Plus, the Met's rooftop project gets delayed by a year due to logistical issues and critic Elenor Munro dies at 94.
Art Industry News is a daily digest of the most consequential developments coming out of the art world and art market. Here’s what you need to know on this Monday, April 11.
Planning Permission Quashed for Adjaye’s Holocaust Memorial – London’s high court has put the kibosh on plans to build a £100 million ($130 million) national Holocaust memorial next to parliament after campaigners opposed the project’s location in Victoria Tower Gardens. The ruling leaned on a 1900 law that restricts the site from being used for anything other than a public garden. The government is considering next steps. (Guardian)
MoMA PS1 Reaches Out to the Neighborhood – In a profile published by the New York Times, MoMA PS1 director Kate Fowle says it’s the museum’s responsibility to integrate into the community. The institution is now planning a $9 million renovation for which some portion of its outer concrete walls would be collapsed to make space for a courtyard. (New York Times)
Critic Elenor Munro Dies at 94 – The writer and critic, who wrote the revelatory 1979 book Originals: American Women Artists, in which she profiled artists including Georgia O’Keeffe and Faith Ringgold, died in New Hampshire on April 1. The daughter of a Cleveland Museum of Art curator, she wrote that Originals was in some sense “an autobiographical search for myself.” (New York Times)
Historian Slams British Museum’s NFT Project and Its Carbon Footprint – Art historian Bendor Grosvenor dug through public records to estimate the carbon footprint for the British Museum’s NFT project, for which it is selling digital versions of masterworks in its collection, and it’s not a pretty picture. “Just for the BM’s NFTs already offered for sale, we get a starting carbon cost of 315 tons of CO2—enough to power that US home for 57 years.” (The Art Newspaper)
Lelanie Foster Photographs Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson – Bronx photographer Lelanie Foster has taken the first official portrait of newly appointed US Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson after her historic bipartisan confirmation. Foster primarily photographs Black women and often explores themes of sisterhood and community. (The Cut)
Met Rooftop Installation Postponed – The Met has postponed Lauren Halsey’s planned rooftop installation by a year until next spring after logistical issues threw off the expected timeline. This will be the first year since 2013 there has been no installation. (NYT)
Spring/Break Art Show Announces 2022 Theme – The theme for the art fair’s 10th edition, “Naked Lunch,” taken from the title of the William S. Burroughs book of the same name, will delve into Neo-Renaissance themes inspired by Sandro Botticelli, Artemisia Gentileschi, Greek antiquity, and Édouard Manet and the Salon des Refusés. The fair is slated to take place from September 7 through 12 in New York. (Press release)
Runway Shows Take Inspiration From Surrealism – Just in case you weren’t aware that Surrealism is en vogue right now, take a peep at the autumn/winter fashion shows this year. Designers engaged with Surrealism across the board, from Dolce & Gabanna’s trompe l’oeil corsets to Bottega Veneta’s fuzzy Meret Oppenheim-inspired platform shoes. (Financial Times)
