manny davidson collection sale sothebys paris

Sotheby's Paris is selling "The Manny Davidson Collection: A Life in Treasures and Benevolence," a multi-owner sale of nearly 500 lots spanning Old Masters, 19th-century British paintings, 18th-century gold enamel, and decorative objects. Highlights include a rediscovered Michael Sweerts portrait estimated at €800,000–€1.2 million, a Thomas de Keyser portrait of a silversmith, and a Joshua Reynolds self-portrait study. The sale, which includes an evening auction on November 5 and an online component, was previewed by Sotheby's global head of private sales, Old Masters, Chloe Stead.

symbolism art institute chicag van gogh munch redon

The Art Institute of Chicago has opened an exhibition titled 'Strange Realities: The Symbolist Imagination,' drawn entirely from its own collection. The show features works by Vincent van Gogh, Edvard Munch, Odilon Redon, and lesser-known artists like Gustaf Fjaestad, aiming to present Symbolism through its visual output rather than its often vague literary manifestos. The exhibition sidesteps strict definitions of the movement, instead offering a broad range of works from the late 1880s to early 1900s that evoke mystery, doubt, and inner realities.

joel shapiro ellen phelan lennox hill home sale 4 75 million

The Manhattan duplex of the late sculptor Joel Shapiro and his wife, painter Ellen Phelan, has been listed for $4.75 million. Located in a 1907 Lenox Hill building on East 67th Street, the home was purchased in the early 2000s and renovated with beveled glass doors, brass hardware, and a sculptural staircase. The listing is held by Eileen Angelo and Max Collins of Sotheby’s International Realty. The couple also owned a lakeside estate in Westport, New York, called Kenjockety, which is also on the market, reduced from $5.49 million to $4.8 million.

leonard lauder sothebys klimt matisse

Sotheby's has secured a major consignment of approximately $400 million in art from the collection of the late Leonard Lauder, who died in July at age 92. The highlight is Gustav Klimt's "Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer" (1914–16), expected to fetch over $150 million, potentially shattering Klimt's auction record. The sale also includes two other Klimt landscapes, six bronzes by Henri Matisse, a $20 million Edvard Munch painting, and an Agnes Martin work, totaling 55 artworks. The auction will inaugurate Sotheby's new space in the former Whitney Museum building, designed by Marcel Breuer.

elaine wynn francis bacon lacma christies november auction

The estate of Elaine Wynn, the late casino magnate and top art collector who died in April 2024, has announced plans for her renowned collection. Francis Bacon's triptych *Three Studies of Lucian Freud* (1969)—which Wynn purchased for a record $142.2 million at Christie's in 2013—will be donated to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), where she served as board cochair. The painting, the first Bacon to enter LACMA's collection, will debut in the museum's new David Geffen Galleries when they open next year. Separately, Christie's will auction 20 works from Wynn's collection across three sales in New York this November, with estimates totaling at least $75 million. Highlights include Richard Diebenkorn's *Ocean Park #40* (1971), Lucian Freud's *The Painter Surprised by a Naked Admirer* (2004–05), Joan Mitchell's *Sunflower V* (1969), and J.M.W. Turner's *Ehrenbreitstein* (1835).

jason wu the robert rauschenberg foundation collaborate new york fashion week

Fashion designer Jason Wu has collaborated with the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation to create a Spring 2026 collection titled "COLLAGE," inspired by the late artist's work and presented during New York Fashion Week. The collection draws on ten works from the foundation's holdings, including pieces from Rauschenberg's "Hoarfrost" series (1974–76) and "Airport Suite" (1974), with Wu granted rare access to study the artist's use of fabric and collage. The collection will be shown alongside a major Rauschenberg piece on September 14, 2025, and will be available for purchase in February 2026.

icons issue fall 2025

The article introduces the annual 'Icons' issue of Art in America, profiling artists whose decades-long practices reflect deep commitment to their mediums. Featured artists include Paul Pfeiffer, who became hyper-aware of image grammar through early video work; Consuelo Jimenez Underwood, who found her voice in textiles; David Diao, who references Barnett Newman; and the late Joel Shapiro, who explored transformation through wood sculpture. The issue also includes an interview with Tehching Hsieh on freethinking and art, plus departments on curatorial challenges, a Bukhara Biennial curator Q&A, and an appreciation of Dara Birnbaum.

