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Art Basel has announced a surprise deal to launch a new art fair in Qatar next year, partnering with Qatar Sports Investments (QSI) and QC+, a subsidiary of Qatar's sovereign wealth fund and commercial arm of Qatar Museums. The fair will debut with around 50 galleries in Doha, intentionally smaller than Basel's other fairs, with a distinct character aimed at building a long-term, sustainable event. The deal comes after rumors that Basel might take over Abu Dhabi Art, and as the region's art scene intensifies, with Art Dubai recently poaching Basel's global head of gallery relations Dunja Gottwies as its new director.

Shoptalk: New Guggenheim Director Melissa Chiu on How She Got the Job

Melissa Chiu has been appointed as the new director of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, transitioning from her long-standing leadership at the Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. The appointment was the result of a confidential search led by Mariët Westermann, the Guggenheim’s overall director and CEO, who determined that the expanding global "constellation" of museums required a dedicated leader for the New York flagship. Chiu will officially assume the role in September, just ahead of the highly anticipated opening of the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi in 2025.

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Artnet News profiles seven key works by Yayoi Kusama, tracing her career from the 1960s to the present. The article highlights her iconic pieces such as *Narcissus Garden* (1966), a guerrilla installation at the Venice Biennale where she sold mirrored spheres, and *Death of a Nerve* (1976), a soft sculpture reflecting her emotional struggles after returning to Japan. It also notes her early life, including her traumatic childhood, move to New York, and friendships with artists like Georgia O'Keeffe and Joseph Cornell.

10 Practical Reasons We Need to Defend the National Endowment for the Arts

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President Donald Trump's administration has renewed efforts to defund the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), proposing for the fourth consecutive year a budget that would zero out the agency. The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank that has staffed the current administration, continues to promote its 1997 report 'Ten Good Reasons to Eliminate Funding for the National Endowment for the Arts' as a key reference in debates. This article, originally published in 2020 and republished in response to these developments, systematically rebuts each of the Heritage Foundation's arguments against the NEA, beginning with the claim that private support alone is sufficient.

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Günther Uecker, the German postwar artist known for hammering nails into canvases to create abstract works, died at age 95. His death was announced by his New York gallery, Lévy Gorvy Dayan, after he had been hospitalized in Düsseldorf. Uecker was a core member of the avant-garde ZERO group, founded in 1957 by Otto Piene and Heinz Mack, and his nail-based abstractions—applied to surfaces from canvases to lightboxes and TV sets—defined his practice from the 1950s onward. He participated in major exhibitions including Documenta and MoMA's 1965 "The Responsive Eye," and continued working daily in his Düsseldorf studio into his 90s.

Lee Ufan: ‘I try to bring together those things which are made and unmade’

Lee Ufan, the South Korean artist and founding member of the Mono-ha movement, is being honored with a major solo exhibition at SMAC San Marco Art Centre as an official Collateral Event of the Venice Biennale, marking his 90th year. Simultaneously, a new display of his painting and sculpture opens at Dia Beacon in New York State, and his first show in Portugal opens at Casa e Parque de Serralves in July. In an interview with The Art Newspaper, Ufan discusses his artistic journey, his rejection of the artist's hand, and the influence of seeing a Barnett Newman exhibition at MoMA in 1971, which led him to develop his signature From Point and From Line paintings that use repeated marks to express the passage of time.

The Venice Biennale’s Polite Fiction of Being ‘Above the Market’ Is Wearing Thin

The 61st Venice Biennale is underway, with art world figures flocking to Venice for the opening. While the Biennale is officially a non-selling curatorial platform, commercial interests are increasingly visible: galleries are funding artists' projects to recoup investments, auction houses like Christie's are hosting private selling exhibitions (including a 'Ghost Pavilion' at the Ca' Dario Palazzo), and fashion houses such as Bottega Veneta and Chanel are sponsoring events. Sotheby's has pulled support for the U.S. Pavilion, which is now crowdfunding, while Frieze is bankrolling the British Pavilion for a second time.

Raghu Rai obituary

Raghu Rai, the renowned Indian photographer known for capturing his country's post-independence history through singular, enduring images, has died at age 83 from cancer. Rai's career spanned six decades, during which he documented events from the 1984 Bhopal gas disaster to the Bangladesh war of independence, and photographed figures including Indira Gandhi, Mother Teresa, and the Dalai Lama. He joined Magnum Photos in 1977 after being invited by Henri Cartier-Bresson, and worked as a staff photographer for the Statesman and as picture editor for India Today.

