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15 museum shop gifts were loving

Artnet News has curated a selection of 15 unusual and art-themed gifts available at museum shops worldwide, ranging from a snake-embroidered brooch inspired by Cartier at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London to a 'Souls in Purgatory' magnet from the Morgan Library & Museum in New York, a traditional palm-leaf fan from Al Ain Museum in Abu Dhabi, a gilded sewing kit from the Neue Galerie in New York, and a CD of a Hanne Darboven composition from the Dia Art Foundation. Each item is presented with its price, source museum, and a brief explanation of its appeal, often tying back to specific exhibitions or artworks.

Your Summer Guide: 20 Art World Highlights Not to Miss

ARTnews has published a summer guide highlighting 20 art world events and exhibitions not to miss in the coming months. Featured highlights include the opera 'El Último Sueño de Frida y Diego' at the Metropolitan Opera, the 'Costume Art' exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a Björk show titled 'echolalia' at the National Gallery of Iceland, a book on the Venice Biennale by Massimiliano Gioni, Raven Halfmoon's 'Flags of Our Mothers' at Ballroom Marfa, a Pierre Huyghe exhibition at Fondation Beyeler Basel, a James McNeill Whistler retrospective at Tate Britain, and the inaugural Medina Triennial in New York.

artnews awards 2025 nominees

ARTnews has announced the nominees for the 2025 ARTnews Awards, which honor excellence in art at US institutions and galleries. The awards, now in their second year, feature six categories: Emerging Artist, Established Artist, Lifetime Achievement, Best Thematic Museum Exhibition, Best Gallery Group Show, and a newly introduced Best Historical Artist category. The jury includes five top US curators and two ARTnews editors, with winners to be celebrated in November.

15 Art Shows to See in NYC This May

Hyperallergic's May 2025 guide to New York City art shows highlights 15 exhibitions, including a survey of Hawaiian Japanese-American artists from the Metcalf Chateau group at Ryan Lee Gallery, a retrospective of Malian photographer Seydou Keïta at the Brooklyn Museum, and Renée Green's multimedia project 'Secret' at Bortolami Gallery. The article also features Lynette Yiadom-Boakye's quietude-focused works, a meditation on grief and death, and a document of a city devastated by the AIDS crisis through portraits of inanimate objects, among other shows.

Mom, I'm Gonna Be an Artist!

Hyperallergic's Saturday newsletter, edited by Valentina Di Liscia, rounds up a week of art-world activity marked by protests and resistance. Staff Writer Isa Farfan asked 15 artists to share advice from their mothers for Mother's Day, featuring responses from Pat Oleszko, whose work is in the Whitney Biennial. The newsletter also covers editor-in-chief Hakim Bishara's report on a historic strike for Palestine and workers' rights at the Venice Biennale, where dozens of national pavilions shut down, and Editor-at-Large Hrag Vartanian's review of the central exhibition "In Minor Keys." Additional stories include Damien Davis on artists and consignment agreements, Matt Stromberg on the LA Art Book Fair, a protest against Jeff Bezos at the Met Gala, MoMA PS1's upcoming Teresa Margolles survey, and a picket at the American Folk Art Museum.

Alma Allen Flops in Venice

Hyperallergic reports on the 2026 Venice Biennale, with Editor-in-Chief Hakim Bishara criticizing the U.S. pavilion's exhibition of Alma Allen's work as a disappointing departure from the previous editions' profound explorations of Indigenous life and Black sovereignty. Editor-at-Large Hrag Vartanian offers a positive review of the main exhibition "In Minor Keys," while Greta Rainbow covers a poetry procession honoring the late artistic director Koyo Kouoh. Additional stories include a review of the film "The Christophers" about an artist and forger, and news of workers at the American Folk Art Museum picketing for higher wages.

New York institutions offer nuanced and inclusive views of US’s 250th birthday

New York institutions are presenting nuanced exhibitions for the US's 250th birthday, offering both patriotic and critical perspectives on the American Revolution. The Grey Art Museum at NYU displays one of the 26 surviving Dunlap broadsides of the Declaration of Independence alongside over 100 contextual documents in "The Declaration of Independence: Long Trail to Liberty," while the Museum of the City of New York's "The Occupied City" immerses visitors in the British occupation of New York, featuring interactive elements like toppling a digital effigy of King George III.

