Inspiration

The Feminist Art History Conference was established in 2010 to celebrate and build on the feminist art-historical scholarship and pedagogy of Norma

Symbolism perhaps suffers from middle-child syndrome. From the storied vanguardism of its older sibling, Impressionism, to the legendary antics of its younger ones, Fauvism and Cubism, it can be easy to forget the febrile movement that reared its head from the late 1880s into the early 1900s. The firstborn and the babies share a family resemblance: The eldest child—who pushed the limits of perception and paint—sees his work, a few decades later, taken to new heights in the hands of the youngest. That, at least, is the story of modernism—a tale in which Symbolism, with its embarrassing fixation on figuration, sometimes schlocky tropes, and an arsenal of abstruse references, has no place. If Symbolism is cursed first with forgettability, it is afflicted next with ill-definition. And if the former is a quirk of art historiography, the latter can be laid squarely at the feet of its hand-waving theorists, who declaimed it with gusto if not always lucidity. Like many middle children, Symbolism was more concerned with defining itself against its predecessor than in actually defining itself. Emerging from a moment when modern life had come to feel especially incoherent, Symbolism made a cr

Earlier this month, during Frieze Week, Tom Sachs was dishing out espressos and 86-proof mezcal from behind a bar at Thaddaeus Ropac’s London outpost on Dover Street. The American artist was launching his new show, “A Good Shelf” (on view through December 20), featuring 30 NASA-emblazoned ceramics inspired by Japanese tea bowls (chawans), ritual, bricolage, and space travel. Sachs had earned a stiff drink after a trying couple of years: in 2023, former studio staff accused the artist of creating a “toxic” workplace environment, including allegations of bullying and inadequate pay. In the aftermath, Nike paused its sneaker partnership with Sachs—only to restart it in September 2024. Now, the artist is back in the spotlight, working as intensely as ever, with several international projects in the pipeline. Earlier this year he made work for another exhibition at Ropac’s Seoul outpost that scrutinized Pablo Picasso.Only a handful of living artists operate on Sachs’s scale, commanding a studio team that realizes ambitious, large-scale visions. Sachs, 59, whose auction record was set at just over $300,000 for his Tiffany Value Meal (1998) at Christie’s New York in 2022, is one of them.

This all provided the fodder for some of his recent paintings, which he produces by suspending his canvas just 13 inches above his body—the exact height of the crawlspace of his LA home. Working alone in his studio, without the help of any assistants, Hiro lies supine and then proceeds to paint astonishing abstractions. Filled with forms variously resembling green plants, silvery fish gills, and necrotic veins, these paintings are part of Hiro’s ongoing quest to make sense of what goes on inside himself. “My body is always in contact with the surface,” he said. Hiro’s latest creations—on view at Bortolami gallery in New York through November 1—are not abstract paintings in the conventional sense. As with many of his recent works, the canvases are not stretched or mounted on an easel during their production. Instead, he often slices holes through his canvases and puts his body through these apertures, essentially allowing him to be in his paintings as he is making them. Most of the works in this show also have ropes attached; Hiro used them to wrap the canvas around himself, affording him the ability to paint not just the areas in front of himself, but also in [...]

Paris Internationale and Asia Now—both celebrating their 10th anniversaries—anchor the week with distinct visions: one focused on human-scale independence, the other on plural, borderless Asias. Newcomers 7 rue Froissart and Upstairs Art Fair bring a sense of community and irreverence to the Paris art scene, while Detroit Salon, a citywide contemporary art show launching in Detroit in 2028, embarks on a three-year global roadshow with its first stop in Paris. Boundary-pushing and defiantly independent, these satellites are where the next chapter of contemporary art is being written. If Art Basel is the establishment, Paris Internationale is its counterpoint. Founded in 2015 by gallerists Ciaccia Levi, Crèvecœur, and Gregor Staiger who wanted “to redefine what an art fair could be,” as director Silvia Ammon explained to ARTnews, the fair is now a cornerstone of Paris Art Week. This year’s 11th edition unites 59 galleries and seven non-profit spaces from 19 countries—a reduction of nine exhibitors from 2024—to “ensure breathing room for each project and allow a more fluid and reflective visitor experience,” Ammon said. It also marks a move to the Rond-Point des Champs-Élysées—just st

“I will do everything in my power to help advance this exceptional show and to remain a tireless advocate for the city of Paris, our exhibitors, partners and Art Basel’s global mission,” Crippa said in a statement. “Working alongside gallerists, artists, writers, institutional representatives, collectors and creatives for the last 15 years has only ever strengthened my commitment to the worlds of art and culture.” Art Basel Paris’s last director, Clément Delépine, left the fair in September to join Lafayette Anticipations, a Paris art space known for its large-scale commissions by contemporary artists. He begins there on November 17.

