Museums & Heritage

Open-air museum that recreates 1950s Britain wins Art Fund Museum of the Year prize

Beamish, The Living Museum of the North was commended for "remarkable attention and passion of its staff"

Frankenthaler Foundation awards grants totalling $3.4m for new climate initiatives

In addition to revealing the 74 recipients of new Frankenthaler Climate Initiative grants, the foundation announced it will extend the initiative another five years

Vancouver Art Gallery to lay off around 30 employees

The layoffs come amid a $23.4m deficit in the last fiscal year and represent around 20% of unionised employees

Reputed Donatello bust taken into hiding by Slovak government

The location of the work—whose authenticity remains unconfirmed—is “subject to strict secrecy”, according to the ministry of culture

Glasgow art centre shuts after police called over planned pro-Palestinian take-over

Art Workers for Palestine Scotland had arrived to host an unofficial week-long programme of events before officers arrived and, the group claim, “violently escalated”

Why the new EU law aimed at stopping antiquities trafficking may hamper museum loans

While loans between museums are exempt from the additional requirements for proof of legal export from the country of origin and provenance documentation, those from private collectors will be affected

Tate launches US-style endowment fund, with aim of raising £150m by 2030

The new fund, announced at a star-studded gala yesterday, has raised £43m so far

Getty launches international art and sustainability fellowship

The new programme, in partnership with 15 institutions on six continents, will support both preservation and the creation of new work in response to the challenges presented by climate change

Historic condom exhibit at Rijksmuseum sparks protest

Christian campaigners have launched a petition against the display of a 19th-century prophylactic depicting a semi-naked nun

Art Gallery of Ontario acquires more than 200 Peter Hujar photographs

The acquisition comes as the museum’s photography department prepares to celebrate its 25th anniversary

Cleveland Museum of Art acquires rare Giambologna marble sculpture

It is one of only two marble works by the revered Mannerist sculptor in a US museum

Lacma will plant towering, flowering Jeff Koons sculpture outside new building

The artist’s 37ft-tall “Split-Rocker” was donated to the museum by collectors Lynda and Stewart Resnick

Uffizi director to ‘limit’ selfies after posing visitor damages 18th-century painting

A man attempting to capture a picture of himself at the Florence gallery tripped and left a hole in a work by Anton Domenico Gabbiani

Chile’s immigrant legacy to be brought to life by new museum

Destino Valparaíso, an ambitious new museum funded by a local businessman and housed in a historic former school, seeks to tell the stories of the many diverse groups who helped shape the scenic coastal city

Italy’s leading archaeological museum uses young creatives’ press shots without payment

National Archaeological Museum of Naples accused of “marketing with unpaid photos”

Climate protester splashes pink paint on Picasso work at Montreal Museum of Fine Arts

The activist from Last Generation Canada said “more resources have been put in place to secure and protect this artwork than to protect living, breathing people”

Archaeologists confirm that limestone 'Venus of Kołobrzeg' found by a farmer in Poland is 6,000 years old

The female figurine is thought to be a depiction of the god of fertility, and will be displayed at the Polish Arms Museum

Climate change is destroying Maine’s historic lighthouses

These unique monuments to a coastal way of life, some of them dating to the US’s colonial period, appear on the 2025 World Monuments Watch list alongside historic sites in countries experiencing war and drought

Iran closes museums and moves artefacts to secure storage

According to local news reports, emergency protocols have been enacted to safeguard cultural objects and heritage sites amid conflict with Israel

Israeli attacks on Palestinian heritage amount to war crimes, UN report finds

The independent UN investigative body released the findings last week

Orange County Museum of Art in talks to merge with University of California, Irvine

Less than three years after opening a $94m new building, the museum is “exploring a transformative agreement” with the nearby university

National Gallery of Canada receives gift of 61 works valued at $16.8m

The donation, from the Vancouver-based collector and businessman Bob Rennie, is the largest in the gallery's history

Grand Egyptian Museum opening delayed again due to 'current regional developments'

The long-awaited museum has been postponed yet again amid the escalating conflict between Israel and Iran

New venue for video, sound and other durational art forms coming to Manhattan

Helmed by the philanthropist Robert Rosenkranz and the founding director of Mass Moca, Joe Thompson, Canyon will open on the Lower East Side in 2026

Kim Sajet, director of US National Portrait Gallery whom Trump tried to fire, resigns

Sajet said it was “not an easy decision” but “the best way to serve the institution I hold so deeply in my heart”

Security guards at three major London museums secure pay rise after months-long dispute

Guards at the Natural History, Science and Victoria & Albert Museums—all of whom are employed by an external contractor—will now earn a base salary in line with the London Living Wage

Newly opened Photography Museum of Seoul plans to become a ‘cultural anchor’ for the region

The new space in Dobong-gu district has been billed as country's first public museum dedicated to photography

Peruvian government reverses decision to shrink Nazca Lines site by nearly half

After outcry from civil servants and environmentalists, the Ministry of Culture has walked back a decision that might have left the famed geoglyphs more vulnerable to mining

Donald Judd campus in Marfa, Texas added to US's National Register of Historic Places

The Minimalist bought and modified more than a dozen buildings in Texas in the 1970s, using them as studios and galleries for his sculptures and transforming a small city into the art-world pilgrimage site it is today