Ten Out Of London Exhibitions Spring 2026 – Artlyst Guide

Artlyst has published a guide to ten major exhibitions opening across UK museums and galleries outside London in Spring 2026. Highlights include a year-long programme for the 250th anniversary of John Constable in Suffolk, the Gwen John exhibition 'Strange Beauties' at National Museum Cardiff celebrating her 150th birthday, a Frank Bowling survey at The Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, a Joan Eardley show in Edinburgh, and Paula Rego at Newlands House & Gallery. Other featured exhibitions include Andy Hollingworth's photography of comedians at Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery and a Vivienne Westwood retrospective at the Bowes Museum.

Has a new Banksy statue just appeared in central London?

A new statue has appeared on Waterloo Place in central London, bearing the signature of elusive street artist Banksy. The artwork depicts a suited man carrying a large flag that covers his face, stepping off a plinth, and blends with nearby bronze and granite monuments. Sightings were first reported on Wednesday 29 April, but how and when the statue was erected in this busy intersection remains unknown. Banksy has not yet posted the work on his Instagram account, his usual method of authentication, though crowds have already gathered.

Wohin am Checkpoint Charlie?

The article covers the Berlin Gallery Weekend, highlighting a cluster of exhibitions around Checkpoint Charlie. It features light art, political sculpture, textile experiments, and spatial interventions. Among the participants is Galerie Max Goelitz, which presents James Turrell's light installation series "Small Elliptical Glass 'First Cause'" (2024) at its Berlin space in Rudi-Dutschke-Straße, as part of the "Perspectives" section.

Raghu Rai, pioneering Indian photographer, 1942–2026

Raghu Rai, the pioneering Indian photographer and photojournalist, has died at age 84. Over his career, he produced more than 30 books covering subjects such as Tibetan exile, Mother Teresa, Indira Gandhi, and Sikhs in India. His most famous work documented the 1984 Bhopal chemical disaster, first for India Today and later for Greenpeace, resulting in the book *Exposure: A Corporate Crime* and exhibitions that toured Europe, the US, and Bangladesh. Rai began his career at The Statesman in 1966, joined India Today in 1982, and became a member of Magnum Photos in 1977 under the patronage of Henri Cartier-Bresson. He was awarded the Padma Shri in 1972 for his coverage of the 1971 India-Pakistan War and the plight of Bangladeshi refugees.

A Rosso for the Metropolitan

Un Rosso pour le Metropolitan

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has acquired a painting by Rosso Fiorentino, a master of Italian and French Mannerism, after restoration revealed an earlier overpaint that had obscured the composition. The work, a Virgin and Child, now shows Saint John the Evangelist in the foreground at right, confirming it as an original by the artist.

Getty’s Black Visual Arts Archives receives additional $1.8m in funding

The Getty Foundation has awarded an additional $1.8 million to its Black Visual Arts Archives initiative, bringing total funding to $4.5 million across 20 awards. The program supports institutions in processing, digitizing, preserving, and activating archival collections related to Black artists and arts organizations in the US. Grantees include Afro Charities, the Auburn Avenue Research Library, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, Charles H. Wright Museum, Morgan State University, the South Side Community Art Center, the University of Chicago’s South Side Home Movie Project, and the David C. Driskell Center. Notable discoveries include footage of the original Wall of Respect mural from the South Side Home Movie Project.

Hundreds of ‘Piss Bottles’ Left at the Met Gala in Protest of Jeff Bezos

Hundreds of bottles filled with what appeared to be urine were discovered at the Metropolitan Museum of Art during the Met Gala on May 5, 2026, according to the New York Post. The protest was claimed by the anti-billionaire group Everybody Hates Elon, which targeted the event over Jeff Bezos serving as the gala's chair. The group left the bottles with signs labeling them a "Met Gala VIP toilet" and criticizing Bezos for alleged labor practices at Amazon, where workers reportedly feel forced to urinate in bottles due to lack of bathroom breaks. The group later clarified on Instagram that the bottles did not contain real urine.

US National Gallery of Art receives $116m gift to continue nationwide lending programme

The National Gallery of Art (NGA) in Washington, DC, has received a landmark $116 million donation from the Mitchell P. Rales Family Foundation to permanently endow its Across the Nation lending programme. Launched in spring 2025, the initiative has already reached around 900,000 visitors at ten partner institutions, including the Anchorage Museum and the Mint Museum, by loaning works from the NGA's collection at no cost—covering transport, installation, insurance, and marketing. The next cycle will run from autumn 2027 to 2029, with new partners to be announced.

