Latest

Prison inmates and artist Marinella Senatore create light installation for Vatican Jubilee Year

The Holy See will launch a series of contemporary art projects at prisons next year

Gareth Harris1 day ago

Unesco beefs up protection for cultural heritage in Ukraine

UN heritage body grants 'provisional enhanced protection' to the Odessa Literary Museum and the National Historical and Memorial Reserve Babyn Yar

MFA Boston acquires 38 photographs by Robert Frank capturing life in 1940s Paris

The experimental images feature in a new exhibition centred on a personal family scrapbook

Paris film screening resurrects pioneering post-punk performance group

The “unapologetically impolite” COUM Transmissions work still has a shock factor

The Week in Art

A podcast bringing you the latest news from the art world, every week

2024 in review: the biggest stories and the best shows - podcast

From the devastating war in Gaza to art attacks in museums, our editors analyse the year's biggest stories

Art market

Sotheby's does a U-turn on new fees structure

Less than a year ago, the auction house reduced buyer’s premium and tried to introduce a flat 10% vendor's commission to avoid bartering. It did not prove popular with sellers

The Groucho Club to reopen in January following rape accusation

The London private members club, owned by the founders of Hauser & Wirth gallery, was shut down by police in November following a “serious crime” at the Soho venue

Phillips auction house executive chairman Ed Dolman resigns

Martin Wilson, the chairman of the British Art Market Federation (Bamf), is joining as chief executive and will oversee global operations

Christie's results are down ‘just’ 6% in 2024, ‘despite challenging environment’

The house's auction total saw a double-digit decrease for a second year in a row—but private sales are booming

Jean-Michel Basquiat's love of the Alps celebrated in new exhibition

The show, at Hauser & Wirth St Moritz, looks at the artist's visits to his Swiss dealer Bruno Bischofberger, when he would go cross-country skiing and visit agricultural shows

Museums & Heritage

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

Figurative painter Claire Tabouret chosen to design contemporary stained-glass windows for Notre-Dame

Heritage organisations remain opposed to President Macron's plans to replace chapel windows at the newly reopened cathedral

Houston's Rothko Chapel reopens after hurricane damage is repaired

The Texas pilgrimage site for devotees of Abstract Expressionism returns just in time for the holidays

In Alabama, plans to preserve the last transatlantic slave ship are taking shape

The Clotilda shipwreck will remain submerged as a monument to the 110 enslaved people it carried—and in tribute to their descendants in Mobile, Alabama

Exhibitions

Jean-Michel Basquiat's love of the Alps celebrated in new exhibition

The show, at Hauser & Wirth St Moritz, looks at the artist's visits to his Swiss dealer Bruno Bischofberger, when he would go cross-country skiing and visit agricultural shows

A bibliophile invites New Yorkers to engage with books that do not exist

A unique and artful exhibition of imaginary books is now on view at the Grolier Club

Naomi Beckwith named artistic director of Documenta in 2027

The deputy director and chief curator of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum says she is "humbled by the breadth of this responsibility"

‘While there are dictators, no one can feel safe’: projects marking anniversaries of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine emphasise need for global vigilance

Among the initiatives launched to mark both 1,000 days since the invasion and its approaching third anniversary is an exhibition in Kharkiv exploring how the concept of safety “has been profoundly redefined by the war”

Artist withdraws from Miami-area exhibition over anti-BDS language in contract

“It was disheartening to experience this level of institutional complacency and complicity,” says the artist Les Gomez-Gonzalez

Opinion

The Year in Review: escalating art attacks and responses to war

This year has been marked by a rising number of politically-motivated attacks on art. But we should not forget the power of art to unite diverse groups of people

Influencers: is it time for museums to go all in?

As an advertising agency pays Instagram influencers to promote museums, is it really worth shelling out thousands of dollars for added publicity and to reach new audiences?

