Latest
Sámi art has gained visibility in Norway—but when will it get a museum of its own?
Thousands of government-purchased works of art remain in storage, while one Sámi artist calls for greater engagement among her community
European art weeks join forces for new ‘spider network’
Collaboration between the leading festivals aims to beef up the ecosystem and raise their profile
Boston Public Art Triennial launches with more than a dozen projects across the city
Works at the inaugural triennial entreat locals and visitors alike to imagine new ways of understanding our world
Artists accuse Whitney Museum of censorship for cancelling pro-Palestine performance
The artists, members of the institution’s current Independent Study Program cohort, decried the decision as an act of cowardice, while a museum representative said it was “clear and necessary”
Growing old disgracefully: Rachel Whiteread reveals what a YBAs’ retirement home might look like
The Turner Prize winner says she's still friends with most of the other Young British Artists—except for Damien Hirst
Art market
Art Basel announces new Qatar fair
The fair, a partnership with Qatar Sports Investments (QSI) and QC+, will launch in February 2026 with around 50 international and regional galleries
Aboriginal art returns to Sotheby’s New York two years after pioneering dealer Tim Klingender's death
The auction house holds its first dedicated sale of Indigenous Australian art since the passing of Klingender, who was instrumental in developing the market for this category
Artist couple open north London not-for-profit in former Zabludowicz gallery
Husband-and-wife artist duo Philip and Charlotte Colbert have opened Camden Arts Projects, which kicks off its programme with a show of works by Martin Creed
Mary Tyler Moore’s art collection heads to auction
The actor’s character on "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" was unprecedented for a woman on primetime television
Top Phillips rainmakers Cheyenne Westphal and Jean-Paul Engelen to leave auction house
Westphal is to set up her own business working directly with collectors and artists while Engelen will join Aquavella Galleries
Museums & Heritage
Celebrating its bicentenary, London's National Gallery makes three major acquisitions
Works by Edgar Degas, Carl Gustav Carus and Floris van Dijck have entered the gallery's collection
Chinese art collector to open non-profit in London devoted to contemporary Asian art
Yan Du Projects will open in October in Bedford Square with an exhibition of paintings by the Chinese artist Duan Jianyu
Best-selling memoir about being a guard at the Metropolitan Museum takes the stage
Patrick Bringley’s Off-Broadway one-man show distils ‘All the Beauty in the World’ into an 80-minute meditation on art, life and human connection
Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art repatriates ancient silk manuscript to China
The museum’s fragments of the Zidanku Silk Manuscripts were looted from a tomb in Hunan Province and smuggled into the US nearly 80 years ago
Manhattan District Attorney's Office returns eight artefacts to Peru, including golden Moche mask
Many of the antiquities being returned were looted from northern Peru in the 1960s and 70s
Exhibitions
A rebuke to Modernism: the Venice Architecture Biennale imagines new ways of building to cope with climate change
Following an open call, this year's chaotic but entertaining Biennale features artists, engineers and climate scientists alongside the architects
John Singer Sargent exhibition in London shines a light on the lives of the ‘dollar princesses’
The show at Kenwood House features 18 portraits of American heiresses who came over to the UK to marry into aristocracy—with many of them going on to make a considerable mark on British society
Elsa James’s exhibition in my home county, Essex, is a potent rejection of the erasure of history
The show gives voice to sidelined Black figures and is a “direct and unapologetic” means of confronting Britain’s role in the transatlantic slave trade
In a new exhibition, the Getty Centre uncovers the mysterious world of medieval codes
The Los Angeles show aims to make the emojis of the past more accessible
Kinetic energy: events across Europe and the US celebrate Jean Tinguely anniversary
100 years since the artist’s birth, there are exhibitions, commissions—and even an actual birthday party
The Week in Art
A podcast bringing you the latest news from the art world, every week
Koyo Kouoh remembered, Queen Elizabeth II memorial, Jasper Johns by Robert Storr—podcast
Remembering Koyo Kouoh, the Venice Biennale curator who died earlier this month, plus a look at the five designs competing for the late-Queen's memorial commission, and a discussion with curator Robert Storr about the work of Jasper Johns
Opinion
Comment | When it comes to tariffs, here's why the art market should be grateful to a long-retired US congressman
A 1988 amendment to the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, secured by Howard Berman, could stop art imports being hit by Trump's tariff hike
Comment | The greatest failure of PST Art: its successes are not travelling
As the Getty wraps up its third edition of this initiative, it is time to address a persistent problem
Comment | Why a country should invest in art—even when it’s under attack
While physically defending their country, Ukrainian artist’s work provides oxygen for urgent issues that demand attention and dialogue, writes Björn Geldhof, the artistic director of the PinchukArtCentre, Kyiv
Why dealers play the waiting game before exhibiting a newly signed artist
Michael Armitage, for example, had his first show at David Zwirner three years after being signed to the gallery
Comment | Muted grey, bloody red, or dark blue—here’s why the colour of museum walls matters more than you might think
As London’s National Gallery launches its “once-in-a-lifetime” rehang, Ben Luke asks: what is the right shade behind the art?