What You Should Definitely Avoid in Venice

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The article humorously critiques the Venice Biennale, highlighting several disappointments. It describes a Japanese pavilion installation by Ei Arakawa-Nash featuring baby dolls for diaper-changing, which a critic dismisses as a male artist over-romanticizing parenthood. Other flops include long queues for the German and Austrian pavilions, underwhelming main exhibition "In Minor Keys," and annoying self-promotional performers outside venues. The piece also laments the presence of loud American collectors and donors who dominate the event.

Who is Yto Barrada, France's representative at the Venice Biennale with a world-spanning work?

Qui est Yto Barrada, représentante de la France à la Biennale de Venise avec une œuvre-monde ?

Yto Barrada, the artist representing France at the 2026 Venice Biennale, has created a multidisciplinary installation titled "Saturne" for the French Pavilion. The work centers on textiles and natural dyeing, weaving together themes of postcolonial history, migration, craft transmission, and the symbolism of Saturn—from its astronomical mystery to its mythological role as the devourer of children. The installation features wool curtains, Aubusson tapestry, goat skins, wasp-nest sculptures, masks, muzzles, a color chart, and video, all housed in a renovated pavilion designed with the help of numerous artisans. Barrada, born in Paris in 1971 and raised in Tangier, founded the Cinémathèque de Tanger and later The Mothership, a research center focused on textiles and natural dyes. The exhibition is curated by Myriam Ben Salah.

5 Trends Shaping the 2026 Venice Biennale

The 2026 Venice Biennale has opened to the public, featuring the main exhibition 'In Minor Keys' conceived by the late Cameroonian Swiss curator Koyo Kouoh, who died unexpectedly in May 2025. Kouoh, the first African woman appointed to lead the Biennale, had her curatorial team—including Rasha Salti, Marie Hélène Pereira, and Gabe Beckhurst Feijoo—carry forward her vision of art as a 'shared and sustaining force.' The opening was weighted with politics and emotion.

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Fanny Pereire is a fine art coordinator for film and television, responsible for curating the art seen in the homes and offices of fictional characters, particularly the ultra-wealthy. Her work spans productions like *The Devil Wears Prada 2*, *Succession*, *Industry*, and *The Menu*, where she sources, reproduces, and often destroys artworks to ensure authenticity and copyright compliance. She typically uses high-quality replicas for expensive pieces and oversees their destruction after filming.

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Geoff Snack, a brand strategy director and paper dealer, shares his approach to collecting rare books, design objects, and paper ephemera in an interview with CULTURED. His collection includes a signed copy of Andy Warhol's "Exposures," works by Barbara Kruger, Lawrence Weiner, and Chris Burden, and flyers from the 1980s New York art scene. Snack sources his finds through flea markets, Craigslist, and instinctive hunts, and runs the consultancy Wrong Answer and co-organizes the book fair Available Works at WSA in downtown New York.

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Martha Stewart has curated a contemporary art sale for Joopiter, the auction platform founded by Pharrell Williams. Titled "The Contemporary Take," the auction runs from April 28 through May 6 and features nearly 50 artworks by leading artists, including Amy Sherald, Hank Willis Thomas, Adrian Ghenie, Alex Katz, Damien Hirst, and Lynette Yiadom-Boakye. Stewart handpicked a selection of works for the Spring season, focusing on themes of growth, regeneration, and vitality. The sale marks Joopiter's first auction of contemporary art, following collection sales by Kim Jones, Kid Cudi, and Nigo.

Meet the Woman Who Curated the Art on Miranda Priestly’s Walls

Fanny Pereire, an art advisor specializing in film and television, curates the art seen on the walls of fictional characters like Miranda Priestly in *The Devil Wears Prada 2*, Logan Roy in *Succession*, and Bobby Axelrod in *Billions*. She works as a fine art coordinator, sourcing reproductions and original works to match character personalities and socioeconomic status, often overseeing the destruction of replicas after filming. Her role, created by producer Scott Rudin in 1999, involves clearing copyrights for every artwork shown on screen, from children's drawings to high-end pieces by artists like Wayne Thiebaud and Alex Katz.

The Art Insider's Guide To Frieze London

Sophia Penske, founder of Penske Projects and art advisor at Gagosian Art Advisory, presents an insider guide to Frieze London week (October 13, 2025). The article highlights key gallery exhibitions including Ed Ruscha's new linen paintings at Gagosian Davies Street, El Anatsui's wooden sculptures at Goodman Gallery, Danielle Fretwell's still lifes at Alice Amati, Victor Man's dreamlike works at David Zwirner, Danny Fox's colorful paintings at Hannah Barry, and Lenz Geerk's portraits at Massimo De Carlo. It also previews museum shows like Kerry James Marshall's "The Histories" at the Royal Academy of Arts and mentions satellite fairs and auction previews.