On Sunday, at around 9:30 a.m., robbers broke into the Parisian museum‘s Apollo Gallery using a cherry picker and an angle grinder to steal nine pieces of jewelry worth an estimated $102 million in less than eight minutes. Could the heist have been prevented? ARTnews contacted experts to find out. Most agreed that the theft could have happened anywhere. James Ratcliffe, director of recoveries and general counsel at the Art Loss Register, called the heist “a case of working out where there is an opportunity and taking advantage of it. I would be surprised if they hadn’t thought about other museums. We know that other French museums have been targeted.” Many museums do have security systems in place to prevent similar heists, but they aren’t always foolproof. Unfortunately, in the case of the Louvre, security concerns went unchecked until it was too late. In June, the Louvre was forced to close when gallery attendants, ticket agents, and security officers walked out in protest of what they described as inadequate staffing. Security concerns, Louvre staff alleged, had resulted in “untenable” working conditions. “With museums, where they fall down is on the trainings and on doing drill

Before the shocking theft of the French Crown Jewels from the Louvre on October 19, most had all but forgotten the ruling women who once wore them during their 19th-century reigns. Even the Louvre’s own website offers little context—under “Object Location,” the page for each piece now reads the stinging phrase: “Not exhibited.” But the individual histories of the women who once owned these jeweled parures reveal much about France’s tumultuous political past—and bring those royal names to life. Two of the stolen pieces once belonged to Empress Eugénie: her pearl-and-diamond tiara and a bow-shaped brooch. Both were sold at that fateful 1887 auction and later repurchased for the Louvre more than a century later with the help of the Société des Amis du Louvre, the museum’s association of private donors. Eugénie’s tiara, adorned with 212 pearls and 1,998 diamonds arranged in 992 roses, was acquired in 1992 from Sotheby’s for a reported $1 million. The brooch was acquired in 2008 for nearly $8 million. Other pieces, acquired by the museum in 1985, had never been sold by the French state. They remained with the families of their original owners, who were allowed to keep them. All of Europ

British artist Rob Munday has filed a lawsuit against Chris Levine, claiming he is the co-creator of two of the most recognizable portraits of Queen Elizabeth II—Equanimity and Lightness of Being—which Levine has for years presented as solely his own work. According to court documents reviewed by the Guardian, Munday claims that Levine relied on his technical and artistic expertise to realize the portraits. “I’ve been going through this cycle for 20 years,” Munday, who began working in holography in the early 1980s, told the Guardian. “It felt like this had to be fought now or never.” Levine, who shares copyright in the works, has not yet filed a defense. In a statement, he rejected Munday’s claims, describing him as “a technical subcontractor” rather than an artistic partner. “Mr. Munday does not hold any copyright in Equanimity or Lightness of Being,” Levine said. “Any claim on my rights will be fiercely defended. This is my art.” The lawsuit follows another dispute last year between Levine and the Jersey Heritage Trust, which accused him of selling unlicensed copies of the portraits potentially worth millions. That case was settled in September with a joint statement crediting L

The history of 20th-century music and art holds out few paragons more important than Kraftwerk, the electronic pop group founded in Germany in the 1970s by Florian Schneider and Ralf Hütter. Creative repurposing of rigid technologies, forging new sounds that would insinuate themselves into countless forms of music, positing useful ways of thinking about human/non-human divides—all of these were part of the total work of art that was Kraftwerk, which started as a radical postwar German enterprise and grew into an international pop-culture phenomenon. While Kraftwerk continues to tour and play innovatory multimedia shows under Hütter’s direction, Schneider died in 2020 at the age of 73. Now, some of his various tools of art are being put up for auction.Related ArticlesJapan's Okada Museum Forced to Sell Works to Settle Founder's $50 M. Legal BillNaotaka Hiro Pushes His Body to Its Limits Using Abstract Painting While Kraftwerk’s influence in music is legion, the group has garnered attention in the art world as well—including a memorable retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art curated by Klaus Biesenbach in 2012 that involved eight nights of concerts (one for each of the group’s mai

By Francesca Aton Associate Digital Editor, ARTnews and Art in America The tomb of ancient Egyptian King Tutankhamen, located in the Valley of the Kings, has experienced instability and damage from flash flooding and major faults that has worsened over time. One expert outlined methods for reinforcing the underground tomb using innovative technology. In a study, published earlier this year in the journal Nature, Sayed Hemeda, a researcher in the architectural conservation department at Cairo University, used geotechnical modeling and PLAXIS 3D software to calculate stresses and deformation patterns in the tomb. This tomb, which includes four main chambers with an entrance ramp and stairs, sits in a low-lying position dug into the valley’s floor. This allowed for its entrance to be hidden by debris amid flooding and tomb construction, but has also made it more vulnerable to geostatic loading from overhead rocks and rock bursts. A prominent fault line, along which earthquakes can reach a magnitude 6 on the Richter scale, also runs through the tomb. Water damage from recent flash floods due to climate change has caused further damage to the tomb’s support pillars and walls, along with