arte popular brazil artists rediscovered

Earlier this spring, artist Julia Isídrez led a guided tour at São Paulo's Gomide & Co. gallery for a joint exhibition with Maria Lira. The show highlights two artists from different generations and mediums—Lira from Brazil (painting) and Isídrez from Paraguay (sculpture, featured in the 2024 Venice Biennale)—who both engage Indigenous and Afro-Indigenous traditions from a contemporary perspective. Gallerist Thiago Gomide rejects labels like 'folk' or 'popular,' insisting it is simply an art exhibition. The article profiles a network of Brazilian dealers, including Vilma Eid of Galeria Estação and Antonio Almeida of Almeida & Dale, who have worked to revive interest in arte popular, a category historically applied to self-taught, Indigenous, and Black artists.

moma ps1 free admission new york museum

MoMA PS1, the contemporary art satellite of New York's Museum of Modern Art, announced it will offer free admission to all visitors starting January 1, 2026, thanks to a $900,000 donation from entrepreneur Sonya Yu. Previously, only New York City residents received free entry, while others faced a suggested $10 fee. The move positions MoMA PS1 as New York's largest free art museum, joining institutions like the Bronx Museum of the Arts and the American Folk Art Museum.

Here Are This Spring’s 11 Must-See Museum Exhibitions in New York

This article highlights 11 must-see museum exhibitions in New York for spring 2025, including shows at Amant, the American Folk Art Museum, the Guggenheim, the Hill Art Foundation, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and MoMA PS1. Featured artists include Madalena Santos Reinbolt, Rashid Johnson, Sam Moyer, Jennie C. Jones, and Andro Eradze, with works spanning textiles, sculpture, sound installations, and mixed media.

joshua johnson

Joshua Johnson, born into slavery in Maryland around 1763, emerged in the late 18th century as the first documented Black professional artist in the United States. After gaining his freedom in 1782, Johnson established himself in Baltimore as a self-taught portraitist, advertising his services in local newspapers and catering to the city's prominent families. His body of work, consisting of approximately 83 attributed paintings, is characterized by a distinct flatness and three-quarter profile compositions typical of early American folk art.

jack whitten 2025 artnews awards historical artist

Jack Whitten is the recipient of the 2025 ARTnews Award for his retrospective "Jack Whitten: The Messenger" at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, running from March 23 to August 2, 2025. Curated by Michelle Kuo with Helena Klevorn, Dana Liljegren, and David Sledge, the exhibition features 175 works spanning Whitten's six-decade career, highlighting his innovative use of acrylic paint, his custom squeegee-like tool called the Developer, and his mosaic-like paintings made from dried acrylic chips. The show includes early works from the civil rights era, mid-career homages to Black thinkers like W.E.B. Du Bois and Ralph Ellison, and a monumental abstraction memorializing 9/11.

Brazilian women bring Latin American art to the New York collector circuit.

Two Brazilian women, Fernanda Mazzuco and Luciana Solano, run Art in Brackets, a consultancy and art advisory firm based in New York. For the first time, they have opened a public exhibition space on Walker Street in Tribeca, featuring a collective show centered on the African diaspora and transatlantic connections. The exhibition includes works by artists such as Santídio Pereira and Madalena dos Santos Reinbolt, with prices ranging from $3,800 to $140,000. The company, founded in 2022, connects collectors with Brazilian and Latin American artists, operating as 'wall curators' in partnership with various galleries.

Brilliant Things to Do This April

April 2026 marks a significant month for global art exhibitions, featuring major retrospectives and site-specific installations across Rome, Seoul, London, and Paris. Highlights include Gagosian Rome’s exploration of Francesca Woodman’s surrealist photography, a homecoming retrospective for video-art pioneer Nam June Paik in Seoul, and Senga Nengudi’s performance-based sculptures at London’s Whitechapel Gallery. Additionally, Isaac Julien will debut a new moving-image work at The Cosmic House, while the Fondation Louis Vuitton prepares a large-scale exhibition dedicated to Alexander Calder’s kinetic sculptures.

Gladstone now represent The Estate of Anna Zemánková

Gladstone Gallery has announced its representation of The Estate of Anna Zemánková, a self-taught Czech artist known for her influential abstract works that explore psychological and spiritual realms. The gallery will collaborate with Cavin-Morris Gallery and plans to present a solo booth of Zemánková's work at TEFAF New York from May 14–19, 2026, following a spring 2025 exhibition in New York featuring her botanical drawings and works on paper. Zemánková, a key figure in Art Brut, created untitled, biomorphic works rooted in the subconscious, often compared to artists like Kunz and Hilma af Klint.

