Michael Armitage in Venice, monumental and disturbing. What the exhibition at Palazzo Grassi looks like

Michael Armitage is the subject of a major solo retrospective at Palazzo Grassi in Venice, marking his largest exhibition in Europe to date. Organized by the Pinault Collection, the show features monumental paintings that blend African identity, local Kenyan chronicles, and mythological narratives. Armitage’s work is noted for its physical scale and its ability to transform the chaos of human affairs into a syncretic epic, utilizing traditional materials like Lubugo bark cloth to ground his contemporary subjects.

From Bottle Caps and Seals Has Come Colorful, Cascading Art

Renowned Ghanaian artist El Anatsui is currently experiencing a significant professional moment with concurrent exhibitions at White Cube in Hong Kong and Seoul, timed to coincide with Art Basel Hong Kong. The artist, known for his monumental sculptures crafted from discarded liquor-bottle caps and copper wire, recently saw his 2023 work "G6" sell for $995,000 at Sotheby’s London to benefit the Royal Academy of Arts. Now living back in Ghana after decades teaching in Nigeria, Anatsui continues to explore the fluidity of his medium, which mimics the organic processes of growth and decay.

8 Must-See Solo Gallery Shows in March

This month’s gallery circuit features a series of high-profile solo exhibitions across the United States, headlined by a museum-quality survey of Jasper Johns at Gagosian. The selection highlights diverse artistic approaches, from Johns’s seminal 1970s crosshatch paintings to Yuko Mohri’s kinetic installations at Tanya Bonakdar and Gabriel de la Mora’s material-focused conceptual works at Perrotin. Other notable shows include Christina Quarles’s new paintings at Hauser & Wirth, which explore themes of loss and resilience.

22 art exhibitions in L.A. to look forward to in 2026

Los Angeles is set for a major year in visual arts in 2026, with 22 notable exhibitions and events planned across the city. Highlights include the opening of the world’s first AI arts museum (Dataland), the long-awaited Lucas Museum, Yoko Ono’s first solo show in L.A., and the LA Art Show featuring Sylvester Stallone’s abstract works and a new Latin American Pavilion. Other exhibitions include a Selena retrospective at the Grammy Museum and a video art survey at the historic Variety Arts Theater.

In memoriam: remembering art world figures who died in 2025

This article from The Art Newspaper, published as 2026 begins, memorializes key figures from the art world who died in 2025. The list includes artist and activist Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, filmmaker and artist David Lynch, conceptual artist Mel Bochner, collector and patron Guy Ullens (co-founder of Beijing's UCCA), curator Koyo Kouoh (the first African woman to curate the Venice Biennale), photographer Sebastião Salgado, broadcaster Alan Yentob, and sculptor Joel Shapiro. Each entry summarizes their career highlights and contributions.

A brush with… Christopher Wool—podcast

This episode of "A brush with…" podcast features an in-depth conversation with artist Christopher Wool, who discusses his career spanning painting, photography, and sculpture. Wool reflects on early influences including the Art Ensemble of Chicago, Dan Flavin, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Dieter Roth, and Toni Morrison's novel *The Bluest Eye*, which inspired one of his text paintings. He also explains the title of his recent exhibition "See Stop Run" and how jazz has consistently inspired his work. The podcast is sponsored by Bloomberg Connects, which highlights museums that have shown Wool's work, including the Guggenheim, MoCA Los Angeles, and SFMOMA.

10 Must-See Shows during Frieze London 2025

Frieze London 2025 has arrived, bringing with it a sprawling public sculpture exhibition and two art-packed tents in Regent's Park, including the historically focused Frieze Masters. Alongside the main fair, London's galleries are hosting a mix of shows ranging from established favorites to emerging talents, with many exhibitions featuring ambitious sculptural works made from unconventional materials like furniture and driftwood. Notable highlights include Sonia Gomes and Kudzanai-Violet Hwami showing bronze sculptures for the first time, Cai Guo-Qiang's controversial gunpowder canvases at White Cube, and Danielle Fretwell's sumptuous oil paintings at Alice Amati. Artsy has curated a list of 10 must-see gallery exhibitions taking place during the fair.