Art Basel 2025

Art Basel 2025 opened with strong preview-day sales, surprising many galleries after a tough year in the art market. Dealers reported a 'buyer's market' with price reductions and flexibility, while high-priced works by Jeff Koons, Michael Armitage, Adrian Ghenie, and Frank Bowling sold. The fair introduced a new section called Premiere for works made in the past five years, aimed at easing participation for small to mid-sized galleries. Satellite fairs including Africa Basel, Liste, Volta, and Maze Design Basel also launched or celebrated anniversaries. Other highlights include the Baloise Art Prize awarded to Rhea Dillon and Joyce Joumaa, a Holbein drawings rehang at Kunstmuseum Basel, and a visa denial for artist Richard Mudariki. Qatar took center stage ahead of a new fair in 2026, and limited-edition Labubu figurines caused a frenzy at the Art Basel Shop.

'I’m interested in breaking binaries, barriers and boundaries': Sarah Rosalena on her new LACMA commission

Artist Sarah Rosalena has completed a monumental 27-foot tapestry titled "Threading the Boundless: Omnidirectional Terrain" (2025), commissioned for the Los Angeles County Museum of Art’s (LACMA) new David Geffen Galleries. The work utilizes an industrial-scale jacquard-rapier loom to weave complex patterns that distort NASA satellite imagery of Earth and Mars. By blending her Wixárika maternal weaving traditions with computational craft, Rosalena transforms scientific data into a tactile, atmospheric landscape that challenges traditional methods of planetary mapping.

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Cultured's spring gallery guide for New York highlights a curated selection of exhibitions across the city, with standout shows including Carol Bove's sculptural installation at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Joan Semmel's retrospective at the Jewish Museum, Jessi Reaves's furniture-based works at the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the group show "Afterlives: Contemporary Art in the Byzantine Crypt" at the Metropolitan Museum. The guide also notes exhibitions by Paul Chan, Nicola Tyson, Doron Langberg, and Yuval Pudik that are closing soon, and extends coverage to shows in Philadelphia and Warsaw.

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Elizabeth Peyton's New York solo debut with David Zwirner, titled "Elizabeth Peyton: mountains in my heart (the death of Sarpedon)," opened at the gallery's West 19th Street space. The exhibition features Peyton's small-scale figurative paintings, including a new work inspired by the death of Sarpedon from the Iliad, rendered after a 19th-century painting by Henri-Léopold Lévy. Peyton, who has been an artist-in-residence at the Louvre since 2023, continues her practice of drawing from pop culture, historical figures, and personal acquaintances, with subjects ranging from musician Cameron Winter to philosopher Simone Weil.

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Artist Amalia Ulman shares a personal inventory of 44 objects from her home, ranging from a pigeon-shaped oven mitt and a 1920s Austrian bronze cat figurine to a telephone-shaped lamp bought from a subway vendor and a graphite portrait of her late dog Holga. The list includes quirky functional items like a cane that turns into a stool, a wooden chair that transforms into a ladder, and sentimental keepsakes such as a red pompom from Holga's casket and a bag of gravel from the dog park. The objects reflect her daily life, travels, and memories, blending humor with melancholy.

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Florence Bonnefous, co-founder of Air de Paris gallery, is profiled in a feature that traces the gallery's 35-year history from its founding in Nice with poet Edouard Merino to its current industrial space in Romainville, a northern Paris suburb. The gallery, named after Marcel Duchamp's readymade, launched with a legendary 1990 exhibition featuring Philippe Parreno, Pierre Joseph, and Philippe Perrin, and has since become known for championing underground conceptual and challenging art. Bonnefous is described as a preeminent gallerist-curator who prioritizes artistic integrity over profit, representing estates of avant-garde female artists like Sturtevant and Dorothy Iannone, and maintaining close bonds with artists such as Liam Gillick and Flint Jamison. The gallery is exhibiting at Art Basel Paris but recently withdrew from Art Basel in Basel over a booth placement dispute.