From intimate still lives to shadowed saints: the many sides of Spanish painter Francisco de Zurbarán go on show at London’s National Gallery

The National Gallery in London is opening a major survey exhibition of Spanish painter Francisco de Zurbarán (1598-1664), the first on this scale since 1987. The show expands beyond his famous austere saints to include intimate still-lifes, late private devotional works, and large-scale altarpiece reconstructions. Curator Daniel Sobrino Ralston highlights two newly discovered paintings, including *Alcarraza on a Plate*, and a rare reconstruction of the second tier of the Charterhouse of Jerez de la Frontera altarpiece, reuniting works from museums in Grenoble and Poznań.

Art Basel's solution to PDF pre-sales? Ask galleries to reserve works until opening day

Art Basel has announced a new initiative called Basel Exclusive for its flagship Swiss fair in June 2025, asking participating galleries to withhold their most important or expensive works from all pre-fair previews, online viewing rooms, and publicity. Instead, these "marquee works" will be unveiled for the first time during the First Choice VIP preview on 16 June. The initiative aims to restore a sense of surprise and urgency, countering the trend of galleries pre-selling works to clients before the fair opens. Around 170 galleries have already signed up, including major names like Gagosian, David Zwirner, Hauser & Wirth, Pace Gallery, and Sadie Coles HQ.

Dance Your Way to the Museum

Curator Naz Cuguoğlu argues in an opinion essay that museums should embrace the ethos of rave culture to become more welcoming and inclusive spaces, suggesting they can foster new forms of belonging. The article also covers several other art stories, including the discovery of pre-Hispanic rock art in Mexico that led to the rerouting of a train line, an exhibition of Genesis P-Orridge's mail art in Toronto, and artist Jean Shin's memorial project at Green-Wood Cemetery.

Jean Shin’s Living Memorial to the Trees of Green-Wood Cemetery

Artist Jean Shin unveiled a new site-specific earthwork titled "Offering" (2026) at Brooklyn's Green-Wood Cemetery on April 18. The installation, situated in a meadow facing the cemetery's gates, consists of a long, oval-shaped mound of soil covering two felled oak trees. The work was inspired by traditional Korean tumulus burial mounds and involved a community ritual led by a Korean shaman, with volunteers planting wildflowers and shrubs on the mound.

LA LECHUZA DE MINERVA

The Círculo de Bellas Artes in Madrid, founded in 1926 by a small group of artists, has launched a centenary exhibition titled "La lechuza de Minerva" (The Owl of Minerva). Curated by Isabella Lenzi, the project revisits the institution's most disruptive exhibition, "El sueño imperativo" (1991), curated by Mar Villaespesa, which invited twelve artists to intervene in both exhibition spaces and transit areas, challenging traditional display logic. The new exhibition features works by artists including Dagoberto Rodríguez, Elo Vega, Rogelio López Cuenca, Isidoro Valcárcel Medina, Itziar Okariz, Los Carpinteros, María Salgado, Pedro G. Romero, Regina Silveira, Silbatriz Pons, and Tino Sehgal, who activate hidden and unexpected corners of the building through visual and sound actions. The project also restores Nancy Spero's 1991 intervention "Minerva, Sky Goddess," which had largely disappeared, through archaeological research led by restorer Rocío Casasus.

Who’s The Next Obsession? 12 European Collectors Reveal How They Discover New Talent

Cultured magazine asked 12 European collectors how they discover new talent, timed to the 61st Venice Biennale. Collectors like Nicole Saikalis Bay, Amélie du Chalard, Belma Gaudio, and Laurent Asscher share their personal approaches—ranging from emotional resonance and dialogue with existing works to long-term obsession with an artist before acquiring a piece. The responses reveal a diversity of methods, from instinct-driven buying to conceptual and technical evaluation.

