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 Tuesday, June 4.
NEED-TO-READ
A Highly Redundant Horse Enters Buckingham Palace – On his well-documented and much-memed state visit to the UK, President Trump viewed several items from the Royal Collection. It is customary for the Queen to present carefully chosen objects to visiting heads of state: for Trump, she chose an illustrated book of tartans, opened to the page showing the pattern of the clan MacLeod, which is the President’s mother’s maiden name. Other treasures included a manuscript copy of the United States Declaration of Independence from 1776, a historical map of New York, and a horse statuette that he had presented to the Queen last year. According to a report in Express, however, First Lady Melania Trump had to remind her husband that they had previously given it as a gift. (The Art Newspaper)
Instagram Suppresses #wethenipple – The social media platform has suppressed the #wethenipple hashtag, which sprung up to document photos of a nude photo shoot co-organized by artist Spencer Tunick and the National Coalition Against Censorship to protest Facebook’s nudity policy. Although the images were designed specifically to skirt social-media censors by having participants cover up their private parts with nipple photographs donated by men, Facebook and Instagram nevertheless removed more than 500 images from the event. (Press release)
Helena Bonham Carter Is Dating an Art Historian Boy – The actress was spotted with her new beau, Rye Dag Holmboe, in New York, putting a new, academic twist on the growing trend of female celebrities dating so-called “art boys.” That’s because Holmboe is an art history PhD two decades Carter’s junior; he is a teaching fellow at University College London and an arts writer who has penned articles for Apollo, the White Review, and various academic journals. The pair reportedly met at a wedding of a mutual friend and have been together since last summer. Carter has her own documented interest in art; she served as the narrator for a documentary on Tintoretto that was released in March. (Daily Mail)
Heirs Sue to Recover Looted Derains in French Museums – Representatives from France’s Ministry of Culture have been summoned to appear in court at the end of the month by the grandchildren of art dealer René Gimpel, who died in a concentration camp in 1945. Since 2013, the dealer’s heirs have accused French state museums of blocking the restitution of three paintings by André Derain. Though France pledged to improve research in the area of Nazi-era looted art at an international conference in Berlin last year and set up a task force in 2019, experts say this court case will serve as a major test of France’s true willingness to return lost art. (TAN)
ART MARKET
WhiBi Star Carolyn Lazard Nabs New Representation – The artist, whose installation inspired by a hospital room is currently included in the Whitney Biennial, is now represented by New York’s Essex Street Gallery. Lazard will have their first show at the gallery in 2020 and also has an upcoming show at Cell Project Space in London. Lazard’s work in video, sound, performance, sculpture, and installation draws on their experience of living with chronic illness and disability. (Instagram)
Big Galleries Join EXPO Chicago – Major galleries including Hauser & Wirth, Marian Goodman, Jack Shainman, and Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac are among the newcomers to EXPO Chicago this year. The eighth edition of the fair runs from September 19 through 22. (Press release)
Paula Cooper to Represent Ja’Tovia M. Gary – The artist, whose documentary films and video art explore the way power shapes our perceptions of representation, race, gender, and violence, is now represented by the august New York gallery. Paula Cooper will present a solo show of Gary’s work in spring 2020 and include examples in its Art Basel Miami Beach presentation in December. (Press release)
COMINGS & GOINGS
Documentary Filmmaker Camille Billops Has Died – The artist and award-winning filmmaker, who established an exhibition space for black artists in New York in the ’80s and whose work was included in the exhibition “We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women 1965–85,” has died at age 85. Billops abandoned her four-year-old daughter in a children’s home to pursue her artistic ambitions and then famously documented their reunion in her best-known film, Finding Christa. (ARTnews)
Look Inside Adrian Cheng’s New Museum – The billionaire patron and collector’s new museum is taking shape at the heart of a new mall and luxury apartment complex overlooking Hong Kong harbor. Designed by SO-IL architects, Adrian Cheng’s museum will have a rooftop sculpture terrace and around 50,000 square feet of gallery space. It will present work from the K11 Art Foundation’s collection as well as temporary exhibitions. (designboom)
FOR ART’S SAKE
Olafur Eliasson Unveils IKEA Prototypes – The artist and co-founder of the solar-energy initiative Little Sun has offered a sneak peek at the solar-powered products his charity is developing with the furniture giant IKEA. The line is called Sammanlänkad, which means “connected” in Swedish. The products, due to launch in 2021, include solar panels that can be connected to windows, charging docks, and lights. (Press release)
Activist-Filmmaker Chains Himself to Turkey’s Culture Ministry – A Turkish filmmaker and activist was arrested after he chained himself to a pole outside the culture ministry in Ankara. Oktay Ince, who has been detained more than 40 times in the past, is campaigning to retrieve his archive of films and videos documenting protests in the country over the past two decades. PEN America has demanded authorities return his life’s work. (Hyperallergic)
Ai Weiwei Remembers Tiananmen Square – In op-ed, the Chinese artist recalls watching the suppression of pro-democracy protests in Beijing on CNN while living in New York. He also took part in a hunger strike outside the United Nations to protest the crackdown. Thirty years later, Ai is posting images on social media of the event, which remain taboo in Mainland China. But the artist does not absolve the West of its own attempts to distort history. The cases of Edward Snowden, Chelsea Manning, and Julian Assange “remind me of my time living in a totalitarian society that suppresses and whitewashes facts,” Ai writes. (Guardian)