News

  • June 06, 2018 at 7:22am

    More Than 100 Confederate-Era Symbols Have Been Removed Since 2015, Report Finds

    A new study released by the American nonprofit and civil rights advocacy group the Southern Poverty Law Center reports that since the 2015 massacre of nine African Americans at the historic Mother Emanuel Church in Charleston, South Carolina, which sparked a nationwide campaign to remove Confederate-era symbols, only 110 monuments, markers, and flags have been taken down.

    Titled “Whose Heritage? Public Symbols of the Confederacy,” the study claims that there are still 1,728 symbols commemorating the Confederacy in public spaces across the country. “These tributes are living symbols of white

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  • June 05, 2018 at 6:21pm

    Shoplifter to Represent Iceland at 2019 Venice Biennale

    Hrafnhildur Arnardóttir, the Brooklyn-based artist who goes by the name Shoplifter, has been selected to represent Iceland at the Fifty-Eighth Venice Biennale, which will take place from May 11, 2019 to November 24, 2019. Birta Guðjónsdóttir, the chief curator at the National Gallery of Iceland in Reykjavík, will curate the pavilion.

    Known for her large-scale installations, sculptures, and performances, Arnardóttir is obsessed with hair, and both artificial and human hair feature prominently in her work. “I find it fascinating that we have this forever changing ‘vegetation’ all over our bodies,

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  • June 05, 2018 at 4:59pm

    Dia Announces $78 Million Campaign to Revitalize Its New York Galleries

    The Dia Art Foundation announced today that it is planning to upgrade and expand its main spaces in the Chelsea neighborhood of Mahattan and in Beacon, New York; to reopen its SoHo location; and to renovate two landmark installations by artist Walter De Maria as part of a new multiyear initiative to advance the organization’s program. Dia has already raised 80 percent of the $78 million in funds needed to support the refurbishment of its sites and bolster its endowment.

    “Dia’s programming and, in turn, the constellation of presentation spaces and sites we’ve created to support it, have arisen in

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  • June 05, 2018 at 12:45pm

    Documenta 14 Artists Voice Support for Greek Mayor Injured in Attack by Far Right

    More than 120 participants of Documenta 14 have penned an open letter condemning the brutal assault of Yiannis Boutaris, the mayor of Thessaloniki, Greece, by a far-right mob during a public event on May 19.

    The seventy-five-year-old liberal politician, who is known as an outspoken advocate for multiculturalism, was attacked while attending a flag-lowering ceremony honoring Greeks who were slain by Turkish forces during World War I. Boutaris was pushed to the ground, punched, and kicked before his aides rushed him to a hospital where he was treated for injuries to his head, back, and legs.

    While

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  • June 05, 2018 at 12:39pm

    Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Announces Participating Artists for Upcoming Triennial

    The participating artists have been announced for the “Bay Area Now” triennial, hosted by San Francisco’s Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, reports SF Gate. The eighth edition is being curated by the museum’s director of visual arts, Lucía Sanromán; curatorial associate, Susie Kantor; and programs manager, Martin Strickland.

    The exhibition, which will open on September 7 and run until March 24, 2019, will feature the work of nineteen artists and six design collaboratives and architects. The show has been put together “without a thematized curatorial agenda,” says Sanromán.

    The participants in this

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  • June 05, 2018 at 11:38am

    Barbara Luderowski (1930–2018)

    Artist Barbara Luderowski, the founder of the Mattress Factory museum in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, died on May 30, reports M. Thomas of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. She was—according to Tom Sokolowski, the former head of the city’s Andy Warhol Museum—a woman of “tenacity, stubbornness, [and] zeal” with an astonishing work ethic.

    Luderowski was born in New York and raised in Connecticut. Her mother participated in the arts, and her father was an architect. She studied at Carnegie Mellon University for a little while (it was called Carnegie Tech when she was there), then the Art Students

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  • June 05, 2018 at 10:21am

    Cultural Figures Call for Boycott of LA’s Pit Gallery over Controversial Exhibition

    The founders of the Pit, an artist-run gallery based in Glendale, California, are facing backlash over an exhibition they organized for the Brand Library Art Center. An open letter signed by artists, filmmakers, writers, and other cultural workers criticizes the show’s lack of diversity, specifically its failure to include artists of Armenian descent.

    Originally titled “Vision Valley: The Glendale Biennial,” the exhibition was billed as “a nod to Glendale’s long-standing artist community” and as a tribute to the multitude of artistic visions at work in the region. 

    The signatories of the open

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  • June 05, 2018 at 9:03am

    UK’s Labour Party Leader Vows to Return Parthenon Marbles to Greece

    The leader of the UK’s labour party, Jeremy Corbyn, is the latest public figure to declare that colonial-era objects that were taken unlawfully should be returned to their country of origin. If elected prime minister in the next general election, which will take place in 2022, Corbyn has pledged to return the famous Parthenon Marbles to Greece.

    Also known as the Elgin Marbles, the fifth-century sculptures—made under the sculptor Phidias—were taken from the Parthenon, an ancient temple dedicated to the goddess Athena that is situated on the Athenian acropolis, by Scottish nobleman Lord

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  • June 05, 2018 at 8:09am

    Brooklyn Museum Acquires Ninety-Six Works by Female Artists

    The Brooklyn Museum in New York has announced that it has added works by ninety-six female artists to its collection. The pieces were acquired in conjunction with the institution’s recent series of programming celebrating women. “A Year of Yes: Reimagining Feminism at the Brooklyn Museum” marked the tenth anniversary of the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art.

    Director Anne Pasternak said that the works, which span from antiquity to the present day, were part of a concerted effort to broaden the institution’s historic narratives. Many of the pieces were showcased in the exhibition “We

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  • June 04, 2018 at 4:20pm

    Documenta Obelisk at Center of Controversy as City Considers Its Relocation

    After agreeing to sell an obelisk made for last year’s Documenta at a discounted price, the Nigerian-born, US-based artist Olu Oguibe is now clashing with the city of Kassel over the work’s permanent location. Last January, the artist and Kassel started a fundraiser for $750,000 in order to pay for Monument to Strangers and Refugees, 2017, an obelisk inscribed with the phrase “I was a stranger and you took me in” (Matthew 25:35) in four different languages. After the crowdfunding campaign only reached around $89,000, Oguibe agreed to let the city have the work—which was specifically designed

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  • June 04, 2018 at 12:58pm

    Public Art Project to Commission Political Billboards in All Fifty States

    For Freedoms, the artist-run political action committee founded by Hank Willis Thomas and Eric Gottesman in 2016, is launching a $1.5 million initiative that is being billed as the largest public art campaign in United States history.

    Called the 50 State Initiative, it will bring together more than two hundred partners and 175 artists, including Tania Bruguera, Sam Durant, Theaster Gates, Marilyn Minter, and Carrie Mae Weems, to collaborate on programming in advance of the midterm elections.

    Beginning in September, political billboards will be installed across the country. Instead of featuring

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  • June 04, 2018 at 11:11am

    Director Okwui Enwezor to Step Down from Munich’s Haus der Kunst

    Okwui Enwezor, the renowned Nigerian curator and art historian who is known for challenging the status quo of the Euro-American-centric art world, announced that he is resigning from his post as artistic director of the Haus der Kunst in Munich because of health reasons. Enwezor has led the institution since 2011.

    “There is never an ideal time to leave but I am stepping down when the Haus der Kunst is in an artistic position of strength,” Enwezor said in a statement. “It has been a great privilege to lead this exceptional institution and work with such a dedicated and talented team.”

    Over the

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