What We Miss When We Talk About Giacometti

This article explores a critical reevaluation of Alberto Giacometti’s career, specifically focusing on the decade between 1935 and 1945. While Giacometti is globally recognized for his spindly, post-war 'Existentialist' figures, art historian Joanna Fiduccia’s new book, *Figures of Crisis*, argues that his mid-career departure from Surrealism to study human likeness was not a mere transition but a profound response to the political crises and nationalism of interwar France.

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The United Kingdom unveiled official coronation portraits of King Charles III and Queen Camilla, painted by artists Peter Kuhfeld and Paul Benney respectively, to commemorate the 2023 coronation. Charles is depicted in a red room wearing coronation regalia beside the Imperial State Crown, while Camilla is shown in photorealistic detail in a powder blue silk dress. The portraits are on view at the National Gallery in London.

Taiwan’s New Typologies

Taiwan is undergoing a significant cultural transformation with the opening of several major municipal art institutions, including the New Taipei City Art Museum, the Taoyuan Museum of Fine Arts, and the Taichung Green Museumbrary. The latter, designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architects SANAA, represents a new hybrid typology that merges a public library with an art museum within a sprawling urban park. These institutions are characterized by striking contemporary architecture and a mission to balance international prestige with deep-rooted local art histories.

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A year after lamenting the dominance of safe, decorative painting in New York galleries, art critic Andrew Russel observes a decisive shift toward sculpture and installation in 2026. The Whitney Biennial epitomizes this trend, alongside major shows like Carol Bove’s survey at the Guggenheim Museum and Michael Heizer’s largest indoor "Negative Sculpture" at Gagosian 21st Street. Two exhibitions spotlight neglected aspects of Isa Genzken’s work: Galerie Buchholz focuses on her "Projects for Outside," while Zwirner Tribeca presents her "world receivers" concrete sculptures. Russel also highlights Paul Chan’s "breathers" at Greene Naftali and three standout shows—Robert Gober at Matthew Marks, Felix Beaudry at Situations, and a pairing of Hans Haacke and Louise Lawler at Maxwell Graham—as essential viewing alongside the Biennial.

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A major survey of the work of Vaginal Davis, spanning five decades of her contributions to drag, queercore, experimental film, and fine art, is opening at MoMA PS1 in New York on October 9. Titled "Vaginal Davis: Magnificent Product," the exhibition debuted at Moderna Museet before traveling to New York. In an interview, Davis discusses her lifelong performance practice, the blurring of her public persona and private self, and the unlikely survival of her archive, much of which was preserved by a high school student in the 1980s.

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Art Dubai became the first major art fair to launch a dedicated digital art section in 2022, inspiring similar initiatives at Paris Photo and Art SG. Now in its fourth year, Art Dubai Digital is thriving in the Gulf region, where cities like Dubai and Abu Dhabi have heavily invested in emerging technologies, including the Dubai A.I. campus, the Museum of the Future, and teamLab Phenomena. The fair has attracted tech entrepreneurs and crypto investors, and Sotheby's recent decision to accept cryptocurrency in Saudi Arabia reflects growing infrastructure for digital art transactions. However, the question remains whether digital art can appeal to traditional collectors or will remain a separate market.

As Kazakhstan cautiously strengthens ties with western Europe, new art venues herald a change of direction

Two wealthy Kazakh entrepreneurs, Kairat Boranbayev and Nurlan Smagulov, are opening private art institutions in Almaty this year: the Tselinny Center of Contemporary Culture and the Almaty Museum of Arts. The Tselinny Center, designed by British architect Asif Khan, will open in September in a repurposed Soviet-era cinema, while the Almaty Museum of Arts, a 10,000 sq. m building by Chapman Taylor, aims to open the same month. These developments come as Kazakhstan cautiously strengthens ties with western Europe to reduce dependence on Russia, following the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, and positions itself as an energy supplier to Europe and a logistical hub for China's Belt and Road Initiative.

12 things not to miss at Art Basel's bigger and better 2025 event

Art Basel's 2025 edition in Basel features a packed program across the city, including a new Shop with exclusive drops like a limited-edition porcelain Labubu by Kasing Lung, an FC Basel jersey designed by an artist, and rare prints by Daniel Arsham and Amoako Boafo. Highlights include Jordan Wolfson at Fondation Beyeler, Dala Nasser at Kunsthalle Basel, a ghost train by Rebecca Moss and Augustin Rebetez at Museum Tinguely, and the group show Maison Clearing organized by C L E A R I N G. Joyce Joumaa presents a light-based installation at Art Basel Statements, Thomas Bayrle's 1960s installation Coats appears in Parcours, and Alia Farid shows at Unlimited.