The Best New York City Exhibitions of 2025

Hyperallergic's staff and contributors present their picks for the best New York City exhibitions of 2025, highlighting a year marked by major museum reopenings, including the Studio Museum in Harlem after a seven-year hiatus and the Frick's expansion. Notable shows include Amy Sherald's 'American Sublime' at the Whitney Museum, Rashid Johnson at the Guggenheim, Wifredo Lam at MoMA, and surveys of Indigenous design at the Ford Foundation Gallery, Seydou Keïta at the Brooklyn Museum, and hometown heroes like Jack Whitten at MoMA and Coco Fusco at El Museo del Barrio. The list also features Saya Woolfalk at the Museum of Arts and Design, Nayland Blake at Matthew Marks Gallery, and Ben Shahn at the Jewish Museum.

American Folk Art Museum Workers Picket Gala, Calling for Higher Wages

Workers at the American Folk Art Museum in New York City, represented by UAW Local 2110, picketed the museum's annual gala at the Mandarin Oriental in Manhattan on May 6, 2026. They demanded higher wages and better benefits after contract negotiations stalled for nearly two years. Frontline workers earn $19 per hour, about $12,000 below the city's living wage, while the museum's CEO Jason Busch earned $321,882 in 2024. The union requested a three-year contract raising wages to $30 per hour, but management offered only $21.50 and refused to guarantee existing benefits, leading to the protest.

Reclaiming the Self-Taught Artist’s Creative Identity

The American Folk Art Museum (AFAM) in New York will present "Self-Made: A Century of Inventing Artists" this spring, a major exhibition examining the historical definition of the "self-taught artist" through authorship, agency, and self-representation. Featuring over 90 works spanning the early 20th century to today, the show is organized around three strategies—self-portraiture, alter egos, and autobiography—and includes pieces by Henry Darger, Clémentine Hunter, Martín Ramírez, Aloïse Corbaz, Adolf Wölfli, Nicole Appel, Susan Janow, and Joe Coleman, many on view for the first time.

Elucidating the Esoteric with Hilma's Ghost

The feminist art collective Hilma’s Ghost, founded by artists Dannielle Tegeder and Sharmistha Ray, is reclaiming the role of alternative spiritualities and the occult within art history. Sparked by the 2018 Hilma af Klint retrospective at the Guggenheim, the collective emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic as a research-based project that bridges artmaking with esoteric practices like tarot, witchcraft, and neo-tantric cosmologies. Through workshops and collaborative paintings, the duo explores how women and queer artists have historically been erased from the canon due to their unconventional, mystical methods.

Jimmy Tsutomu Mirikitani, a New Sort of Street Artist, Rises from Art History’s Margins

Jimmy Tsutomu Mirikitani, a late Japanese American collagist who lived and worked as a street artist in New York City, is the subject of a new solo exhibition at the Spencer Museum of Art in Kansas City, on view through June. Co-curators Maki Kaneko and Kris Imants Ercums organized the show thematically rather than chronologically, reflecting Mirikitani's fragmented life—from surviving the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and incarceration at Tule Lake to arriving in New York in the 1950s. The exhibition draws on years of research, including visits to the parks where he lived and to Hiroshima, and builds on Linda Hattendorf's 2006 documentary *The Cats of Mirikitani*.

art new york museum exhibition guide winter

Cultured magazine has published a winter exhibition guide for New York museums, highlighting six major shows running through early 2026. Featured exhibitions include Ayoung Kim's "Delivery Dancer Codex" at MoMA PS1, a survey of UFO-themed works at The Drawing Center, a Ruth Asawa retrospective at MoMA, Renoir drawings at the Morgan Library & Museum, Robert Rauschenberg's photography at the Museum of the City of New York, and Alexander Calder's circus at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Each entry provides dates, curatorial context, and visitor tips.

Drones, Uncle Sam, and Grand Master Rafael: 10 Must See Exhibits This Spring

New York City’s museum landscape is entering a major spring season characterized by high-profile retrospectives, institutional reopenings, and the 82nd Whitney Biennial. Key highlights include a massive Raphael survey at the Metropolitan Museum of Art featuring over 200 works, the reopening of the expanded New Museum with a tech-focused exhibition on the future of humanity, and a major survey of sculptor Carol Bove at the Guggenheim. The season also features thematic shows exploring American folk art, Dutch Golden Age masterpieces, and the relationship between Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera.