Long-Hidden Keith Haring Artworks Come to Auction

A collection of rare Keith Haring artworks, gifted to his childhood friend Kermit Oswald over nearly three decades, is coming to auction at Sotheby’s Breuer Building in May 2025. The trove includes a self-portrait from 1985 (estimated at $3–5 million), a painted crib and dresser ($250,000–350,000), a carved wood sculpture from 1983 (up to $800,000), and other early works on wood, fabric, and paper. These pieces trace Haring’s artistic evolution before his subway drawings and international fame, and were kept by Oswald, who was Haring’s best friend since kindergarten and later installed his shows.

warhol foundation fall 2025 grants

The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts has announced its Fall 2025 grant recipients, awarding over $4 million to 57 arts organizations across 17 states, Washington, D.C., and two international locations. Grantees range from established institutions like the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston and Independent Curators International to smaller artist-run spaces such as Mini Mart City Park in Seattle and Transformer in Washington, D.C. Twenty organizations are first-time recipients, including Path with Arts in Seattle and Access Gallery in Denver. Exhibition support covers solo shows for artists like Ching Ho Cheng, Gisela Colón, and Leilah Babirye, as well as group exhibitions such as “Telenovelas” at the Americas Society and the Counterpublic 2026 Triennial.

‘Surfers say, that board is so sick!’ The French artist redesigning the surfboard like you’ve never seen before

French designer and musician Lucas Lecacheur is creating wildly unconventional yet functional surfboards and skateboards, including a split board resembling crab pincers, a stingray-like shape, and a Brutalist board. Currently in Australia for Melbourne Design Week, Lecacheur is living and working out of At The Above gallery in Fitzroy, where he is crafting new boards like the cowboy boot-nosed Château Rouge. His designs, made with traditional materials like fiberglass, push the boundaries of surfboard norms while remaining rideable.

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.

DACA Artist Uses Thread to Weave Immigration Stories

Arleene Correa Valencia, a DACA recipient and Bay Area artist, presents her debut solo exhibition "CÓDICE •• SOBREVIVIENDO A LA PERSECUCIÓN" at Fridman Gallery in Manhattan, on view through May 2. The show features large-scale acrylic and textile works on amate bark paper, including a 16-foot-long piece depicting border-crossing narratives. Valencia collaborates with her father, mother-in-law, and papermaker Jose Daniel Santos de la Puerta, and incorporates childhood letters that poignantly reflect family separation and undocumented life.

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 frieze los angeles 2026 gallery shows

Cultured magazine has published a guide to the best off-site gallery shows during Frieze Los Angeles 2026, organized by neighborhood. The article highlights six exhibitions: Rodney McMillian's "Some lives in the sunshine" at Vielmetter, Emma McIntyre's "Aragonite and conchiolin" at Château Shatto, Cayetano Ferrer's "Object Prosthetics" at Commonwealth and Council, Vicky Colombet's "Eutierria" at Fernberger, Kye Christensen-Knowles's "ALL & ALL" at Gaylord Fine Arts, and Christina Quarles's "The Ground Glows Back" at Hauser & Wirth. Each entry includes details on dates, key artworks, and curatorial context.

travel guide joshua tree robert goff art food

Robert Goff, a journalist-turned-art dealer and current Deputy Chairman and President of Private Sales at Gurr Johns, launches a new column for CULTURED titled "Out of Office" that explores destinations through the lens of local artists and creatives. The inaugural edition focuses on Joshua Tree and the Yucca Valley, highlighting off-the-beaten-path art experiences such as Rachel Whiteread's concrete casts of 1950s homesteader cabins on Jerry Sohn's private property, the outdoor sculptures of Noah Purifoy, and a memorable outdoor dinner at Andrea Zittel's A-Z West compound organized by sculptor Dan John Anderson, complete with a meal from the acclaimed High Desert restaurant La Copine.

art los angeles gallery show guide

Cultured's gallery show guide highlights five exhibitions in Los Angeles. Lee Lozano's "Hard Handshake" at Hauser & Wirth (through January 18, 2026) features drawings from her first nine years, marking the first major LA show devoted to her work. Puppies Puppies (Jade Guanaro Kuriki-Olivo) presents "Forbidden Colors (Free)(Palestine)(Sudan)" and "Transgender Abstraction to Transgender Conceptualism" at Ceradon (through December 6), transforming the gallery into flags referencing Palestine, Sudan, and trans pride. Sabrina Gschwandtner's "Absinthe, Smoke, Sugar, Choice" at Shoshana Wayne Gallery (through January 10, 2026) uses quilt-making with illuminated film strips to explore female bodily autonomy. Kathleen Ryan's "Souvenir" at Karma (through December 20) debuts concrete peaches with Harley Davidson engines. Ben Sakoguchi's "Chin Music" at Marc Selwyn Fine Art (through December 23) uses historic advertisement motifs to animate history.