The 27 museum employees represented by Wex Workers United were not presented with the letter, as the union has its own protocol for bringing grievances to museum leadership. “However, we support our Wexner Center colleagues in working to create a healthy, equitable, and sustainable workplace,” a union representative told Matter News.  Nearly one year to the date the letter was sent, the Columbus Dispatch published a report in which Wexner staff members detailed a “a culture of dysfunction perpetuated by the museum’s executive director” that forced the departure of more than two dozen employees. In an investigation published one month later by Hyperallergic, several former and current staff members, who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retribution, accused Verna of perpetuating workplace dysfunction, financial mismanagement, hostility towards the union, and impulsive decision-making. Verna was appointed to her position in November 2022. In their letter, Wexner Center staff echoed several of these claims and cited new examples of alleged fiscal irresponsibility, such as the university issuing the center a “red card” for financial turmoil and the launch of a major ca

Almeida & Dale, one of Brazil’s most prominent galleries, was raided on Wednesday by police in connection to the case of three missing paintings by modernist Alfredo Volpi.  The São Paulo State Department of Criminal Investigations (Deic) arrived at the gallery’s branch in the Jardins neighborhood of São Paulo with a search warrant regarding the painting by Volpi, valued at R$6.4 million (about $1.2 million), which have been the focus of a civil dispute. The artist’s estate has accused gallery cofounder Carlos Dale of brokering the unauthorized sale in 2006 of Bandeirinhas Estruturadas com Mastro no. 1996, Cinetico/Mosaicos, and Fachadas- no 1999. Volpi, a Brazilian modernist celebrated for his vibrant abstract paintings, died in 1988. The artist’s estate reported the three works as stolen in 2008. The gallery claimed no wrongdoing on its part in a statement posted to Instagram yesterday: “Nearly twenty years ago, the gallery acted as an intermediary in the sale of three works by Vlopi, in legitimate and fully documented transactions that took place prior to any judicial inquiry. These transactions occurred in 2006, well before the theft report filed by the artist’s family.” Accord

Japan’s Okada Museum of Art is selling works from its collection because its founder, Kazuo Okada, needs to settle a $50 million legal bill that stems from his long-running feud with casino magnate Steve Wynn. Okada, an 83-year-old billionaire, is the former chairman of Tokyo-based Universal Entertainment Corp.Sotheby’s Hong Kong has landed the 125 works, which are set to hit the auction block on November 22. The collection includes Katsushika Hokusai’s iconic The Great Wave Off the Coast of Kanagawa (1830–32), a rare Qianlong “Eight Treasures” vase, and a pair of 16th-century six-panel screens by Kano Motonobu from the Muromachi period. Several works are expected to fetch several million dollars.Decades ago, Wynn and Okada became friends and founded the Las Vegas-based hotel-casino operator Wynn Resorts together in 2002. However, relations soured a few years later when they accused one another of questionable payments to public officials in Asia. In 2012, Okada was ousted as Wynn Resorts’ vice-chairman, and the company redeemed Universal Entertainment Corp’s 20 percent stake in the business at a discount. The latter disputed the redemption amount in court, and Okada eventually pre

Multiple dealers confirmed receipt of the email, and while it’s unclear when exactly the policy began, one New York gallerist said the practice has been in place since Art Basel Miami Beach in 2021. Vincenzo de Bellis, the fair’s chief artistic officer and global director, confirmed that such a program was in place. The discounts are a rare moment of financial mercy in a fair circuit that’s showing signs of strain. A report published earlier this year by First Thursday, a London-based art-sales intelligence firm found that 46 percent of galleries surveyed said they spend about $40,000 to attend a single fair, with nearly one in five shelling out between $66,000 and $133,000. Unsurprisingly, more than 80 percent cited participation costs as their biggest headache. “The model feels unsustainable at present,” one gallerist said. Global art sales fell 12 percent last year to $57.5 billion, according to April’s Art Basel and UBS Global Art Market Report, marking the second straight year of contraction and the slowest pace of growth since the pandemic. Amid it all, fairs remain essential but costly for dealers, who must now battle higher shipping costs, slower buying, and newly reimposed

It’s not every day that one of the world’s most well-attended museums gets robbed, but that’s exactly what happened on Sunday, when thieves broke into the Louvre during broad daylight and ran off with an array of bejeweled objects worn by French royals of years past. Politicians have denounced the museum, and its director has faced calls to resign. In the process, a range of questions have arisen: How did the Louvre not detect the robbery? How did it happen in less than 10 minutes? How much are those jewels worth, anyway? Below, here’s your guide to the Louvre heist, with updates to come as news emerges from Paris, where the robbery has become the unexpected star of a week that also includes the opening of Art Basel Paris and the reopening of the Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain. The theft was a bold one, given that it took place in broad daylight and while other visitors were in the museum. The robbers smashed cases, setting off alarms as they did so, and ran off with their spoils. According to French investigators, as they absconded, the thieves accidentally dropped one of their stolen items: a crown belonging to Empress Eugénie. [...]