renoir drawings exhibition morgan

A woman in Pennsylvania purchased a nude charcoal sketch for $12 at a local auction, later discovering it was a Pierre-Auguste Renoir drawing now potentially worth six figures. This fall, the Morgan Museum and Library will present "Renoir Drawings," the first exhibition dedicated to the artist's works on paper since 1921, bringing together over 100 drawings, pastels, watercolors, and prints. The show is organized thematically, covering Renoir's academic studies, sketches of modern life, and portraits, and will reunite finished works with preparatory drawings, including major loans from the Musée d'Orsay, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and other institutions.

must see site santa fe international cecilia alemani once within a time

Curator Cecilia Alemani has organized the latest edition of the SITE Santa Fe International, titled "Once Within a Time," inspired by Godfrey Reggio's 2022 film of the same name. The exhibition, which opened in 2025, centers on storytelling and features Reggio's trippy 55-minute film alongside works by over a dozen artists, including Helen Cordero, D.H. Lawrence, Louise Bonnet, Norman Zammitt, Joseph Yoakum, John McCracken, Karla Knight, and Ali Cherri. The show extends beyond SITE Santa Fe to multiple venues across New Mexico, such as the New Mexico Military Museum, a hotel, and a cannabis shop, weaving together themes of eros, energy, the military, and the state's archetypes like UFOs, Land art, and Native spirituality.

wafa al hamad overlooked artist

The Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art in Doha has opened "Wafa al-Hamad: Sites of Imagination," the first solo museum exhibition dedicated to the late Qatari artist Wafa Al-Hamad (1964–2012). Curated by Lina Ramadan, the show runs through August 9 and features over 40 years of Al-Hamad's work across mediums including ink, watercolor, pastel, collage, and digital art. Al-Hamad was one of the first female students at the Qatari Free Atelier in 1981 and later became a professor at Qatar University, exhibiting in group shows across the Gulf such as the Sharjah Biennale 4 (1999) and "6 Gulf Women Artists" in Sharjah (1994).

goodwood art foundation

The Goodwood Art Foundation, a new contemporary art destination set within the 11,000-acre Goodwood Estate in West Sussex, England, opens to the public on May 31. The inaugural season features works by Susan Philipsz, Rachel Whiteread (including a monumental staircase sculpture *Down and Up*), Veronica Ryan, Rose Wylie, Isamu Noguchi, and Hélio Oiticica (whose *Magic Square #3* will be the first outdoor sculpture by the late Brazilian artist in Europe). The estate, owned by Charles Gordon-Lennox, the 11th Duke of Richmond, is historically known for sporting events like the Festival of Speed and the Qatar Goodwood Festival, and houses a historic art collection including Canalettos and works by George Stubbs.

guerrilla girls feminist collective why so important

The feminist collective Guerrilla Girls began its activism in May 1985 by wheat-pasting posters in SoHo, New York, that listed prominent male artists and revealed that their galleries showed 10 percent or fewer women artists. The group formed after the 1984 MoMA exhibition 'An International Survey of Recent Painting and Sculpture' included only 13 women out of 169 participants, sparking protests that failed to gain traction. For 40 years, the Guerrilla Girls have used statistics-driven, provocative posters to call out sexism and racism in galleries, museums, and the broader art world. This year, their anniversary is marked by retrospective exhibitions at the National Museum for Women in the Arts in Washington, D.C., the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles, and the National Gallery of Bulgaria in Sofia.

marcia resnick photographer punk scene dead

Marcia Resnick, a photographer renowned for capturing Manhattan's downtown art and punk scene in the late 1970s and early 1980s, has died at age 74 from lung cancer. Her sister Janice Hahn confirmed the cause of death. Resnick began with conceptual photography before shifting to portraiture, documenting figures such as Mick Jagger, Klaus Nomi, Joseph Beuys, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Ed Koch, and John Belushi. She was briefly married to MC5 guitarist Wayne Kramer and taught at New York University and Cooper Union. Her work was featured in the SoHo Weekly News, and a retrospective of her photography opened at the Bowdoin College Museum of Art in 2022.

elizabeth street garden lawsuit seeks vara protection

The Elizabeth Street Garden in New York City has filed a federal lawsuit seeking protection under the Visual Artist Rights Act (VARA) to prevent its destruction for an affordable housing project called Haven Green. The lawsuit, filed by law firms Siegel Teitelbaum and Evans and McLaughlin and Stern, argues that the garden is a unique work of visual art and landscape architecture created by the late Allan Reiver and his son Joseph Reiver, and should be legally protected as a sculptural work. The garden received a temporary stay after eviction papers were served last fall, but the city plans to build 100% deeply affordable senior housing on the site, claiming the project will provide over 15,000 square feet of public space.

