
Sweating the Future at Riga Art Week
From underfloor heating to private patronage, Riga Art Week revealed an art scene wrestling with the comforts and contradictions of post-Soviet capitalism
Help I Hate… My Friend
Charlotte Jansen advises on a uniquely intense friendship formed in the early stages of a creative career
DC’s National Gallery of Art Acquires the Life’s Work of Mitch Epstein
The National Mall institution has acquired 1,261 photographs from the ageing photographer's home, becoming the principal institutional archive for one of postwar America’s defining photographers
News

Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam Presents Major Yayoi Kusama Retrospective
The exhibition will cover more than seven decades of work by the Japanese artist, spanning childhood experimentation to her iconic Infinity Mirror Rooms

Lucia Pietroiusti and Filipa Ramos Announced as ‘Convenors’ for 2028 Bergen Assembly
The Bergen Assembly describes itself as an ‘exploratory platform for art’ structured around ‘convenings’ rather than a single curatorial concept and biennial format

Tess Jaray, British Artist Inspired by Architecture, 1937–2026
The artist produced geometric paintings of Renaissance architectural elements inspired by trips to Italy, and was the first female teacher at Slade School of Art

Ho Tzu Nyen Wins 2026 Fukuoka Grand Prize, Worth ¥5 million (£23,400)
The prize recognises individuals who have made substantial contributions to both Asian studies and Asian arts and culture

Wolfgang Tillmans Receives Roswitha Haftmann Prize 2026
The award is named for the late Swiss art dealer Roswitha Haftmann and is administered by Kunsthaus Zürich, where an award ceremony will take place on 17 September

CHANEL and Centre Pompidou Renew Partnership for Five Years
This collaboration will provide financial support to the museum as it undergoes extensive renovations, expected to be completed in 2030

Louvre Announces Architects for $1 Billion Transformation
The restoration and expansion will be led by New York’s Selldorf Architects and STUDIOS Architecture Paris, as announced in a press release earlier this week

Art Basel Qatar 2027 Appoints Wassan Al-Khudhairi as Artistic Director
The second edition of the fair will take place from 28 January to 30 January 2027 across Msheireb Downtown Doha

‘Do Architecture’: The 2027 Biennale Architettura in Venice
The title was announced yesterday by The President of La Biennale di Venezia, Pietrangelo Buttafuoco and the Curators of the 20th International Architecture Exhibition, Wang Shu and Lu Wenyu
Market

DC’s National Gallery of Art Acquires the Life’s Work of Mitch Epstein
The National Mall institution has acquired 1,261 photographs from the ageing photographer's home, becoming the principal institutional archive for one of postwar America’s defining photographers

Governance at Alabama Museum Reflects Transparency Issues in US Sector
Concerns surrounding the institution’s state of affairs reveal a wider issue in publicly funded cultural institutions

Messy Business: “You Need a Delusional Brain to Run a Gallery These Days”
New York Art Week delivered its strongest spring auction numbers in years. But for gallerists selling work at the $10,000 mark, the mood was rather more complicated
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Christie’s to Host Non-Selling Show of Works from Arts Council Collection to Prove Art is ‘Vital Source within Society’
The show, titled Close Encounters, will promote the Arts Council Collection’s mission to be seen widely throughout the UK and deepen institutional partnerships

Curator’s Fears Realised After Disputed Artworks Reappear on Market as Originals
Last month, two auction houses were criticised by Konstantin Akinsha for selling disputed works. He said the paintings would resurface as genuine; his prediction proved prophetic
Opinion

Help I Hate… My Friend
Charlotte Jansen advises on a uniquely intense friendship formed in the early stages of a creative career

Help! I Hate... My Artist
Agony Aunt Charlotte Jansen advises an independent gallerist defending a controversial artist in public while harbouring private doubts

Private Views: New York Fair Week, a “Feast During a Plague”
Burnt out gallerists, branding exercises and whispered Venice scandals ended with foraged soup and guided meditation at Storm King Art Center

Help! I Hate... My Pavilion
In her second Agony Aunt column, Charlotte Jansen soothes a Venice Biennale curator with an emotional hangover

Help! I Hate... Networking
The Art Journal's resident artworld Agony Aunt Charlotte Jansen answers your questions about access, gatekeeping and sticky social problems

