Latest
Metropolitan Museum workers launch unionising effort
The new organising effort, with the Local 2110 chapter of the United Auto Workers, would create a union representing around 1,000 employees
Print dealers' association expands to include gallerists specialised in drawings
Members of the IFPDA "overwhelmingly voted in favour" of the shift, the first major change to the association’s bylaws in decades
Kicking off New York November sales, Christie's nets healthy $690m from double-header 20th-century auction
The house's total is up 42% from last year's equivalent sale, and it set new auction records for Leonor Fini and Beauford Delaney
Climate report from Getty’s PST Art programme urges cultural organisations to confront exhibitions’ impacts
The report is a significant step toward addressing the environmental sustainability of art world activities
Art Basel Hong Kong announces new section dedicated to work made in past five years
The fair has also made a historic curatorial announcement
Art market
French art world slams proposal for new art tax
The fair group Art Basel are among the signatories of a statement criticising a proposal to introduce a levy on “unproductive wealth”
Art Collaboration Kyoto holds its most global edition yet
The fifth edition of the fair, where Japanese galleries invited international ones to share stands, welcomed 72 exhibitors
In a risk-averse market, Paris Photo offers diversity
Japanese galleries return in full force this year, while the percentage of women photographers shown has increased
Hauser & Wirth charged with breaching UK’s Russia sanctions
The UK gallery is being prosecuted for allegedly making available a work by George Condo to a person connected with Russia after the country's invasion of Ukraine in 2022
The British artist David Shrigley wants £1m for piles of old rope
The artist, whose practice is underpinned by humour, has a poke at the art market with his new London exhibition
Museums & Heritage
Metropolitan Museum's new Condé M. Nast Galleries will put fashion at the forefront
Anna Wintour's efforts to "get out of the basement" have paid off as the Costume Institute prepares to take centre stage
Fast-rising Montana art organisation to take over century-old theatre
Bozeman-based Tinworks Art will start programming at the historic Rialto Theater with screenings of Matthew Barney’s neo-Western film “Redoubt”
Acquisitions round-up: an ‘exceptionally rare’ portrait of an enslaved person and two large-scale donations
Our pick of the latest gifts and purchases to enter institutional collections worldwide, including the enigmatic “Portrait of Frederick”
Portland Art Museum to unveil $116m transformation with Mark Rothko at its heart
After more than a decade of planning, the US state’s largest ever capital investment in the arts opens with a new pavilion named for Rothko and a gallery devoted to Black artists
With end of US government shutdown, National Gallery of Art and Smithsonian museums start reopening
Areas of the National Gallery of Art and parts of the Smithsonian were open to the public for the first time in more than a month on Friday
Exhibitions
‘Mona Lisa of illuminated manuscripts’ goes on show in Rome
The bible, which is considered a masterpiece of Italian Renaissance art, is on display as part of the Vatican’s Holy Year celebrations
Farewell to Lumiere? UK light festival holds what may be its final edition
Organisers announced in October that this would be the last iteration of the event due to funding challenges
‘The Hay Wain’ to go on show in Constable's home county for the first time
The famed painting will travel to Suffolk next year as part of an exhibition marking 250 years since the artist's birth
Children curate exhibition of Clyfford Still works inspired by their reservation
A hundred students from the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation contributed to Clyfford Still Museum’s new show
The Big Review | Manet & Morisot at Legion of Honor, San Francisco ★★★½
Berthe Morisot was at times a leading light to the more established Édouard Manet, who seemingly even filled the gaps in one of her series. But her intimate paintings struggle to compete with his bolder works
Saudi Arabia's Cultural Development Fund
The Week in Art
A podcast bringing you the latest news from the art world, every week
Studio Museum reopens, the long-awaited Grand Egyptian Museum, Stanley Spencer in Suffolk—podcast
Editor-in-chief in the Americas, Ben Sutton, takes a trip to Harlem, digital editor Alexander Morrison discusses Egypt's newest museum and Ben Luke meets a curator of “Love & Landscape: Stanley Spencer in Suffolk”
A brush with... podcast
A podcast that asks artists the questions you've always wanted to
A brush with… Peter Doig—podcast
Peter Doig 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
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.
