James Franco, New Film Still #58 (2013).
© 2014 Pace Gallery, All Rights Reserved. © the artist, Pace Gallery.

VIEWERS’ CHOICE
Benjamin Sutton visited artist-actor-essayist James Franco’s new photography exhibition at Pace Gallery and found his homage to Cindy Sherman tactless and offensive. The ubiquitous celebrity’s re-staging of Sherman’s “Untitled Film Stills” empties the powerful originals of their original meaning, Sutton argued.

CRITICAL
The artnet News team’s New York contingent fanned out across the five boroughs (well, two of them at least) to review 14 exhibitions currently on view in the city. Among the highlights are the rich conceptual sculptures of Robert Kinmont at Alexander and Bonin, Michelangelo Pistoletto at Luhring Augustine‘s Brooklyn outpost, and Jane South’s enormous installation at Spencer Brownstone Gallery.

ANALYTICS (DOUBLE DOSE)
As we continue to chart the top auction results of living artists by nationality, Alexander Forbes sized up the top-selling German artists. Unsurprisingly, Gerhard Richter landed at the top, but further down the list things get interesting. Far more unpredictable, though, is Coline Milliard’s look at the highest-selling living artists from France, beginning with the country’s preeminent figure Pierre Soulages, and quickly turning up more obscure artists like François Morellet.

LEGAL TANGLE
A judge in New York’s State Supreme Court ordered former Salander-O’Reilly gallery director Leigh Morse to pay up $1.65 million, Philip Boroff reported. This would be the first restitution payment to come out of the 2010 conviction of Lawrence Salander on charges of fraud amounting to $120 million.

LEGAL TANGLE (BONUS ROUND)
The US attorney’s office issued a long-awaited indictment against the parties responsible for the still-unfolding Knoedler & Co. forgery scandal. Eileen Kinsella took a close look at the 43-page document, outlining the charges leveled at dealers Glafira Rosales and Jose Carlos Bergantiños Diaz, as well as the forger Pei Shen Qian, who has fled to China.

NEWS TO KNOW
Picasso’s Paris Studio in Danger of Becoming a Luxury Hotel

New Study Suggests Artists’ Brains Are More Fully Developed

Steve McQueen Returns to Artmaking

Vandal Takes Razor to More Than a Dozen Works at Upper West Side Gallery

Is Larry Gagosian Readying for Retirement?