art meg webster land art minimalism

Artist Meg Webster, now 80, is receiving overdue recognition for her contributions to Land art and Minimalism. Nine of her sculptures—made from moss, beeswax, salt, and other natural materials—recently went on long-term view at Dia Beacon in Upstate New York. Webster, who worked as Michael Heizer's studio assistant in her late 30s, has spent decades creating intimate, urban-sited Land art in downtown Manhattan, challenging the movement's reputation as a macho, remote, monumental practice. She will also feature prominently in a Minimal art group exhibition at the Bourse de Commerce in Paris this October.

art charlie marder east hampton

Cultured magazine's Hamptons issue features an interview between designer Robin Standefer and Charlie Marder, the East End horticulturalist known as the 'tree whisperer.' Marder, who co-founded an eponymous Bridgehampton nursery with his wife Kathleen—dubbed 'a horticultural MoMA' by the New York Times—has assembled a sprawling field of massive geological specimens across from the nursery. The rocks, some weighing 10 tons, are salvaged from development sites and quarries. Standefer, who purchased one of Marder's boulders for her birthday, discusses with Marder the ethics of placement, the personalities of stones, and the human urge to give new life to ancient matter.

new york exhibition guide

The article is a July 2025 New York exhibition guide from Cultured, highlighting last-chance viewing opportunities for shows across the city. Featured exhibitions include Willem de Kooning at Gagosian, Salman Toor and Jack Whitten at MoMA, Jane and Louise Wilson at 303 Gallery, Chloe Dzubilo at Participant Inc., N.H. Pritchard at Peter Freeman Inc., and Steve McQueen at Dia Chelsea, among others. The guide organizes shows by neighborhood and includes critical commentary on each artist's work.

must see summer gallery shows new york

Cultured magazine has published a roundup of must-see summer gallery shows in New York, featuring exhibitions by Che Lovelace at Nicola Vassell, Seth Price at 15 Orient, Carrie Yamaoka at Anonymous Gallery, Kati Heck at Bortolami, Lutz Bacher at Galerie Buchholz, and Dustin Yellin at Almine Rech. The shows run through July and August 2025, highlighting a diverse range of media including painting, video collage, sculpture, and light installation, with themes spanning post-colonial identity, historical collage, reflective surfaces, mythological realism, and enigmatic legacy.

A Major Martin Puryear Retrospective Reveals an Artist Who Has Never Stopped Evolving

The Cleveland Museum of Art has opened "Nexus," a major retrospective of Martin Puryear featuring over 50 works, the first comprehensive survey of the artist's career in some time. The exhibition includes rarely displayed early pieces from Puryear's personal collection alongside recent works, organized in consultation with the 84-year-old artist. Highlights include the titular 1979 piece "Nexus" made of Alaskan yellow cedar, and other works like "Night and Day" and "Alien Huddle" that showcase his mastery of wood and cold-molding techniques.

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.

Several Eternities in a Day: Form in the Age of Living Materials

The Hammer Museum in Los Angeles presents "Several Eternities in a Day: Form in the Age of Living Materials," a spring 2026 exhibition running from April 5 to August 23. Curated by Jill Spalding, the show features works by artists including Edgar Calel, Guadalupe Maravilla, Carmen Argote, and others, exploring the concept of "Brownness"—a fluid identity rooted in ancestral memory, animal kinship, and a profound connection to living materials. The exhibition is organized into three acts: large-scale installations, paintings and works on paper, and ceramics, offering a visceral and immersive experience that draws on precolonial traditions across the Americas.

At MAXXI L'Aquila, exhibition dedicated to Ai Weiwei recounts catastrophes and memory

From April 29 to September 6, 2026, MAXXI L'Aquila presents "AI WEIWEI: Aftershock," an exhibition curated by Tim Marlow featuring approximately seventy works by Chinese artist, architect, and activist Ai Weiwei. The show spans his entire career, focusing on themes of earthquakes, wars, political repression, and memory. The centerpiece is the installation "Straight" (2009–2012), made from 150 tons of steel rods recovered from schools that collapsed in the 2008 Sichuan earthquake, displayed across three rooms. The exhibition is held at Palazzo Ardinghelli, a Baroque building that houses MAXXI L'Aquila and was itself restored after the 2009 L'Aquila earthquake, creating a dialogue between the works and the building's history of recovery.

