Arts news

• “America’s Greatest Opera Boss Has Died”

  03-06-2026 05:28 via artsjournal.com
  
  Norman Lebrecht’s obituary notice for Speight Jenkins, which ran today, is titled “America’s Greatest Opera Boss Has Died.” I couldn’t
  
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• Marjane Satrapi, ‘Persepolis’ Director, Dies at 56

  04-06-2026 20:23 via artnews.com
  
  Marjane Satrapi, the French-Iranian graphic novelist, artist and film director whose landmark animated feature Persepolis earned a Cannes Jury Prize and an Oscar nomination and made her one of the most distinctive voices in world cinema, has died. She was 56.“Marjane Satrapi died of sadness a little over a year after the death of Mattias Ripa, her husband and the love of her life,” members of her family said in a statement sent to AFP.Ripa, a Swedish producer, actor and scr
  
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• Museum Veteran Philippe Vergne Joins Miami’s Bass Museum as Artistic Director and Chief Curator

  04-06-2026 19:29 via artnews.com
  
  Longtime museum director and curator Philippe Vergne is assuming a newly created position at Miami’s Bass Museum of Art, joining the institution on October 1 as artistic director and chief curator. Since 2019 he has led Portugal’s Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art, in Porto.“Philippe Vergne brings a remarkable depth of curatorial experience and a global perspective to The Bass at a pivotal moment in Miami Beach’s growth as a dynamic and complex city,” said Silvia
  
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• John Lennon Drawings to be Animated, Pace Gallery Trims Artist Roster, and More: Morning Links for June 4, 2026

  04-06-2026 15:34 via artnews.com
  
  Good Morning!
  Pace Gallery is dropping some 50 artists from its roster and cutting about 50 staff.Marjane Satrapi, the Iranian-French artist and author of the graphic novel Persepolis, has died at 56.A new study says the Bayeux Tapestry can safely travel to London’s British Museum from Normandy.The Headlines SLOWING THE PACE. The mega Pace Gallery, with seven locations worldwide, is laying off some 50 staff and dropping about 50 artists, per last night’s New York Times
  
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• Artists & Mothers Announces 2026 Recipients of Childcare Grants

  04-06-2026 14:01 via artnews.com
  
  New York City nonprofit Artists & Mothers has named the 2026 recipients of its eponymous $25,000 grant for artists who identify as mothers. The landmark program provides funding to cover nine months of childcare and is open to emerging and mid-career artists raising a child under the age of three.From photography and sculpture to collage and bookmaking, this year’s awardees span a wide range of artistic practices, conceptual concerns, and styles. Mimi Ọnụọha centers h
  
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• Mega Gallery Pace is Dropping Some 50 Artists, 50 Staff in ‘Model Correction’

  04-06-2026 13:37 via artnews.com
  
  Pace Gallery, a mega gallery with seven locations worldwide, is laying off some 50 staff and dropping about 50 artists.In a statement to ARTnews Thursday, CEO Marc Glimcher said that the gallery will now focus its roster on 85 artists, after growing to 135 and will “continue to be a global gallery” with plans to “ground their programs in the character of the local art scene.”“Galleries need a model correction,” he said. “For Pace, this means returning to
  
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• Kulapat Yantrasast Named Artistic Director of Next Bukhara Biennial

  04-06-2026 13:00 via artnews.com
  
  Kulapat Yantrasast, the architect behind major museum projects for institutions including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Louvre, has been named artistic director of the 2027 Bukhara Biennial in Uzbekistan.The appointment comes less than a year after the debut edition of the biennial, which drew an estimated 1.8 million visitors and quickly became one of the most talked-about events on the international art calendar. Conceived and commissioned by Gayane Umerova and the
  
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• After Drawing Women Trapped in Labyrinths for Years, Kyung-Me Painted Herself Free