Van Gogh’s ‘Sower’ will soon go on sale at Sotheby's—where it's set to make record price
Owned by the cosmetics king Leonard Lauder, the work could become the most expensive Van Gogh drawing ever sold
Book reviews
Pakistani artist Shahzia Sikander navigates her country’s complex past—a new monograph tells her story
An art historian’s book on the Lahore-born artist does justice to both her beautiful paintings and the history that informs them
The story of Jean-Michel Basquiat’s brief but dazzling life, as told by an art-world insider
A former Christie’s president examines the meteoric rise of the “radiant child”, and his legacy following his untimely death
How the Sienese painter Ambrogio Lorenzetti spoke truth to power
A new book explores Siena's heyday—the good, the bad and the sceptical
New book highlights Vorticism’s toxic side—and puts its women pioneers back in the frame
James King’s study places Jessica Dismorr and Helen Saunders at the centre of the movement
Martin Parr steps out from behind the camera lens in informal autobiography
An intimate and chatty biography gives the artist space to reflect on his career in photography and the practice’s evolution
Opinion
Comment | Want to truly read a painting? Forget the present, and focus on the past
To read a painting is to understand the context in which it was made, not the context in which we see it, writes Bendor Grosvenor
Comment | Fifty years on, John Berger’s writing is still relevant—and troublingly prescient
The writer went beyond the noble occupation of the art critic, smuggling hope into our lives
Comment | Exhibitions comparing artists can be problematic, but the Barbican brings Giacometti, Bhabha and Hatoum together with perfect judgement
Affinities and distinctions are equally welcomed in a pair of exhibitions at the London venue
Comment | A spate of dealer anniversaries offers hope amid art market doomerism
Several New York galleries have hit major milestones in recent months—what lessons can those in charge impart?
Comment | Museums can't get enough of anniversary exhibitions—but surely there's better ways to serve the public
This year museums are falling over themselves to celebrate Robert Rauschenberg’s 100th birthday. But, asks Julia Halperin, who is it really all for?
Diary
No such thing as bad press: makers of lift used in Louvre theft launch ad campaign
Social media users have been left—largely—amused by the German company's tongue-in-cheek approach
Francis Bacon’s Paris pad honoured with plaque
The artist had “a very full existence” in the French capital during the 1970s
Look what she made them do: Taylor Swift fans descend on German museum
Swifties have been arriving in droves to catch a glimpse of Friedrich Heyser's Ophelia, which appears in a recent music video by the showgirl superstar
Talking point: visitors to Versailles can now meet the AI Apollo
An new app allows visitors to ‘speak’ with 20 statues in three languages
Despite past legal drama, Madonna still seems hung up on the V&A
The Queen of Pop’s 2003 visit sparked a lawsuit—but she was spotted there again just last month
Obituaries
Carla Stellweg, influential critic, gallerist and scholar of Latin American art, has died, aged 83
The founding editor-in-chief of the bilingual Artes Visuales magazine, Stellweg ran galleries in new York and was also a prolific critic, scholar and curator
Tony Fitzpatrick, indefatigable artistic polymath from Chicago, has died, aged 66
A beloved figure in the Windy City art scene, Fitzpatrick was an artist, author, actor, curator and more
Agnes Gund, collector and philanthropist who helped transform MoMA, has died, aged 87
In addition to supporting many art institutions, Gund was a passionate funder of arts education and criminal justice reform initiatives
Rosalyn Drexler—Pop Art painter, polymath, and travelling wrestler—has died aged 98
Drexler, who was a fixture of the Pop Art scene by the early 1960s, was also a member of an all-women wrestling troupe under the pseudonym Mexican Spitfire
Remembering Robert Redford, the Hollywood star with the sensibility of a struggling painter
Redford, an Oscar-winning actor, director and founder of the Sundance Institute, died yesterday at his home in Utah