climate activist hurls pink paint at picasso painting at montreal museum

On Thursday, an environmental activist from the group Last Generation Canada hurled bright pink paint at Pablo Picasso's 1901 painting *L’hetaire* at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. The protester, identified as 21-year-old Marcel, was arrested and later released pending a court appearance; two accomplices who filmed the act were detained and released without charge. The group cited the record-breaking heat wave in Winnipeg and Manitoba as a motivation, arguing that art is meaningless on a dead planet.

old masters sales takeaways art detective

Sotheby's underperformed with the highly anticipated Saunders Collection of Old Masters, which was estimated at $80–120 million but sold for only $65.4 million, falling $14.6 million short of its low estimate. The sell-through rate was a dismal 58%, with 16 of 43 lots failing to sell in the standalone auction. Christie's also saw disappointing results, with a smaller sale totaling $6.89 million, 17% below its low target. The collection, amassed by the late banker Thomas A. Saunders III and his wife Jordan, was billed as the most valuable Old Masters collection ever to come to auction.

william dobson acquisition

A rare self-portrait by 17th-century British painter William Dobson has been jointly acquired by London's Tate and the National Portrait Gallery for £2.37 million ($3.2 million), setting a new record for the artist. The painting, considered the first known self-portrait by a British-born painter, was created in the late 1630s and last sold at Bonhams London in 2016 for just over £1.1 million. It will go on view in London before embarking on a national tour in 2026.

theaster gates smart museum chicago

The Smart Museum at the University of Chicago has announced plans for a major mid-career survey of artist Theaster Gates, titled “Unto Thee,” opening September 23 and running through February of next year. This marks Gates’s first solo museum exhibition in his hometown of Chicago, despite his international acclaim and numerous institutional shows elsewhere. The exhibition will feature objects Gates has collected and repurposed from the university, including glass lantern slides, vitrines, concrete, and wooden pews, alongside a large-scale installation of African masks accompanied by music from the late DJ Frankie Knuckles.

art in america new talent issue 2025

Art in America's 2025 "New Talent" issue features 20 emerging artists chosen by the magazine's editors, including Nico Williams, Bint Mbareh, Justin Allen, Agnes Questionmark, and Brooklin A. Soumahoro. The issue also includes a postmortem on figurative painting by Barry Schwabsky, an essay on spiritual art by Eleanor Heartney, a symposium on art's purpose with seven artists, and a tribute to the late Jaune Quick-to-See Smith by Emmi Whitehorse. Other sections cover Suzanne Valadon, Hito Steyerl's book, and a debate between art fairs and biennials.

smithsonian teams up with saudi arabias alula project

The Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art (NMAA) has signed a formal partnership agreement with Saudi Arabia’s Royal Commission for AlUla (RCU), formalizing two years of behind-the-scenes collaboration. Signed by NMAA director Chase Robinson and RCU chief executive Abeer Al Akel, the deal covers joint archaeological research, exhibition loans, curatorial exchange, and professional development, with a focus on the ancient site of Dadan, a key stop on the Incense Road. The partnership is part of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 plan to rebrand the kingdom as a global cultural destination.

len riggios mondrian christies auction

A 1922 painting by Piet Mondrian, *Composition with Large Red Plane, Bluish Gray, Yellow, Black and Blue*, sold at Christie’s New York for $47.6 million, falling short of its $50 million-plus estimate and the artist’s auction record of $51 million set in 2022. The work was the highlight of the “Leonard & Louise Riggio: Collected Works” sale, a 39-lot trove from the late Barnes & Noble founder and Dia Art Foundation chairman, estimated at up to $326 million. The painting sold to a single phone bidder, likely the guarantor, with no room action.

sothebys sets new world record for photography auction

Sotheby's New York held a single-owner auction titled "175 Masterworks To Celebrate 175 Years of Photography: Property from Joy of Giving Something Foundation" on December 11 and 12, achieving a world record for a photography auction. The sale grossed $21,325,063, surpassing its presale estimate of $13–20 million and beating the previous record of $15 million set by a Sotheby's sale in 2006. The collection came from the late American financier Howard Stein, who founded the Joy of Giving Something Foundation in 1999. The auction had a strong sell-through rate of 90.3 percent by lot and 94.9 percent by value, with top lots including Alvin Langdon Coburn's "Shadows and Reflections, Venice" (1905) at $965,000 and August Sander's "Handlanger" at $749,000. Several female photographers set new records, including Tina Modotti, Julia Margaret Cameron, and Lee Miller.

kehinde wiley new sexual assault complaint

Artist Ogechi Chieke has filed a legal complaint against Kehinde Wiley, accusing him of sexual assault stemming from an incident in 2007. Chieke alleges that after a New York exhibition she was included in, Wiley groped her and made unwanted sexual advances, causing her to leave New York and abandon her art career. Wiley denies the allegations, calling them a "blatant money-grab" and stating he has never met Chieke. The suit was filed under New York City's Victims of Gender-Motivated Violence Protection Law just before the statute of limitations window closed on March 1, 2025.