  04-06-2026 11:00 via artnews.com
  
  It’s rare for an artist to spend years honing a craft and perfecting a way of working only to one day pivot 180 degrees. Kyung-Me makes this look both easy and essential. After Kyung-Me first saw the 12th century illustrations for The Tale of Genji, she “became obsessed with drawing, almost overnight,” as she told me when I visited her studio in Ridgewood, Queens. First, she copied drawings from the work—considered the world’s first novel, and written by a woma
  
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• 5 Books on Steffani Jemison’s Shelf

  04-06-2026 11:00 via artnews.com
  
  In the sprawling, splashy “New Humans” exhibition inaugurating New York’s newly expanded New Museum (sound new enough for you?), a mechanical apparatus quietly whirrs. This tumbler, by the artist Steffani Jemison, is slowly but surely agitating and refining dredged debris: glass, coins, stone.Having studied comparative literature as an undergraduate, Jemison often moves between writing and art in thoughtful if seemingly unlikely ways, as in her novella A Rock, A River, A Street
  
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• New Freeman’s CEO, Rana Begum Joins Lehmann Maupin, and More: Industry Moves for June 3, 2026

  03-06-2026 22:10 via artnews.com
  
  Editor’s Note: This story originally appeared in On Balance, the ARTnews newsletter about the art market and beyond. Sign up here to receive it every Wednesday.Happy Wednesday! Here’s a round-up of who’s moving and shaking in the art trade this week.Makeda Best Named Chief Curator of Photography at MoMA: The curator comes from the Oakland Museum of California, where she served as deputy director. Best will fill a role that has been vacant at MoMA f
  
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• We Asked Artists, Dealers, Lawyers, and Advisers What Gallery Representation Means Today—And It’s Surprisingly Complicated

  03-06-2026 22:03 via artnews.com
  
  Editor’s Note: This story originally appeared in On Balance, the ARTnews newsletter about the art market and beyond. Sign up here to receive it every Wednesday.Every young artist wants gallery representation. The details vary. Maybe it’s Gagosian. Maybe it’s Hauser & Wirth. Maybe it’s a scrappy gallery on Henry Street with a leaky roof and an owner who still installs every show themselves. The dream remains remarkably consistent: Someone
  
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• National Labor Relations Board Rules Buffalo AKG Art Museum Violated Federal Law With Layoff

  03-06-2026 21:55 via artnews.com
  The National Labor Relations Board has determined that the Buffalo AKG Art Museum violated federal labor law and retaliated against union workers when it laid off 13 employees last year. The layoffs and subsequent restructuring were widely condemned by the union, which described them as an effort to eliminate union positions.In a win for Buffalo AKG Workers United, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) on May 28 ordered the museum to reinstate the 13 union workers laid off from its Visitor E
  
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• Colorado Governor Signs Artist Corporation Bill into State Law

  03-06-2026 21:14 via artnews.com
  
  On June 2, Colorado governor Jared Polis signed Senate Bill 133, a bill that creates a new type of limited liability company (LLC) called an Artist Company, or A-Corp, report the Art Newspaper and the Colorado Sun. The new business structure is designed to help artists in the state—defined in the bill as “individuals that create works of authorship or artistic expression comprising written, oral, visual, graphic, literary, musical, audiovisual, digital, or performing art in any mediu
  
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• Follower of Hieronymus Bosch Painting Sells for Over 10 Times High Estimate in Strong Week for Old Masters in New York

  03-06-2026 20:26 via artnews.com
  
  A small painting of hell by a follower of Hieronymus Bosch led a string of surprise results during this week’s Old Masters sales in New York, selling for $537,600 at Sotheby’s against an estimate of $30,000 to $50,000. (All prices include buyer’s premium unless otherwise noted.)The result came as Christie’s Old Masters and 19th Century Paintings sale brought in nearly $7 million with a sell-though rate of 89 percent, while the similarly titled sale at Sotheby’s sale
  
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• How Gedi Sibony Makes a Show, By Transforming Street Finds Into Magical ‘Frozen Moments’