The Good, the Bad, and the Fugly From the 2026 Met Gala

Cultured magazine's 2026 Met Gala coverage features a roundtable of critics and writers offering candid, often humorous takes on celebrity looks from the red carpet. Emma Chamberlain's hand-painted Mugler gown is widely praised as the most on-theme, while Troye Sivan's Prada homage to Robert Mapplethorpe and Chase Infiniti's Thom Browne trompe-l'œil dress also earn acclaim. Gabrielle Richardson calls for more color, noting the theme is about art, and criticizes the monochromatic trend. Mackenzie Thomas pans Alysa Liu's look as "prom" and "quinceañera," while others celebrate Naomi Osaka's Robert Wun Couture and Connor Storrie's Saint Laurent ensemble. The article is structured as a series of short, punchy quotes from multiple contributors, each focusing on specific attendees' fashion choices.

The Strange Coincidence Behind Ivy Getty’s Ludovic de Saint Sernin Met Gala Dress

Ivy Getty, an American model and philanthropist, collaborated with Parisian designer Ludovic de Saint Sernin to create her Met Gala dress, inspired by the 1926 illustration *L’Eclat de l’Or* by Russian artist Erté. The sketch, originally for the show *The Golden Fables*, was chosen from Getty’s mood board; the pair later discovered it is held in the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s archive, coinciding with its 100th anniversary. The final fringed gown debuted on the Met Gala red carpet, and the duo discussed the creative process in an interview.

fashion ivy getty met gala ludovic de saint sernin

Ivy Getty, an American model and philanthropist, collaborated with Parisian designer Ludovic de Saint Sernin on her 2025 Met Gala look. The design was inspired by a 1926 illustration titled *L’Eclat de l’Or* by Russian artist Erté, originally created for the show *The Golden Fables*. Getty's mood board included vintage sketches and imagery from the 1920s, and the pair discovered that the original artwork is held in the Metropolitan Museum of Art's archive, which they visited in person. The final dress features a fringe-lined reinterpretation of the historic design, and the article includes an interview with the duo about their creative process and the experience of preparing for the event.

Deutscher Pavillon wird zum Plattenbau

The German Pavilion at the Venice Art Biennale has been transformed into a prefabricated concrete slab building (Plattenbau) for this year's edition, designed by artists Sung Tieu and the late Henrike Naumann, who died suddenly in February at age 41 from cancer. Curator Kathleen Reinhardt described the pavilion as part of a highly political Biennale, with Tieu covering the 1938 fascist-era building with a mosaic of over three million tiles depicting a Berlin apartment block that once housed Vietnamese contract workers. Naumann's interior installation features mint-green references to Soviet barracks in East Germany, a cartography of war, and works including a relief of chairs, a curtain of chainmail, and the performance "Trümmerfrau."

Décès de Jacques Gairard

Jacques Gairard, a figure in the French art world, has died. The announcement appears in Le Journal des Arts, which also covers the opening of the Venice Biennale amid controversy, the final adoption of a law on the restitution of cultural property looted during colonization, the V&A East's focus on young audiences, the uneven economic impact of Monet's legacy in Giverny, and the structuring of the Nabis art market.

Exhibition catalogs printed in China

Les catalogues d’expositions imprimés en Chine

Le Journal des Arts reports on several developments in the art world: the return of American Rousseau works to Paris, the growing trend of outsourcing museum reception services, the New Museum's expansion, challenges facing the Musée des tissus, and Art Brussels adapting to contemporary trends. These stories cover a range of topics from exhibition logistics to institutional change.

À Nîmes, la peinture sans entrave de Tursic & Mille envahit le Carré d’art

The article covers the retrospective exhibition of French artist duo Ida Tursic and Wilfried Mille at the Carré d'art in Nîmes. Titled "Dissonances à géométries variables," the show traces their career from student works at the École nationale supérieure d'art de Dijon to recent paintings, featuring a critical, humorous, and materially rich approach to figurative painting. The duo draws from press images, internet sources, art history, and archives, disrupting reproductions with paint splatters and odd details, and the exhibition is organized thematically from "happiness" to "melancholy."

Ittai Gradel, Whistleblower in British Museum Gem Theft, Dies at 61

Ittai Gradel, the Israel-born Danish gem expert who alerted the British Museum to the theft of thousands of antiquities from its collection after discovering them for sale on eBay, died on April 28 of renal cancer at age 61. Days before his death, British Museum officials visited him in hospice and presented him with a rarely awarded medal for his service. Gradel first warned deputy director Jonathan Williams in 2021 that artifacts were being sold online, identified veteran curator Peter Higgs as the culprit, and provided detailed evidence. After the museum failed to act, Gradel contacted then-director Hartwig Fischer; two years later, Higgs was fired, and Fischer and Williams left the institution amid the scandal.