The Sainsbury Wing reopening
After a two-year project, led by the architect Annabelle Selldorf, to remodel the wing as the main entrance to London's National Gallery, the reopening of its early Renaissance galleries forms part of C C Land: the Wonder of Art, a complete rehang of the museum's collection
The Big Review | The reopening and rehang of the Sainsbury Wing, National Gallery, London ★★★★★
The two-year remodelling of the Sainsbury Wing as the National Gallery's main entrance has allowed for new restorations and fresh curation of the museum's unrivalled collection of early Renaissance pictures. The effect is revelatory
First look: the ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ rehang at London's National Gallery
The reopening of the Sainsbury Wing on 10 May will allow the gallery to show nearly 40% of its collection. The Art Newspaper took an early tour
Comment | Muted grey, bloody red, or dark blue—here’s why the colour of museum walls matters more than you might think
As London’s National Gallery launches its “once-in-a-lifetime” rehang, Ben Luke asks: what is the right shade behind the art?
London's National Gallery buys mysterious altarpiece for $20m
The museum has acquired a 16th-century work by an unknown artist from a family collection
New perspectives: Annabelle Selldorf brings a fresh angle to the National Gallery’s Sainsbury Wing
A tour of the remodelled building, five months before its reopening, shows the New York architect has created a spectacular main entrance closely integrated with the rest of the London institution and with the public space of Trafalgar Square
Pope Leo XIV
Robert Francis Prevost, the US-born former head of the Augustinian order of friars, was elected Pope Leo XIV on 8 May. He becomes the proprietor in trust of the art and architecture riches of the Vatican and inherits his predecessor Pope Francis's concern for peace and for addressing climate change
The art of being Pope Leo: from a Raphael portrait to the first pontiff to be captured on film
Cardinal Prevost’s choice of the name Leo links him to Leo XIII, a 19th-century champion of social justice, and also recalls Leos I, III and IV, whose diplomatic and military achievements are depicted in Raphael’s “stanze” frescoes, completed for Pope Leo X
Robert Francis Prevost has been elected Pope Leo XIV—why does this matter to the worlds of art and heritage?
The Chicago-born pontiff—the new spiritual leader of 1.3 billion Catholics and the proprietor in trust of the great art and architecture treasures of the Vatican—has publicly supported his predecessor Pope Francis's lead on climate change
The original ‘Conclave’? How commercial engravings grew global interest in papal succession
Downloads of the 2024 film have surged since the death of Pope Francis—but in the 16th and 17th century, it was etchings that drove public fascination with the historic process
Pope Francis (1936-2025)
Pope Francis, for 12 years the spiritual leader of 1.3 billion Catholics, and proprietor in trust of the Vatican's great art treasures and its liturgical and built heritage, died on 21 April 2025, aged 88
The original ‘Conclave’? How commercial engravings grew global interest in papal succession
Downloads of the 2024 film have surged since the death of Pope Francis—but in the 16th and 17th century, it was etchings that drove public fascination with the historic process
Remembering Pope Francis, for 12 years head of the Catholic church and proprietor in trust of the Vatican's library and art collections
The Argentinian pontiff was a powerful progressive voice in world politics, the first Jesuit priest to be spiritual leader of the world’s 1.3 billion Catholics and the first from the Americas or the southern hemisphere to hold the office
Holy ground: why Persian carpets played an important symbolic role in the funeral of Pope Francis
For over 600 years carpets from Turkey and Iran have been used in Catholic ceremony and religious paintings by artists, including Andrea del Verrochio, to indicate a carefully defined, sacred space
From the archive | Pope Francis, his crucifix and the Virgin Mary: miraculous or merely traditional?
Art history removes the numinous from art. At the Vatican’s Covid-19 blessing we saw it invoked again
One of Pope’s favourite paintings is looking refreshed after restoration
Icon’s first major intervention since 1931 brings back original colours
Diary
Out of this world: Artangel concept album celebrates space-bound 12-inch record with new audio-visual works
‘The Golden Record’, in orbit since 1977, included images and sounds
Is Trump painting an ‘awesome portrait’ or by ‘Tariff Lautrec’?