Comment | Why it's important to find hope for—and through—the arts after the US election

The divisions within American society cannot be ignored, but let’s focus on where the country is united, and how the cultural sector can foster that unity

Jamie Bennett and Suzy Delvalle

Comment | EU’s new anti-looting law is another blow for legitimate trade

Though laudible in its aim to kerb trafficking of stolen goods, planned rules will impose unreasonable burdens on lawful and genuine trade

Rudy Capildeo

Comment | In the run up to the US election, Boston's Museum of Fine Art is hopeful about art's role in a democratic future

The museum's latest exhibition explains and scrutinises democracy through objects spanning 2,500 years

Phoebe Segal

Obituaries

Zilia Sánchez, Cuban artist renowned for shaped, abstract canvases, has died, aged 98

Sánchez, who fled Cuba and ultimately settled in Puerto Rico, only achieved widespread critical acclaim late in her career

Lorraine O’Grady, conceptual artist who dissected language and dualities, has died, aged 90

O’Grady, who devoted herself to art in her early forties, spent the ensuing decades making incisive works that spanned photography, collage, performance and more

Remembering Joseph Rykwert, influential writer and teacher on the theory of architecture

Warsaw-born RIBA gold medal winner, who became the professor of architecture at the University of Pennsylvania, changed architectural understanding

Remembering Elizabeth Esteve-Coll, groundbreaking director of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London

Charismatic leader who steered the museum through a difficult period in the 1980s, and later became a university vice-chancellor

Remembering Frank Auerbach, one of the leading artists of his generation, who has died aged 93

The German-born British painter, a leading figure in the School of London, produced some of the most enduring and perceptive observations of what it meant to be alive during his time

Book Club

Some of our favourite books of 2024—picked by The Art Newspaper’s books team

Our literary editors share what has delighted them this year, from art-themed novels to edifying histories

Magnum’s opus of America: a new photography compendium reveals the many sides of the US

The publication’s co-editor Peter van Agtmael chooses seven key images from legendary agency’s new book

An expert’s guide to the Venetian Renaissance: five must-read books on the period

All you ever wanted to know about the subject, from the story of Carpaccio and Bellini's narrative painting to a Venice guide for little explorers—selected by the curators Annette Hojer and Christine Follmann

Books

Beetlejuice and beyond: the origins of Tim Burton’s world of gothic romance and its enduring influence

Catalogue accompanying exhibition at London’s Design Museum explores the US film-maker’s unique aesthetic

Two books explore Piet Mondrian's journey into abstraction—and his posthumous influence on 1960s fashion

How, two decades after his death, did Mondrian become a brand icon, and make a lasting contribution to the “youthquake”?

This newly translated volume compiles the photographic traces of a libidinous love affair

Author Annie Ernaux and journalist Marc Marie’s collaborative memoir documents a passionate yet haunted relationship

The arts should be recognised as a key part of what it means to be human, argues a new publication

An urgent treatise on the decommodification of culture by the professor of cultural economy Justin O’Connor

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.

What links Van Gogh, Trump, a golden toilet and Cattelan's $6.2m banana?

This unlikely grouping is part of an astonishing story involving New York’s Guggenheim Museum

A brush with... podcast

A podcast that asks artists the questions you've always wanted to

A brush with… Michael Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset — podcast

In the first episode of A brush with featuring an artist duo, Elmgreen and Dragset discuss their influences, and the cultural experiences that have shaped their lives and work

Hosted by and Ben Luke. Produced by David Clack
Sponsored byBloomberg Connects

Drawing back the curtain—X-rated art makes waves in Miami

David Nolan Gallery showed a number of erotic works on paper in a secluded room at Art Basel Miami Beach

Stellar work: Mercury crater named after artist Ruth Asawa

The Japanese-American sculptor is the 23rd woman to be given the honour—compared with 100 men

Elon Musk serves up disconcerting AI art

The controversial billionaire failed to spot a contemporary car in Caillebotte picture altered using artificial intelligence by Luma

Go big or go to the London gallery offering small beautiful art

Flowers Gallery has opened its annual exhibition of little pieces

Listen up, Elon: Clifton Suspension Bridge Museum makes dramatic exit from X

Bristol institution makes waves after quitting social media platform

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.

AI to Z: an art & tech alphabet for 2024

The art, artists and awards that pushed boundaries this year

Paintboxed! Artists invited to work with 1980s digital art tool once championed by Keith Haring and Richard Hamilton

ArtMeta art fair and Tezos ecosystem are taking Quantel Paintbox—used by contemporary art giants four decades ago—on a global tour to introduce it to a new generation of creators

Vatican launches AI-generated version of St Peter’s Basilica

Co-developed by Microsoft, the project also identified conservation issues at the world-famous church

Technologyanalysis

How auction houses are embracing artificial intelligence

New services such as AI-enhanced translation are proving popular, even as human involvement remains crucial

From roving gallery to London’s Mayfair: Unit’s social media journey, 11 years on

Joe Kennedy and Jonny Burt didn’t have any of the traditional things needed to start a gallery—but they did have the power of Instagram