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 Thursday, September 9.
NEED-TO-READ
The Van Gogh Museum Gets Sued for Denying a Work’s Authenticity – Stuart Pivar, an art collector and the founder of the New York Academy of Art, is suing Amsterdam’s Van Gogh Museum after it declared that a work he believes is a long-lost Van Gogh is, in fact, a fake. Pivar, who is is suing for $300 million or the estimated market value of the work, said the museum made the “cursory” decision without properly studying the painting or looking at it in person, despite his offer to ship it to them. (New York Post)
Female Artists Still Lag Behind Men in Auction Sales – Here’s a bit of news you probably already suspected, but now have the data to confirm. While 18 percent of the artists represented in major auctions held in London, New York, and Paris from April to July were women, just one—Joan Mitchell—was among the top 40 best-selling names. In all, work by women made up just eight percent of the season’s $1.8 billion in total sales. (ARTnews)
Jeff Koons Is Getting Into NFTs – The world’s most expensive living artist at auction has revealed he is hard at work on his own NFTs, which he expects will be released “within a year’s time.” The artist revealed the news during the launch of his new art car collaboration with BMW at Munich’s Pinakothek der Moderne museum. Earlier this year, Koons jumped from Gagosian and David Zwirner to Pace, a gallery that has been considerably more bullish on crypto and NFTs than its rivals. Koons says it’s a logical extension of his practice: “All my work has been generated digitally for almost the last two decades,” he said. (The Art Newspaper)
Gladstone Gallery Director Is Having a Baby – An art dealer’s growing family rarely makes international headlines, but the Internet is aflutter with the news that Gladstone Gallery director Cooke Maroney is expecting his first child with his wife, movie star Jennifer Lawrence. Congratulations to the couple! (Page Six)
MOVERS & SHAKERS
Barbican Center Plans £150 Million Revamp – London’s iconic Brutalist structure, the Barbican Center, will get a £150 million ($207 million) overhaul as part of the city’s latest revitalization project. A call for proposals to refresh the 1982 building is now open. (Evening Standard)
Mark Cuban Gifts 1963 World Trade Center Drawings – The entrepreneur and Dallas Mavericks owner bought a set of 1963 drawings of the World Trade Center by the late architectural illustrator Carlos Diniz and donated them to the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum in New York ahead of the 20th anniversary of 9/11. (Axios)
Cécile Fakhoury Is Opening a Gallery in Paris – The French art dealer, whose galleries in Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal focus on African art, will open a new gallery in Paris (in addition to her existing Paris showroom). The space on the increasingly popular Avenue Matignon will debut on October 21. (Journal des Arts)
FOR ART’S SAKE
Unseen Sex Pistols Pics to Go on View in London – At Photo London, which is underway this week, Paul Stolper Gallery is showing previously unseen photographs of the punk legends taken by Kevin Cummins at a Christmas Day gig at Ivanhoes in Huddersfield, U.K., in 1977. The photos from the afternoon party include images of Sid Vicious dancing to Boney M and having a food fight. (Guardian)