Malaysia Showcases Recovered 1MDB Artworks, From Picasso to Miró

Four artworks recovered from the 1MDB scandal—by Picasso, Miró, Balthus, and Maurice Utrillo—have gone on public display for the first time at the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission headquarters in Putrajaya. The paintings were repatriated from New York after being traced through Sotheby’s and shipped back to Malaysia on April 14. They are part of a broader art trail linked to the massive financial fraud, with Malaysian officials framing the display as an act of restitution rather than an art event.

Pleasure, parody and propaganda: rethinking the art of illustration in a new history of the genre

D.B. Dowd's new book "Reading Pictures" offers a sweeping 400-page history of illustration, tracing the genre from the Diamond Sutra frontispiece in Tang China (AD868) to Molly Crabapple's Gaza reports in 2015. The book examines key works such as Jules Chéret's 1891 poster for the Alcazar d'Été Club, Stuart Davis's caustic covers for The Masses, and Duong Ngoc Canh's Vietnamese propaganda poster, arguing that illustrations are meant to be "read" rather than admired like museum paintings.

May Book Bag: from a guide on entering the art world to a publication about artists influenced by Ovid’s Metamorphoses

The May Book Bag article from The Art Newspaper reviews four new art-related publications. It covers "Metamorphoses: Ovid and the Arts," edited by Francesca Cappelletti and Frits Scholten, which examines Ovid's influence on Western art through works by artists like Titian, Caravaggio, and Louise Bourgeois. Other featured books include Hettie Judah's "How to Enter the Art World," a practical guide for emerging artists; "Derrick Adams: Prints," showcasing the artist's printmaking from 2019-2025; and "Whistler's Legacy" by Daniel Sutherland, which explores the legacy of James Abbott McNeill Whistler through his close associates.

Klimt, Modigliani, and Freud Lead $200M Lewis Collection at Sotheby’s London

Sotheby’s London will auction a collection of 50 masterpieces from billionaire Joe Lewis and his daughter Vivienne in June 2025, expected to exceed $200 million. Highlights include Gustav Klimt’s 1902 portrait of Gertha Felsőványi (estimate £20–30 million), Lucian Freud’s never-auctioned *Woman in a Grey Sweater* (1988), and Amedeo Modigliani’s *Homme à la Pipe* (1918), making its auction debut after 45 years unseen. The sale follows a successful March auction of School of London works from the same collection, which brought $47.7 million.

How Art Firms Are—or Should Be—Using A.I. Right Now

Art firms are increasingly experimenting with artificial intelligence, but concrete use cases remain limited and industry-specific tools are still in their infancy. A new partnership between Bonhams and tech company ARTDAI aims to apply AI to market analytics, valuation, and specialist research, while companies like Artsy and Artnet are integrating AI capabilities into their platforms. Industry experts, including former Art Basel chief Marc Spiegler, note that the art market's small size has historically discouraged tech development, but AI now makes high-performance tools accessible to smaller businesses.

Which Auction House Led the Pack in 2025?

Christie's led the global fine-art auction market in 2025 with $3.5 billion in sales, a 10.1% increase from 2024. Its top lot was Mark Rothko's 'No. 31 (Yellow Stripe), 1958,' which sold for $62.1 million. Sotheby's followed closely with $3.3 billion in sales, a 31% annual increase, highlighted by the record-breaking $54.7 million sale of Frida Kahlo's 'El sueño (La cama).' Phillips placed a distant third with $390.9 million in sales, a 14.2% decline.

Statue with Banksy signature of man blinded by flag appears in London

A new statue bearing Banksy's signature has appeared in Waterloo Place, central London, depicting a man marching forward with a large flag obscuring his face. The elusive artist has not yet confirmed the work, though he typically posts confirmation on his website after public discovery. The statue stands near monuments to Edward VII and Florence Nightingale, and follows Banksy's previous sculptural works like *The Drinker* (2004) and recent murals addressing homelessness and protest.

Cy Twombly, From Intimate Angles

A recently discovered cache of negatives taken by Tatiana Franchetti, the wife of artist Cy Twombly, reveals intimate and personal photographs of the 20th-century master. The negatives were found by Twombly's granddaughter, offering a new, private perspective on the artist's life and daily surroundings.