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 Wednesday, October 31. Happy Halloween!

NEED-TO-READ

Brazil’s Museums Need to Mobilize for Democracy – Brazilian museums should work to promote democratic values following the election of the far-right candidate Jair Bolsonaro as president, writes Fernanda Brenner, the founder of the São Paulo-based nonprofit art space Pivô. Exhibitions that offer narratives that run against Bolsonaro’s disturbing rhetoric about women, people of color, and the LGBT community are necessary, and the institutions hosting them should be protected, she says. (Frieze)

Betye Saar Is Taking New York – On Friday, the exhibition “Betye Saar: Keepin’ It Clean” will open at the New-York Historical Society (through May 27), featuring 24 works from Saar’s washboard series. It couldn’t come at a more poignant time. “Saar says that it’s about keeping everything clean, keeping politics clean, keeping your life clean, your actions clean,” said the curator Wendy NE Ikemoto about the 92-year-old, LA-based artist’s ongoing series. “She wants America to clean up its act and a lot of her art has to do with this idea that we haven’t cleaned up our act.” (Guardian)

Cindy Sherman Gets a Show in China – Conceptual photographer Cindy Sherman is getting her first major survey in China at the Fosun Foundation Shanghai. Opening on November 7 and coinciding with Art021 and the West Bund Art Fair, the show will bring together 120 works by Sherman spanning her entire career, from the 1970s to the present. (Press release)

Arizona’s Largest Art Gallery Is Dedicated to Burning Man – The production company behind many of the art cars at Burning Man, Walter Productions, has opened new, 24,000-square-foot art venue in Phoenix. The Where?House, which will present work by local and international artists, debuted with a display of art cars and illuminated board games (we’re not sure exactly how the latter works, either). “The Walter style is immersive and interactive,” says the group’s founder Kirk Strawn. “The art world is moving in that direction.” (Phoenix New Times)

ART MARKET

You Can Buy a Copy of Van Gogh’s Sketchbooks – The Van Gogh Museum is Amsterdam is selling limited-edition facsimiles of four of the artist’s fragile sketchbooks. Made with Uitgeverij Komma publishing, the 1,000 true-to-life copies of the books dating from 1884 and 1890 contain some of the artist’s earliest drawings and insight into his working methods. (Art Daily)

Jackie Kennedy’s Love Letter Heads to Auction – On November 7, Boston’s RR Auction is selling an undated letter that the former First Lady sent to JFK about their relationship and their young daughter, Caroline, signed “All my love, Jackie.” The letter is estimated to have been written between 1957 and 1958. It was previously sold for more than $22,000 in 2016. (Art Daily)

UNTITLED Art Fair Launches a Podcast – Artists, curators, and art-world professionals will take part in interviews, performances, and curate playlists for a new podcast, “The Untitled Art Podcast.” It will be hosted by the fair’s director of programming, Amanda Schmitt, and focus on sound in contemporary art. (Press release)

COMINGS & GOINGS

International Photojournalist Who Captured Life in Istanbul Has Died – Though Ara Güler captured such celebrated subjects as Pablo Picasso and Alfred Hitchcock, some of his most poignant work focused on his home country’s capital of Istanbul. Güler died on October 17 at the age of 90. (Guardian)

Quebec City Biennial Names Curator – English curator Jonathan Watkins will curate Manif d’art 9, Quebec City’s biennial, in February 2019. Watkins has released his title for the show, “Small Between the Stars, Large Against the Sky,” which borrows from a lyric by the recently deceased Canadian musician Leonard Cohen. (Press release)

Alfredo Jaar Wins Hiroshima Prize – The City of Hiroshima has selected the Chilean artist for its 11th triennial Hiroshima Art Prize—an award recognizing an artist who contributes to world peace through art. As part of the prize, the artist, architect, and filmmaker will receive an exhibition at Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art in 2020. (E-flux)

Hungary’s Museum of Fine Arts Reopens – The historic Szepmuveszeti Muzeum in Budapest reopens to the public today after being closed for 70 years. The institution had just begun an ambitious three-year renovation, employing 70 conservators to restore the building to its former glory, when it suffered severe damage in World War II. (TAN)

FOR ART’S SAKE

Kanye West Disowns Blexit Merch – The rapper has backtracked just a day after he made headlines for his involvement in the design of merchandise for conservative commentator Candace Owens’s “Blexit” campaign, which set out to encourage people of color to distance themselves from the Democratic Party. On Twitter, he now says he is being “used to spread messages I don’t believe in” and had nothing to do with Blexit or the design of the merch. Writing “my eyes are now wide open,” he has resolved to distance himself from politics. (BBC)

See the Pieta in a New Light – Michelangelo’s world-renowned sculpture, La Pietà, is now illuminated with an LED light system. St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City opted for the new, dramatic lighting so that visitors could better contemplate the details of the masterpiece by the Italian sculptor. (Rome Reports)

Paula Cooper’s 50th Anniversary Show Is Subdued, But Powerful – The gallery is celebrating its jubilee this year. The Chelsea dealer, who has been spearheading the market for Minimalist and conceptual art for half a century, closes her celebratory show “50 Years: An Anniversary” this weekend. Catch it before it’s gone. (New York Times)

A Viral Fountain in Japan Is Not Real – A video showing a monumental head with a flowing waterfall of hair in Japan has been busted as a CGI fake. The video, which went viral, is actually a digital artwork, though the author of the work has not been confirmed. (Facebook)