Venice Biennale: In Minor Keys Needs Major Work
The 61st edition of the biennale reflects the terminal insularity of the contemporary art world

Does the Turner Prize Still Move the Market?
The 2026 shortlist is notably light on market power, signalling an art prize that no longer converts reputation into instant value. Is this welcome?
Features
Art Warsaw 2026: Poland’s Parallel Art Market
Art Warsaw captures the city as it tries to establish a more visible role within the Central and Eastern European artistic and cultural field
A Historic Crossroads for Uzbekistan’s Art Scene
At the Venice Biennale, a solo exhibition by artist Vyacheslav Akhunov draws Uzbekistan’s inherited legacy of architectural symbolism into relief
The £91.2m Question: What the Sainsbury Centre Gift Reveals About British Museums
A huge donation will future-proof the centre’s Norman Foster-designed building, but also highlights the growing importance of mega donors within Britain’s cultural sector
Kazakhstan’s Venice Pavilion: An Archive of Silence
The removal of an artwork at the last minute raises questions of intellectual freedom and returns to Soviet-era censorship
Performance Art: The Last Bastion of an Artworld Beyond the Market?
Timed-based and live art features heavily across this year's Venice Biennale. Can the public appetite for spectacle translate to market success?
Painting at the End of the World: Chornobyl and Artistic Exploitation
In the decades since the explosion of the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant, the disaster has become a cultural touchstone
Don't Mess With Me: Brazil’s Pavilion Warns Against Authoritarianism
Brazil's Venice Biennale show interrogates the myth of ‘racial democracy’ in South America’s largest nation, taking its title from a symbolic plant known for its beauty, toxicity and protective powers.
Art with a Designer Label
Will the shifting culture of commercial patronage in the arts cause the 61st Venice Biennale to look materially different?
Places
Sweating the Future at Riga Art Week
From underfloor heating to private patronage, Riga Art Week revealed an art scene wrestling with the comforts and contradictions of post-Soviet capitalism
Sofia: The Art Market that Defies All the Rules
Sofia’s art scene has emerged largely independent, if not in opposition to, international standards. The city is slowly becoming a hub for cultural and economic retention
New Delhi’s Art Market: A Turn, or Return, to Opulence?
The city's real-estate boom is fuelling an influx of new exhibition spaces and mega-museums, but also reflects an awkward dance between the government, corporates and the arts in the capital
A Turning Point for Reykjavík’s Art Scene
The city's art market reveals a misalignment between the perceived and actual value of artistic labour in Iceland
Notes from Kampala’s Fugitive Art Economy
For Uganda’s artists, precarity is generative rather than a condition to overcome
Is Belgrade’s Art Market an Ornament for Urban Rebranding?
A cluster of new galleries has emerged in the Serbian capital, despite deep-seated structural problems and concerns of an ‘urban and political facelift’
After a Landslide Victory, Will Sanae Takaichi’s Election Reshape Japan’s Artworld?
The unlikely mandate of a new prime minister raises pressing questions about the future of Japan’s art ecosystem, both domestically and internationally
Can Palermo’s Art Market Fulfil its Potential?
Palermo experienced a surge in tourism in the 2010s on the back of the Sicilian capital’s rehabilitation as a cultural capital. Now, as the city is once again reshaped by outside forces, can its nascent art market establish a state of self-dependence?
Profiles

VALIE EXPORT, Austrian Performance Artist Who Reframed the Politics of the Female Body, Dies Aged 85
The radical Viennese artist became one of postwar Europe’s most influential feminist practitioners through photography, performances and films that confronted spectatorship, sexuality and power

The Painter: Merike Estna at the Estonia Pavilion
Representing her country at the Venice Biennale, the artist has created a monument to the demands of maintenance, temporality and parenthood

The Collector: Nicole Saikalis Bay Has a Global Vision for Milan’s Art Scene
The architect and patron has grown a personal collection into an arts foundation that extends her global outlook to the Milanese cultural scene

The Collector: Marinko Sudac Champions the Legacy of Europe's Avant-Garde
The Croatian art collector on acquiring art as an intellectual exercise, his most controversial work and why 'neutral' collections cannot exist

The Photographer: Was Martin Parr Just Taking the Piss?
Behind the ice creams, leisure parks and plastic excess lay a photographer who turned consumer culture back on itself – and refused to play the art market’s scarcity game


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