The painting by Elaine de Kooning that was stolen out of an art transportation truck in Boulder, Colorado on December 14th, was found at another hotel only a 40-minute drive away. Authorities found the painting and other works stolen from the vehicle, along 2,000 fentanyl pills, and 23 grams of methamphetamine.
The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art has acquired an NFT from the pioneering digital artist Lynn Hershman Leeson. Though just north of Silicon Valley, this is the institution’s first acquisition of a digital artwork on blockchain.
After being raided by the FBI for showing fake Basquait paintings in June 2022, the American Alliance of Museums has now put the Orlando Museum of Art on probation, which could affect its ability to secure loans. To get out of probation, the institution must prove that it has addressed the issues that got it in trouble, which includes dismissing a specialist’s concerns over the authenticity of the Basquait paintings before going ahead with the exhibition.
Late last year, Phillip Guston’s daughter gifted the Metropolitan Museum of Art 200 of her father’s works in a landmark donation, but critics are now wondering if it’s too much Guston. New York Times chief art critic Roberta Smith published an editorial earlier this week stating that the donation is taking up too much of the Museum’s collection, especially if they are hoping to include more artists who are historically underrepresented in the canon.
Iraqi-American Artist Michael Rakowitz is offering the British Museum a deal: he’ll donate his large Fourth Plinth sculpture “The Invisible Enemy Should Not Exist” to the institution if they return one of the Assyrian lamassu sculptures in their permanent collection to Iraq. Rakowitz has been working on this deal since 2020, and the Tate, an affiliate of the British Museum, is apparently in talks to move his proposal forward.
After leading the most popular art museum in Spain for 15 years, Manuel Borja-Villel stepped down as the director of the Reina Sofía Art Museum in Madrid. The director’s last day was January 20th, with speculation of maladministration from the Spanish right-wing news outlet ABC. Both Borja-Villel and the Reina Sofía have denied these allegations. ABC has gone after the director before, stating that his selection of works and texts were promoting ideological discourse aligned with the Ibero-American left.
Finally, after the National Gallery of Canada abruptly laid off four senior executives in November, including the Chief Curator and Curator of Indigenous art, it has now been revealed that the executive who oversaw those layoffs is an external consultant operating as both the director of HR and Chief Operating Officer. The consultant is charging a fee of $1100 a day, rather than drawing a salary typical of one of those positions—about $150k/year. Many in the Canadian art community wonder how the gallery will attract staff members without permanent senior staff.
On the 21-23 January's Agenda, a stolen Van Gogh, defamation lawsuit over claims of islamophobia, and… Madonna?