Museums & Heritage

London's Wellcome Collection returns 2,000 manuscripts to the Jain community

Unusually, the objects will not be transferred to their country of origin but to the UK Institute of Jainology for deposit at the University of Birmingham

New York’s Neue Galerie will merge with the Metropolitan Museum

The merger, to be completed in 2028, will bring the Ronald Lauder-founded Neue Galerie’s exceptional holdings of German and Austrian Modern art into the Met’s encyclopaedic collection

Parliamentary report calls for major changes at French museums in the wake of Louvre heist

The French parliamentary commission raises alarms over the “worrying condition” of their collections and proposes 40 recommendations amid rising threats to museums

'A work of conceptual art': Belmond launches new Art Deco-inspired train dining car

The film director Baz Luhrmann and his wife, production designer Catherine Martin, have designed the lavish interior

Greta Thunberg, Hugh Bonneville sign letter defending Southbank Centre chair Misan Harriman

Harriman has been the focus of several articles in conservative UK media outlets following posts he shared on social media

Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera are given a voice by New York's Metropolitan Opera

A new production, loosely based on the artists' lives, is accompanied by an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art—both visually imagined by the set and costume designer Jon Bausor

Getty’s Black Visual Arts Archives receives additional $1.8m in funding

The initiative funds institutions to process, digitise, preserve and activate archival collections related to Black art in the US

Underground Railroad stop in New York threatened by real-estate development

Construction next door to the Merchant’s House Museum in Manhattan could damage its historic secret hiding place

New Museum unveils Sarah Lucas's bawdy Bowery commission

The British artist's playful riff on a reclining nude will hold court at Bowery and Prince Street for two years

With new Costume Institute exhibition and galleries, the Met makes powerful statement about fashion's place in museums

Featuring nearly 400 objects ranging from gowns to ancient Greek armour and vases, “Costume Art” argues the dressed body is the only form of artistic expression that connects each of the museum’s collecting areas

19th-century European weapons found in cenote in Mexico

More than 150 guns and an iron cannon were recently documented at the Síis Já cenote in Yucatán

Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit reopens, with the local community front and centre

Showing off its upgrades after being closed for almost a year, the Midwestern kunsthalle hopes to inspire dialogue in its galleries using a method called Visual Thinking Strategies

Fire erupts at San Francisco's Vaillancourt Fountain during its dismantling

The controversial San Francisco landmark has met its end after a contentious fight to save it failed

Trump’s plan to paint Washington, DC's Eisenhower Building could cost more than $7.5m

In a National Capital Planning Commission meeting, one public commenter compared the project to the ending of ‘Death Becomes Her’

Dancereview

Brendan Fernandes animates a century-old Chicago auditorium through dance

The artist’s year-long residency at the Driehaus Museum centres on a recurring dance piece in the recently renovated Murphy Auditorium

Metropolitan Museum receives $23m to endow internship programme

The gift, from the foundation of Jennifer Rubio and Stewart Butterfield, is the latest example of donors offering targeted support that goes beyond funding institutional acquisitions

Rio’s Museum of Image and Sound finally opens after 16 years in development

Located just off of Copacabana Beach, the new museum celebrates the artists and musicians that helped make the city a global cultural destination

Museumsanalysis

No money, more problems: 85% of US museums in urgent need of building repairs

A survey by the federal Government Accountability Office shows that a majority of the nation’s museums lack the resources to maintain their buildings, putting collections at risk

Latino community organisation opens $33m arts centre in Boston

La Casa, the new home of Inquilinos Boricuas en Acción, will be a hub for civic engagement, education and artistic expression

Brandywine Conservancy and Museum picks architects for $100m expansion project

The Pennsylvania museum and land trust plans an ambitious overhaul of its campus, which will connect gallery buildings to the original studios of N.C. Wyeth and Andrew Wyeth

1,000-year-old archaeological site bulldozed during construction of Mexico-US border wall

A contractor for the Department of Homeland Security destroyed a 1,000-year-old etching in the sand of the Sonoran Desert

Artists made their mark at 2026 Met Gala

Amy Sherald, Tschabalala Self and Jordan Roth turned heads at the annual benefit for the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute

Pedro Reyes’s new Lacma commission sparks criticism in Mexico

Mexican cultural figures say the Olmec-inspired sculpture reprises a work that was previously rejected in Mexico City

Filippo Lippi painting—once the centrepiece of Florence's Palazzo Medici chapel—to undergo two-year restoration

The varnish layer of the work, which is held in Berlin's Gemäldegalerie, is degrading the tempera paint

Van Gogh Museum in funding mediation with Dutch government following threats of closure

Legal proceedings—begun by the museum to demand more public funding for a renovation—have now been postponed

Botticelli under UK export ban purchased by Klesch Collection

The Quattrocento Renaissance painting will be on loan to the Ashmolean Museum for three years

Museo de Arte Moderno de Bogotá's director departs amid accusations she harassed staff

Martha Ortiz is out only two months after the sudden dismissal of artistic director Eugenio Viola

US National Gallery of Art receives $116m gift to continue nationwide lending programme

The donation, from the foundation of the collector and NGA trustee Mitchell P. Rales, is the largest programming gift in the gallery’s history

Oldest astronomical observatory in the Americas discovered in Peru

The Caral civilisation used the structure thousands of years ago to track the sun, moon and stars to determine conditions for fishing and gathering shellfish