  03-06-2026 19:48 via artnews.com
  
  The latest show by Gedi Sibony continues the artist’s practice of making enchanting assemblage sculptures out of the most minimal means, and of making paintings that rely on such restrained gestures that they’re barely there. The press release for “The Invisible Point,” his eighth show at New York’s Greene Naftali since 2008, consists of just four sentences, explaining that his process is “powered by an intuitive momentum,” that the show includes “
  
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• Christo-Inspired Public Artwork in Paris By French Artist JR Delayed Because of Storm

  03-06-2026 19:12 via artnews.com
  
  The opening of a public artwork by French artist JR inspired by Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s 1985 intervention The Pont Neuf Wrapped has reportedly been delayed after a storm damaged the installation overtop the River Seine in Paris.As reported by Euronews, the opening planned for this weekend has been postponed to an unspecified date after severe winds mangled part of the artwork on the oldest bridge in the French capital. A statement from Atelier JR, the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Foundati
  
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• Venice Biennale Artists Threaten Legal Action Against Organizers For Disregarding Requests to Be Withdrawn from ‘Visitors’ Lions’ Awards

  03-06-2026 18:23 via artnews.com
  
  More than 100 artists are threatening legal action against the Venice Biennale Foundation for ignoring their demands that the foundation withdraw their names from consideration for the “Visitors’ Lion” awards at the current edition over the inclusion of national pavilions by Israel and Russia. The threat is included in a new announcement published on e-flux.A May 20 letter addressed to the foundation and its president, Pietrangelo Buttafuoco, is published in the announcement. I
  
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• Makeda Best to Lead MoMA Photography Department, New Lead in Louvre Heist, and More: Morning Links for June 3, 2026

  03-06-2026 16:13 via artnews.com
  
  The Headlines BRINGING OUT THE BEST. The Museum of Modern Art in New York finally has a new chief curator of photography: Makeda Best, who has served as deputy director at the Oakland Museum of California since 2023, reports the New York Times. The plum position “has influenced, implicitly or explicitly, so much of how we understand the medium,” said Best, who starts in September. It has also been vacant for almost four years. “I’m
  
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• New York State Adds $150 Million To Theater Production Tax Credit — But Is It Going To Shows That Really Need It?

  03-06-2026 15:36 via news.bloomberglaw.com
  
  “The program … faces criticism from budget watchdog groups, state lawmakers, and even theatrical insiders who say the tax credits don’t support shows most in need of financial support. Many that have received state aid had the backing of major production companies,” including Disney. – Bloomberg Law News
  
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• Trump Administration Wants To Judge Higher Ed Institutions On Graduates’ Earnings, Posing Dangers For Arts Schools

  03-06-2026 15:04 via artnews.com
  
  “The Department of Education has proposed a new ‘accountability’ system that would judge higher-education programs largely by graduates’ earnings, … a test that music, visual arts, and filmmaking programs would, by their nature, be likely to fail.” Programs whose graduates don’t meet earnings benchmarks could become ineligible for federal student loans. – ARTnews
  
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• Minnesota Star Tribune To Cut 65 Jobs, Explore Going Fully Nonprofit

  03-06-2026 14:32 via startribune.com
  “The Star Tribune employs 495 people and cuts will be made across every department. The newsroom has just under 200 journalists and will decline to 175 while remaining one of the largest between the coasts. Just last year, 125 employees were laid off when the company … closed its … printing plant.” – The Minnesota Star Tribune
  
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• Speight Jenkins, Director Who Transformed Seattle Opera, Has Died At 89

  03-06-2026 14:00 via artsjournal.com
  Over his 31 years as general manager, he made the company into one of the most respected in the country and, said some observers, the Wagner capital of the U.S. It’s easy to forget that he began his career as a New York music critic and hosted Met Opera telecasts. – MyNorthwest.com
  
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• How Olga Fröbe-Kapteyn—a Painter, Collector, and Collaborator of Carl Jung—Mined the Archive and Her Subconscious

  03-06-2026 11:00 via artnews.com
  
  “The deepest things in human life … can only be expressed in images,” wrote Olga Fröbe-Kapteyn. And yet, though obsessed with images, she never called herself an “artist,” even as she painted and drew. Fundamentally, she was a collector: of people, of images, of ideas, always animated by her interest in symbols and archetypes. Carl Jung, her close friend and collaborator, fueled this long, epic inquiry. Still, she remains profoundly mysterious and contradictor
  