Remembering Rauschenberg’s decades in Florida

Robert Rauschenberg (1925-2008), described by critic Robert Hughes as "the most important American artist of the last century," spent four decades in Florida, where materials and collaborators from the state fueled breakthroughs like his scrap-metal sculptures and the Rauschenberg Overseas Cultural Interchange (Roci). As Miami Art Week unfolds, two projects mark his centennial: "Robert Rauschenberg: Real Time" at NSU Art Museum Fort Lauderdale (through April 2026) and the forthcoming book "Out of the Real World: Robert Rauschenberg at USF Graphicstudio." However, the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation announced it will end its Captiva Island residency and sell the artist's home and studio, prompting reflection on how Florida shaped his legacy.

5 Artists on Our Radar in December 2025

Artsy's December 2025 edition of "Artists on Our Radar" highlights five emerging visual artists who have gained attention through new gallery representation, exhibitions, auctions, or art fairs. Featured artists include British painter Imogen Allen, known for gauzy, nature-inspired works with a Gerhard Richter-like blur effect; Brazilian painter Elian Almeida, who reimagines marginalized figures in Brazilian visual culture through vibrant, narrative paintings; and nomadic American artist ektor garcia, who works with unconventional materials like wire, clay, and leather. The article details their recent exhibitions, gallery affiliations, and career milestones.

The art world's most infamous toilet is heading to New York auction for US$10m – and the starting bid moves with gold

Maurizio Cattelan's solid-gold toilet sculpture, *America* (2016), will be auctioned at Sotheby's New York on 18 November 2025 as part of the Now & Contemporary Evening Auction. The work, weighing 223 pounds of 18-karat gold, has a raw material value of around US$10.2 million based on current gold prices. In a first for auction history, the starting bid will fluctuate with live gold prices until bidding begins. The sculpture was previously installed at the Guggenheim Museum, where over 100,000 visitors used it, and later made headlines when the Guggenheim offered it to the Trump White House as a loan alternative to a Van Gogh painting. One edition was stolen and never recovered, making this the only surviving example.

Robert Rauschenberg at 100: How the Relentless Experimenter Rewired American Art

A global celebration marks the centennial of Robert Rauschenberg's birth on October 22, 1925, with a bumper program of exhibitions at major museums including the Museum of the City of New York, the Guggenheim in New York, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Des Moines Art Center, the Menil in Houston, Museum Ludwig in Cologne, and M+ in Hong Kong. The article highlights eight key facts about Rauschenberg's life and career, from his early use of the G.I. Bill to study art in Paris and at Black Mountain College, to his rebellion against teacher Josef Albers, and his invention of the "Combines"—radical painting-sculpture hybrids that broke with Abstract Expressionism and predicted Pop Art.

Why Helen Chadwick’s earthy, provocative art remains as vital as ever

Nearly 30 years after her death in 1996 at age 42, artist Helen Chadwick is receiving renewed attention with a major retrospective, "Helen Chadwick: Life Pleasures," at the Hepworth Wakefield. The exhibition spans two decades of her provocative work, including iconic pieces like "The Oval Court" (1984-86) and the chocolate fountain "Cacao" (1994). Chadwick was known for using unconventional materials—rotting organic waste, meat, hair, cleaning fluids—to explore identity, gender, and the sensuous body, often with irreverent humor. She was also a influential teacher at the Royal College of Art, Goldsmiths, Chelsea, and Central St Martins, mentoring artists such as Tracey Emin, Anya Gallaccio, Sarah Lucas, and Damien Hirst.

Hydrojustice: A Review

A Non-Aspirational Justice: Review of Hydrojustice

The article is a critical review of Andreas Philippopoulos-Mihalopoulos's book 'Hydrojustice,' which uses the concept of water as a lens to critique traditional, top-down legal justice and propose a more fluid, collective, and embodied alternative. The review frames this analysis through the recent erasure of a Banksy graffiti piece on the London Courts of Justice, which depicted a judge violently silencing a protester.