A new portrait of the US leader, looking defiant following the attempted assassination last year, has drawn, er… mixed responses
The world according to Cattelan? Maverick Maurizio updates ‘autobiography’
Maurizio Cattelan sheds light on his famous golden toilet and that duct-taped banana
Wes Anderson’s priceless ‘Renaissance portrait’ to go on show in London
A new exhibition includes the fictional masterpiece ‘Boy With Apple’, which appeared in the Anderson classic, ‘the Grand Budapest Hotel’
Let him entertain you: Robbie Williams gets honest in latest Moco exhibition
Last night the star—and subject of a recent, monkey-themed biopic—unveiled works that seem to strip away any last remaining filters
Book reviews
New book explores how Rome’s ruins have resonated in art and literature over centuries
A survey tracing the city’s greatest ornaments from antiquity to the present day originated as a series of lectures
Extended from one volume to three, the new ‘Taste and the Antique’ expands on four centuries of interactions with sculpture
The essential guide now includes colour photographs of 95 works
A new ‘anti-biography’ rips apart the myth of Leonardo as a solitary genius
The new study of the Da Vinci brand uses historical context to debunk the artist’s cult status and present him as a man of his time
East meets West in Venice: the unlikely love affair between a Hermitage curator and a Cambridge don
A new volumes details a chance meeting that liberated art scholars Francis Haskell and Larissa Salmina in very different ways
Japan is opening its eyes to women photographers—and to the female gaze
Denied recognition and even credit for their work until recent times, Japan’s women photographers are challenging and subverting traditional assumptions about the female body
A brush with... podcast
A podcast that asks artists the questions you've always wanted to
A brush with… Salman Toor — podcast
Salman Toor talks to Ben Luke about his influences—from writers to musicians, film-makers and, of course, other artists—and the cultural experiences that have shaped his life and work
Technology
News, background and analysis on the latest tech developments—artificial intelligence tools; Web3, the blockchain, NFTs; virtual and augmented reality; social media platforms—and how they affect the art market, museums, artists and curators.
Can graphic imagination wake audiences up to the climate emergency? This multimedia artist believes so
Berlin-based Michael Najjar has been working with scientists in Greenland to tell stories with images designed to replace familiar memes of environmental journalism
An inside track on the Huntington’s rapid social media growth
The California institution is one of the top five museums for social media growth in the world in the past year. We spoke to the museum's director of digital and social content strategy
How AI models are helping to reveal South America's archaeological sites
Analysis of aerial and satellite images has rapidly identified ancient sites, but human expertise is still essential in refining the outcomes
Jeu de Paume puts on wide-ranging survey of work created by artists working with artificial intelligence
With “Le Monde Selon L’IA”, the Paris media art centre takes a broad look at work made using both analytical AI and generative AI
Museums are losing social media followers amid users' mass X-odus
Some institutions have ditched their accounts in protest, while others have chosen to “quiet quit” and stopped posting on the Elon Musk-owned platform
Book Club
Sex, beauty and the body: how Helen Chadwick shaped British contemporary art
The “provocative, punky, perverse” artist died far too young but her work’s influence endures, argues a new biography
The Voynich Manuscript revealed: five things you probably didn't know about the Medieval masterpiece
Scholars have speculated for centuries about the meaning behind the 15th-century codex and its peculiar illustrations
May Book Bag: from a comic compendium inspired by MoMA to a turning point in the history of photography
Our round-up of the latest art publications
An expert's guide to artists' books: four must-read publications on the genre
All you ever wanted to know about artists' books on the eve of a major exhibition at London’s Warburg Institute—selected by the show's co-curator Arnaud Desjardin
The trials and tribulations of putting together Lucian Freud’s catalogue raisonné
The forensically researched volume on the British artist's oil paintings offers a depth of scrutiny that he himself was famous for
Obituaries
‘An immense void in the world of contemporary art’: Koyo Kouoh, curator of the 2026 Venice Biennale, has died, aged 57
The acclaimed curator was due to present her plans for the exhibition next week
Zurab Tsereteli, Georgian-born artist and Russian patriot, has died aged 91
Artist, who also ran museums and institutions in Russia, was best known for his monumental sculptures, including a 30m-high memorial to victims of 9/11 in the US
Guy Ullens, collector and patron of Chinese contemporary art, has died, aged 90
The Belgian businessman co-founded Beijing’s Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (UCCA) in 2007 with his wife Myriam Ullens
Remembering Pope Francis, for 12 years head of the Catholic church and proprietor in trust of the Vatican's library and art collections
The Argentinian pontiff was a powerful progressive voice in world politics, the first Jesuit priest to be spiritual leader of the world’s 1.3 billion Catholics and the first from the Americas or the southern hemisphere to hold the office
Remembering Rosalind Savill, the porcelain expert who transformed the Wallace Collection
During her 19-year tenure as its director, she turned a sedate institution into a vibrant tribute to the culture of 18th-century France
Adventures with Van Gogh
Adventures with Van Gogh is a weekly blog by Martin Bailey, our long-standing correspondent and expert on the artist. Published every Friday, his stories range from newsy items about this most intriguing artist to scholarly pieces based on his own meticulous investigations and discoveries.
Huge Paris exhibition reveals David Hockney’s love of Van Gogh
Hockney, now 87, says he is always happy when he paints—“just like Van Gogh”