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• The Movie Star Who Doesn’t Exist

  03-06-2026 03:02 via artsjournal.com
  Good Morning,A top celebrity-profile writer set out to interview Tilly Norwood and ran into a problem: she isn’t a person (The New York Times). The AI “actress” has no inner life to report, which didn’t stop anyone from trying.
  Bookstores are supposed to be dying, but that’s old conventional wisdom. The count is actually growing, and briskly (AP). Publishing is supposed to be glamorous; but here’s how the business really works (The Republic of Letters).
  Suppos
  
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• Higher-Ed Groups Decry Proposed Federal ‘Earnings Test’ That Could Decimate Arts Education

  02-06-2026 23:05 via artnews.com
  
  The Department of Education has proposed a new “accountability” system that would judge higher-education programs largely by graduates’ earnings, prompting concern from liberal arts institutions and education advocates who argue that this is a test that music, visual arts, and filmmaking programs would, by their nature, be likely to fail.The proposed guidelines, known as the Student Tuition and Transparency System (STATS) and Earnings Accountability rule, are intended to provid
  
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• Art Basel Reveals More Participating Galleries and the Artists Selected for its ‘Exclusive’ Initiative, Which Withholds Artworks from Email Previews

  02-06-2026 22:26 via artnews.com
  
  The criticisms of art fairs (and the art market they are a defining part of) are many. One of them is that though we might think of these shows as real-time events, where deals are made and multimillion-dollar artworks are sold to whoever gets to the gallery’s booth first, in reality some of the biggest-ticket sales are are quietly engineered ahead of time: the galleries email PDF previews to high-powered advisors and deep-pocketed collectors in the weeks leading up to opening day, such th
  
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• Kara Walker Fronts Loewe’s 180th Anniversary Campaign Nodding to Its Art-Filled Past

  02-06-2026 22:17 via artnews.com
  
  Loewe unveiled a new campaign on Monday celebrating the fashion brand’s 180th anniversary, complete with a capsule collection, an anniversary magazine, and an animated film, much of which nods to the house’s long-standing connections to the art world.Under former creative director Jonathan Anderson, the fashion brand played up that connection through numerous high-profile collaborations with artists ranging from Lynda Benglis to Richard Hawkins. Many of Anderson’s collections w
  
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• A New Partnership Helps Stand-Up Comics In Chicago To Finally Get Steady Health Insurance

  02-06-2026 21:02 via wbez.org
  
  The Health Alliance for Chicago Comedians is building a pilot program to help 10 comics pay insurance premiums through the Affordable Care Act’s next open enrollment period. Stand-up comedians, especially early in their careers, often take gigs and side jobs which offer no insurance. – WBEZ (Chicago)
  
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• Raymonde Arcier, Feminist Artist Who Worked With Fabric in France, Dies at 86

  02-06-2026 20:58 via artnews.com
  
  Raymonde Arcier, who brought attention to women’s work by way of an art practice based in fabric and textiles of different kinds, died in May at the age of 86. Her death was acknowledged by sources including curators and the magazine Textile/Art.Arcier was born in 1939 in Bellac, France, and made her way as an office worker and self-taught artist who “from 1970 on, produced her most striking works, crocheting wool and cotton, and knitting metal—with each piece demanding up to a
  
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• Israeli Airstrikes Reportedly Hit 900-Year-Old Crusader Castle in Lebanon

  02-06-2026 20:57 via artnews.com
  
  Beaufort Castle, a 900-year-old Crusader fortress in Lebanon, was reportedly struck directly by Israeli airstrikes on May 27, according to footage posted on social media and local reports. The news follows intense Israeli strikes on the ancient city of Tyre, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in southern Lebanon that is home to some of the region’s most significant Phoenician and Roman ruins, as well as a large civilian population.As reported by the Associated Press, the Israeli military release
  
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