Memories Bathed in Color

In Farbe getauchte Erinnerungen

The Fondation Luma in Arles, France, has opened three exhibitions exploring memory and archives, headlined by Gerhard Richter's "Overpainted Photographs." The show features 120 works from Richter's private archive, some exhibited for the first time, created since the mid-1980s by dragging photographs through leftover paint in his studio. Richter, now 94, personally selected and hung the works chronologically starting from the fall of the Berlin Wall, reflecting his lost homeland and the passage of time. The exhibition also includes early sketches and oil paintings by the late architect Zaha Hadid, previously shown at London's Serpentine Gallery in 2016.

First Details of the German Pavilion

Erste Details zum deutschen Pavillon

The German Pavilion at the upcoming Venice Biennale will present an exhibition titled "Ruin," featuring works by the late Henrike Naumann and artist Sung Tieu. Curated by Kathleen Reinhardt, the exhibition explores historical ruptures and the lingering effects of political and social voids following German reunification. Tragically, Naumann passed away shortly after completing her contributions, and her studio team is now working to realize her final artistic vision for the prestigious international stage.

Protests in Mexico Challenge Move of Frida Kahlo Trove to Spain

A heated controversy has erupted in Mexico following the decision to move a massive trove of Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera artworks to Spain for a long-term loan. Protesters and cultural advocates are challenging the relocation of the Dolores Olmedo Museum collection, which includes some of Kahlo’s most iconic paintings, to a new private museum in Madrid. In response to the backlash, Mexican officials have issued public assurances that the collection remains national heritage and is legally required to return to Mexico by 2028.

Art Publisher Owes $102.2 Million in Damages for Late Robert Indiana Works

A Manhattan jury has ordered art publisher Michael McKenzie to pay $102.2 million in damages for creating unauthorized or adulterated versions of works by the late Pop artist Robert Indiana. The lawsuit, brought by Indiana’s former business partner the Morgan Art Foundation, alleged that McKenzie produced Indiana-related junk products that infringed trademark and copyright, including reproductions of Indiana’s iconic “LOVE” design and the artworks *The Ninth American Dream* (2001) and *USA FUN* (1965). The jury found McKenzie liable for exploiting Indiana in the final years of his life, after the artist granted power of attorney to his caretaker, Jamie Thomas.

Robert Rauschenberg Foundation Estate Sold to Florida Resort

The Robert Rauschenberg Foundation has sold the late artist’s twenty-two-acre estate on Captiva Island, Florida, to the neighboring South Seas resort for $45 million. The sale includes ten buildings, most notably Rauschenberg’s custom-built 8,000-square-foot studio and his historic "Beach House." While the resort plans to integrate the property into its operations and host art-related programming, the foundation cited escalating maintenance costs and environmental risks from climate change as the primary reasons for the divestment.

Marie Zolamian’s Paintings Remain Little Mysteries

A retrospective of Tracey Emin's work at Tate Modern reveals how her art, frequently interpreted as raw personal confession, is deeply intertwined with the broader cultural and social forces of her time. The review argues that her oeuvre serves as a witness to a specific era, moving beyond purely autobiographical readings to reflect wider societal currents.

Dale Chihuly Is Synonymous With Seattle. But Venice Gave Him a Medium, a Career Blockbuster, and a Son.

Dale Chihuly returns to Venice with "Chihuly: Venice 2026," a public exhibition marking the 30th anniversary of his landmark 1996 project "Chihuly Over Venice." The new show features three large-scale glass sculptures installed along the Grand Canal, viewable from the Accademia Bridge, at Palazzo Franchetti, Palazzo Querini alla Carità, and Palazzo Balbi-Valier Sammartini. The article also recounts Chihuly's 1968 Fulbright-funded study at Venini, where he learned Murano glassblowing and embraced glass as his primary medium, and reveals that his son Jackson Chihuly was conceived in Venice after a party hosted by the late Paul Allen.