor more.' The museum unveiled 'Plan Host,' a new strategy prioritizing visitor experience over volume, including measures to limit crowds and attract more local Spanish audiences, as 65 percent of current visitors are overseas tourists. Falomir warned against chasing ever-higher attendance, citing the Louvre as a cautionary example where overcrowding has led to deteriorating conditions, staff strikes, and calls for the director's resignation.
A time capsule designed by British architect Norman Foster has been buried in Washington D.C. to mark the 250th anniversary of American independence. The titanium box features 13 facets and stars representing the original colonies, and contains letters from King Charles III and President Donald Trump, along with soil from George Washington's ancestral home. It was presented by Virginia governor Glenn Youngkin and U.K. officials to the U.S. Department of Interior, and is not to be opened until July 4, 2276.
The Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam has opened an exhibition titled "Van Gogh and the Roulins. Together Again at Last," which reunites 14 of Vincent van Gogh's 23 portraits of the Roulin family, painted during his 15-month stay in the Yellow House in Arles (1888–89). The show features a full-scale recreation of the Yellow House façade, the original chair used by postman Joseph Roulin during sittings, and costumed actors portraying family members. It traveled from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, where it drew 280,000 visitors, and includes four additional paintings not shown in Boston, on loan from institutions such as the Stedelijk Museum, Kröller-Müller Museum, Kunst Museum Winterthur, and Museum Folkwang.
Hauser & Wirth and art shipping company Artay Rauchwerger Solomons face trial over charges of evading U.K. sanctions by allegedly making artist George Condo's 2021 work on paper, *Escape from Humanity*, available to a person connected with Russia in 2022. The U.K. Crown Prosecution Service brought the charge in November, and a judge has scheduled a 10-day trial for January 2028, with a hearing on May 5, 2026, for arraignment. Hauser & Wirth has stated it will plead not guilty, while the shipping firm, which went into voluntary liquidation in April 2024, did not respond to requests for comment.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York is hosting "Emily Sargent: Portrait of a Family," its first exhibition of watercolors by Emily Sargent (1857–1936), the younger sister of famed portraitist John Singer Sargent. The works were rediscovered after a forgotten trunk of hundreds of paintings was found in storage by relatives, and in 2022, the family donated 26 pieces across seven museums in the U.S. and U.K. The show features about 20 of the Met's received works, rotating delicate pieces midway through its run, and includes a watercolor co-created by Emily and John.