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 this Thursday. June 29.
NEED-TO-READ
Jeff Koons Donates Gazing Ball to Establish SAIC Scholarship Fund – The artist gifted his Gazing Ball (StooI), (2013-2016), valued at $1 million, to his alma mater, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC). The school will sell the work to fund need-based and merit-based scholarships to be known as Jeff Koons Scholarships. (Artdaily)
Chelsea Manning to Show Collaborative Self-Portraits in New York – The artist Heather Dewey-Hagborg used DNA samples sent to her from prison by the famous whistle-blower to make 3-D portraits of Manning. Thirty of the works will go on view at the Fridman Gallery from August 2. (ARTnews)
Nicholas Serota Releases First Arts Council England Grants – The former Tate director presented the council’s first funding program since he joined as chairman in February. The grants for the period 2018-2022 allocated £409m a year to arts organizations and demonstrated a shift in attention from the British capital to the regions. (The Art Newspaper)
Chicago Announces Year of Public Art – The $1 million initiative, announced by Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel, will see local artists creating public artworks in all 50 wards and will culminate in a Public Art Festival this October. (Chicago Tribune)
Albright-Knox Expansion Design Faces Opposition – Mark Hogan argues that OMA’s project will erase the work of Buffalo’s most famous architect, Gordon Bunshaft, demolishing his midcentury addition just so that students can take a shortcut to the free street parking on the other side of the museum. (Curbed)
ART MARKET
Pierre Bergé Sells Rare Items From €30 Million Library – A Wagner score with the composer’s corrections and a rare tome by Athanasius Kircher are some of the items sold in Paris on Tuesday from the YSL co-founder’s library. Proceeds will go to an AIDS research foundation Bergé set up together with his late partner, Yves Saint Laurent. (Artdaily)
Life After Gagosian for Cecily Brown – The artist’s 1998 painting The Girl Who Had Everything fetched a record price for Brown at Sotheby’s London Contemporary sale yesterday, proving that two years after her split from Gagosian, her market remains strong. (artnet News)
COMINGS & GOINGS
Hammer Museum Names New Assistant Curator – The Los Angeles institution has appointed local independent curator Erin Christovale as assistant curator ahead of the biennial Made in L.A. exhibition, which Christovale is co-organizing with Anne Ellegood. (Press release)
Dijon Consortium Director Xavier Douroux Dies at 61 – The visionary figure who co-founded France’s first contemporary art center outside Paris has died. He will be remembered for his role in shaping the contemporary art scene both in France and globally over the past 30 years. (Press release)
The Ultimate Guide to the Complex Web of Art Festival Curators – ARTnews has surveyed 15 major international festivals held over the past 25 years and created a map of the surprising connections among curators. Did you know, for example, that Raqs Media Collective has shown work in 20 major biennials? (ARTnews)
Is the Louvre Still the Most Popular Museum in the World? – New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art has never been more popular; its attendance growing faster than that of any other museum. In fact, the Met may soon surpass the Louvre as the most attended art museum in the world. (Quartz)
FOR ART’S SAKE
Dallas Museum’s Mexican Art Show a Huge Hit with Latino Audiences – The Dallas Museum of Art’s major exhibition of Mexican masterpieces is the museum’s second most-attended show in the past five years, proving particularly popular among first-time museum visitors and Latinos. (NBC)
Henri Cartier-Bresson’s Photos of Gandhi’s Final Days on View – The French photographer captured the Indian leader’s last moments before his assassination—and the photographs are now on view at the Rubin Museum of Art in New York. (BBC)
See the 63 Dutch Masters Coming Home to Holland – In October, Hermitage Amsterdam will host a collection of 17th-century Dutch paintings loaned by its sister institution in St Petersburg. The 63 Golden Age works, including six Rembrandts, haven’t been back home since they were originally acquired for the Russian collection. (Press release)
Pieter Janssens Elinga, Room in a Dutch House, c. 1665–75
© State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg
Gerard ter Borch, Glass with Lemonade, 1660–70
© State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg
Rembrandt van Rijn, Flora, 1634
© State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg