Politics

Agnes Gund’s Art for Justice Fund awards $22m in grants to activist groups and social programmes

As well as backing arts-focused initiatives, the money will help support organisations working to change government policy

Swiss journalists reporting on opening of Louvre Abu Dhabi detained for two days

The pair were blindfolded then interrogated for up to 10 hours by authorities over their coverage of migrant workers

Letter from Yemen: artist speaks out about his country’s 'forgotten war'

Ahmed Jahaf describes what it is like to live through catastrophic conflict

Podcastsfeature

Abu Dhabi Focus podcast, episode two: How Saudi artists are driving political change

As Abu Dhabi Art fair opens, we speak to the Saudi artists Manal Al Dowayan and Ahmed Mater. Plus: Iraq's Dia Azzawi on creating the Arab world's Guernica

Russia and Israel sign historic deal to share digitised Gunzburg Collection

Ownership of vast library of Hebrew manuscripts and books has long been contested

Public artcomment

‘The newly empty plinths are all potential Fourth Plinths’

The artist Hew Locke says a creative response to memorials dedicated to slave owners and empire builders can reveal hidden histories

Activists deface American Museum of Natural History’s Theodore Roosevelt monument

The group says it splashed red paint on the statue as “an act of applied art criticism”

Erdogan responds to detention of leading cultural activist Osman Kavala

Chairman of the Anadolu Kültür centre, who is outspoken critic of Turkish president, was detained at Istanbul airport

Artists in Qatar take stand against blockade with super-sized graffiti

Qatar Museums has called for more anti-embargo art on “bridges, tunnels and walls” across the country

Brazilian arts group calls out censorship by 'arrogant fundamentalists' in open letter

More than 1,000 artists, curators and professionals have signed the protest document published by the pro-democracy collective Pela Democracia

Imperial War Museum explores artists’ responses to war and terror after 9/11

Show of more than 40 artists includes Jenny Holzer, Grayson Perry and Gerhard Richter

Ai Weiwei stopped from boarding flight from New York to São Paulo

Chinese artist was en route to premiere of his documentary Human Flow when staff wrongly claimed his visa was invalid

LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner’s anti-Trump work adopted in Nantes

The protest work He Will Not Divide US has been moved four times after attacks by far-right extremists and vandals in the US and UK

Performance artist Pyotr Pavlensky sets fire to a bank in Paris

Russian artist famous for nailing scrotum to Moscow’s Red Square invokes the “great French Revolution”

Ai Weiwei calls out Trump’s divisiveness and ‘super rich people’ at Cooper Union talk

The artist discussed the impetus behind his New York City-wide public art project Good Fences Makes Good Neighbors

Audrey Azoulay, former French culture minister, to be Unesco’s next director-general

In a surprise election, the dark-horse candidate won the vote of the culture agency’s executive board

US to pull out of Unesco by 2018

The State Department says the decision was based on concerns over funding and anti-Israel bias in the cultural organisation

Alfredo Jaar condemns 'brutal' CIA torture chambers

Artist unveils his “black site” installation in Yorkshire as Guardian article reveals the suffering of prisoners shackled in dungeons in Afghanistan and Thailand

Show by late curator Martin Roth goes ahead in Qatar despite Gulf blockade

German design survey has opened alongside Deutsche Bank collection exhibition in beleaguered state

UK could completely ban ivory trade by 2018

The government has launched an immediate consultation period with the aim of protecting African elephants

Politicsfeature

The sculptures that unite America

As the debate rages about divisive Confederate monuments, five leading US scholars and curators pick the nation’s greatest memorial sculptures

Artists step up to the plate in statues debate

Colonial monuments and the US flag are subverted at Frieze London

Berlin’s Volksbühne returns to business as usual after occupation ends with a whimper

Police oversaw end of protest as new director Chris Dercon said he could not find “common path” with occupiers

Leading German arts figures rise-up against AfD

Joint letter urges parliament not to appoint far-right party member as chair of culture committee

Saudi artists speak out over new law giving women the right to drive

While some hail the reform as progressive, others question it as a PR stunt

JR's border baby

The French street artist teams up with a very very young collaborator—one-year-old David

Female artists get the word out on political action with Times Square project

Artists Carrie Mae Weems and Wangechi Mutu have created new works for the show