Self-Made at the American Folk Art Museum explores a century of artists inventing themselves

The American Folk Art Museum has launched "Self-Made: A Century of Inventing Artists," an exhibition exploring the work of self-taught creators who operated outside traditional institutional frameworks. Featuring a diverse array of drawings, paintings, and sculptures by figures such as Henry Darger, Bill Traylor, and Sister Gertrude Morgan, the show examines how these artists used their practice to construct identities and narratives in environments that often offered little formal recognition.

Plan your visit to “American 250: Common Threads,” now on view at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art

Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art has opened a new special exhibition titled "American 250: Common Threads." The exhibition features a wide range of artworks, including historic documents, quilts, prints, and contemporary pieces, all reflecting on the American experience and national identity. A notable interactive work by artist Basil Kincaid involves local quilters assembling fabric squares decorated by Arkansas students.

UWS’s American Folk Art Museum Marks Two Milestones With New Shows

The American Folk Art Museum on the Upper West Side is celebrating its 65th anniversary and the upcoming 250th anniversary of the United States with two major exhibitions: “Folk Nation: Crafting Patriotism in the United States” and “Self-Made: A Century of Inventing Artists.” These shows feature works ranging from 19th-century textiles to 20th-century paintings by self-taught icons like Morris Hirshfield and Reverend Benjamin Franklin Perkins, highlighting how marginalized and non-academic artists have historically interpreted American identity and personal narrative.

40 things to do this April 2026 in NYC

The Metropolitan Museum of Art is hosting "Raphael: Sublime Poetry," the first comprehensive exhibition of the High Renaissance master in the United States. Running through June 28, 2026, the landmark show features over 170 works, including major loans like "The Alba Madonna" and the "Portrait of Baldassarre Castiglione," alongside preparatory sketches that reveal the artist's technical process.

10 Must-See Exhibitions in the US This Year (2026)

A preview of ten major art exhibitions opening across the United States in 2026, curated by art historian Emily Snow. Highlights include 'Frida: The Making of an Icon' at the Museum of Fine Art in Houston, a Mary Cassatt centenary show at the National Gallery of Art, a focused presentation of Matisse's 'Jazz' at the Art Institute of Chicago, the 82nd Whitney Biennial, and the first comprehensive Raphael exhibition ever staged in the U.S. at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Other featured shows include 'America 250: Common Threads' at Crystal Bridges Museum and 'Manet & Morisot' at the Cleveland Museum of Art.

The tale of a French psychiatric asylum that harboured Second World War resistance fighters—and where patients became artists

An exhibition catalogue from the American Folk Art Museum's 2024 show traces the story of Saint-Alban-sur-Limagnole, a French psychiatric asylum that sheltered Spanish Republican refugees and resistance fighters during World War II. Under Catalan psychiatrist Francesc Tosquelles, patients were encouraged to create art from found objects, producing works that later influenced Jean Dubuffet's concept of Art Brut. The asylum became a haven where hierarchies between doctors and patients were leveled, and patients bartered their creations for food during wartime austerity.

Vitra Design Museum celebrates the enduring influence of egalitarian religious sect, the Shakers

The Vitra Design Museum in Germany has opened "The Shakers: A World in the Making," an exhibition exploring the minimalist designs and democratic beliefs of the Shakers, an egalitarian religious sect founded in the 18th century. Organized with the Milwaukee Art Museum, the Institute of Contemporary Art Philadelphia, and Germany's Wüstenrot Foundation in collaboration with the Shaker Museum in Chatham, New York, the show features historic Shaker objects like oval boxes and ladder-back chairs alongside newly commissioned works by contemporary artists including Amie Cunat, David Hartt, and Kameelah Janan Rasheed.

Long Overlooked, Minnie Evans’s Mystical Landscapes Are Finally Getting the Spotlight

Minnie Evans (1892–1987), a self-taught African American artist who worked for 25 years as a ticket seller at Airlie Gardens in Wilmington, North Carolina, is experiencing a major resurgence. Long overlooked after her death, Evans created thousands of vibrant, kaleidoscopic drawings featuring florals, animals, and abstraction, often on scrap paper using affordable materials. A touring exhibition, "The Visionary Art of Minnie Evans," is currently on view at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, curated by Colton Klein, and a larger exhibition opens this November at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta before traveling to the Whitney Museum of American Art in summer 2026. Evans had a 1975 retrospective at the Whitney during her lifetime but faded from prominence afterward.