On a recent podcast, artist Damien Hirst identified his manager, Joe Hage, as the most influential person he's met, praising his work with other major artists. Hirst also downplayed the role of major galleries like Gagosian and White Cube, comparing them to 'estate agents,' and revealed a new private commission: an amethyst-encrusted grotto for the Getty family.
This week's In Memoriam column from Hyperallergic honors seven figures from the art world who recently passed away, including Swiss collector and dealer Bruno Bischofberger (1940–2026), Pulitzer-winning arts critic Manuela Hoelterhoff (1949–2026), and artist-editor Steven Durland (1951–2026). Other notable losses include British painter Ray Burgoyne, iconographer Christina Dochwat, German gallerist Jenny Falckenberg, realist painter Ward Nichols, and MoMA preparator Pamela A. Popeson. Each entry provides a brief biography and highlights their contributions to visual art, criticism, and cultural organizing.
Chicago's annual art week unfolded with gallerist Daisy Sanchez documenting the scene for Artnet News's 'Wet Paint in the Wild' column. Sanchez, who recently co-opened Hans Goodrich gallery with Peter Anastos, attended the Renaissance Society's annual benefit, EXPO Chicago, and after-parties. The week featured artists including Joanne Greenbaum, Leah Ke Yi Zhang, B. Ingrid Olsen, and Isabelle Frances McGuire, with appearances by curators Myriam Ben Salah, Karsten Lund, and Giampaolo Bianconi, among others.
Randall Suffolk, director of the High Museum of Art, argues that art museums should let artists lead the integration of artificial intelligence into programming, rather than institutions racing to adopt the technology themselves. He advocates for using AI primarily behind the scenes for organizational efficiency and decision-making, while cautioning against letting AI distract from the direct experience of artworks in galleries.
Art fairs appear serene on the surface, but behind the scenes, logistics professionals work frantically to ship, install, and present hundreds of artworks. The article shares dramatic installation tales from galleries and shippers, including Gianpietro Carlesso's heavy sculpture at Frieze Sculpture 2020, a Calder Stegosaurus transported for Art Basel Miami Beach 2013, and Mandy El-Sayegh's immersive booth installation at Frieze London 2023. These stories highlight the challenges of tight schedules, extreme weather, and complex installations that require structural engineers, cranes, and overnight work.
The 61st Venice Biennale is underway, and while it is officially a non-commercial exhibition, market forces are increasingly influential behind the scenes. Artnet News host Margaret Carrigan reports on auction houses actively participating in opening week, and highlights Sotheby’s upcoming single-owner sale in London featuring works from billionaire Joe Lewis’s collection, expected to exceed $200 million. Meanwhile, Whitechapel Gallery has created a new economist-in-residence position to address ongoing financial strain in museums.
The traveling exhibition "Make Way for Berthe Weill: Art Dealer of the Parisian Avant-Garde" explores the legacy of the pioneering gallerist who first championed artists like Pablo Picasso, Amedeo Modigliani, and Diego Rivera. The show originated at New York University’s Grey Art Museum before traveling to the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and finally to the Musée de l’Orangerie in Paris. Curators highlight the logistical complexities of such a tour, including the necessity of international partnerships to secure high-profile loans and the role of registrars and conservators in transporting delicate works.
The Seattle Art Museum (SAM) team faced an extraordinary challenge installing the retrospective “Ai, Rebel: The Art and Activism of Ai Weiwei,” which required handling eight tractor-trailers of artwork—far more than the usual two—within just three weeks. The exhibition features 130 complex works, including a giant tree sculpture, a life-size jail cell replica, and a Lego rendition of the Mueller report, many arriving without instruction manuals and requiring creative assembly by a 12-person crew led by lead preparator Joshua Gosovich.
Kulapat Yantrasast, the Bangkok-born architect behind Why Architecture, has completed a $70 million overhaul of the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Michael C. Rockefeller Wing, which houses the arts of Africa, Oceania, and the ancient Americas. Working with executive architect Beyer Blinder Belle, Yantrasast redesigned the 40,000-square-foot exhibition hall to address longstanding conservation issues caused by a 200-foot glass wall on Central Park that exposed fragile objects to heat and light. The wing reopens to the public on May 31 after four years of construction.
The Museum of the Moving Image (MoMI) in New York has opened a new exhibition titled 'Stories and Set Designs for The Sopranos.' The show delves into the creation of the landmark HBO series, featuring original research materials, concept art, ground plans, and scripts that reveal the intense preparatory work by creator David Chase and his team. It reconstructs key locations like the Soprano home, the Bada Bing strip club, and Dr. Melfi's office to illustrate the show's transition from pilot to full series production.
Leaders from roughly 10 Ivy League and top private research universities have formed a private collective to coordinate their response to the Trump administration's attacks on academic independence and research funding. The administration has paused billions in funding at Cornell and Northwestern, cut $400 million from Columbia, and blocked $2 million from Harvard, which is now suing the government. The collective, operating behind the scenes, is concerned about federal overreach into admissions, hiring, curricula, and international student and faculty policies.
In spring 1975, the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City hosted the second American stop of "The Exhibition of Archaeological Finds of the People's Republic of China," a landmark traveling show of ancient Chinese artifacts including jade, silk, and bronze sculptures. The author, then a University of Missouri-Kansas City economics student, worked behind the scenes at the museum, describing an unusual interview conducted while gardening and his task of touch-painting gallery walls with a dry brush to cover visitor smudges before opening.
The art auction market showed signs of recovery in 2025, with total sales increasing for the first time since 2021, driven by a strong late-season surge in New York. The U.K. market grew by 11.3%, aided by major sales like the $136 million dispersal of Pauline Karpidas's Surrealist collection, while the ultra-contemporary sector declined for a fourth year as investment flowed to established Impressionist and Modern works.
The article spotlights Galka Scheyer, a largely overlooked figure who introduced European modernism to California in the early 20th century. A new exhibition in Pasadena brings her story to the foreground, highlighting her role in championing artists who later became famous.
The Lawrence Art Guild held the fourth annual Art Spaces Studio Tours on Saturday, with studios open again Sunday from noon to 6 p.m. Featured artist Nick Schmiedeler, a forklift operator who creates assemblage sculptures from found metal and wood, opened his studio at 710 Missouri St. Muralist Dave Loewenstein and his 8-year-old son Andrés hosted guests at their alleyway studio, where Andrés performed live drawing demonstrations. The tour also included Art Emergency, a collective studio space at 721 E. Ninth St. housing artists working in painting, photography, textiles, and mixed media.