The Week in Art

On 4 July 2026 the US will mark the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, the nation’s founding document. But huge divisions in US society and culture are symbolised in a number of disputes relating to its history and the representation of its people. The latest furore came this week, when it emerged that the Trump administration had removed the rainbow Pride flag from the Stonewall Monument, the landmark for LGBTQ+ rights in New York. Ben Luke speaks to Ben Sutton, The Art Newspaper’s editor-in-chief, Americas, about this and other flashpoints as the US grapples with its history, and we explore the cultural initiatives that are marking the semiquincentennial. One of London’s best known and longest-established art dealers, Stephen Friedman, has announced the closure of his London gallery, following that of his New York space last year. Ben speaks to our contributing art market editor, Anny Shaw, about the fallout from the closure and the significance for the wider London art market. And this episode’s Work of the Week is the Tudor Heart, an intricately decorated golden pendant with links to Henry VIII and his first wife, Katherine of Aragon. The British Museum has raised £3.5m to acquire the work, following a four-month fundraising campaign. Our digital editor, Alexander Morrison, talks to Rachel King, the curator of Renaissance Europe and the Waddesdon Bequest at the museum, about the pendant.

The Tudor Heart pendant is now on view at the British Museum.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The first Art Basel Qatar art fair is now open in Qatar’s capital, Doha, and The Art Newspaper’s art market editor, Kabir Jhala, joins Ben Luke to discuss its impact, as well as reflecting on the wider artistic outlook in Qatar and the Middle East. The author of a new catalogue raisonné of the work of Albrecht Dürer argues that a painting of the artist’s father in the National Gallery in London, long thought to be a copy after Dürer’s original, is in fact an autograph work. Our special correspondent in London, Martin Bailey, tells us about the arguments for and against its authenticity. And this episode’s Work of the Week is actually a pair of works. That is because there is a compelling double header opening at the Albertinum in Dresden this weekend, the exhibition Paula Modersohn-Becker and Edvard Munch: The Big Questions of Life. The exhibition’s co-curator Andreas Dehmer discusses Selbstbildnis mit Hand am Kinn or Self-Portrait with Hand on Chin (1906) by Modersohn-Becker and Vampir or Vampire (1895) by Munch with our digital editor, Alexander Morrison.

Art Basel Qatar continues until Saturday, 7 February.

Christof Metzger, Albrecht Dürer: The Complete Paintings. Selected Drawings and Prints, Taschen, £175 (hb)

Paula Modersohn-Becker and Edvard Munch: The Big Questions of Life, Albertinum, Dresden, 8 February-31 May.

To buy The Art Newspaper’s guidebook The Year Ahead 2026, an authoritative look at the year’s unmissable art exhibitions, museum openings and significant art events, visit theartnewspapershop.com. £14.99 or the equivalent in your currency.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The South African culture minister, the right-wing populist Gayton McKenzie, is attempting to cancel the project for South Africa’s pavilion at the forthcoming Venice Biennale, proposed by the artist Gabrielle Goliath and curator Ingrid Masondo. Goliath and Masondo have appealed to the country’s president and submitted a case to its high court to overturn McKenzie’s decision. Ben Luke speaks to Charles Leonard, who has been reporting on this story for The Art Newspaper over the past few weeks. The art dealer Marian Goodman, who founded her gallery on New York’s 57th Street in 1977 and represented many of the world’s leading artists over recent decades, has died aged 97. Ben talks to one of The Art Newspaper’s New York writers, Linda Yablonsky, about this titan of the New York art world. And this episode’s Work of the Week is The Card Players, made between 1893 and 1896 by Paul Cezanne. The painting is in a major new exhibition of the French artist’s late works at the Beyeler Foundation in Basel, Switzerland. We talk to the exhibition’s curator, Ulf Küster, about it.

Cezanne, Fondation Beyeler, Riehen, near Basel, Switzerland, until 25 May.

To buy The Art Newspaper’s guidebook The Year Ahead 2026, an authoritative look at the year’s unmissable art exhibitions, museum openings and significant art events, visit theartnewspapershop.com. £14.99 or the equivalent in your currency.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art in Washington, D.C. this week opens Here: Pride and Belonging in African Art, a new exhibition focusing on LGBTQ+ artists from across Africa and its diaspora. Ben Luke talks to its co-curator, Kevin Dumouchelle, about the exhibition and forthcoming book. We explore the cultural effects of the protests in Iran that began at the end of last year, and the brutal crackdown that followed, with Sarvy Garenpayeh, one of The Art Newspaper’s reporters on the Middle East. Sarvy has attempted to contact art workers after the Iranian government cut off the internet two weeks ago. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Louise Nevelson’s Moon Garden Plus One (1958), a landmark installation first staged in New York that is being reprised, at least in part, in a new survey of the American sculptor’s work at the Centre Pompidou-Metz in Metz, France. We speak to the curator of the exhibition, Anne Horvath.

Here: Pride and Belonging in African Art, National Museum of African Art, Washington, D.C., 23 January–23 August. The related book, published by Smithsonian Books, will be available later this year.

The London gallery Ab-Anbar, which was founded in Tehran in 2014, has announced that it has extended its solo exhibition of the Iranian artist Amin Bagheri’s work until 22 February. The gallery has been hosting what it describes as “moments of togetherness for its London community: a space to gather, talk, and be together”, in solidarity with the people of Iran.

Louise Nevelson: Mrs. N’s Palace, Centre Pompidou-Metz, Metz, France, 24 January-31 August

To buy The Art Newspaper’s guidebook The Year Ahead 2026, an authoritative look at the year’s unmissable art exhibitions, museum openings and significant art events, visit theartnewspapershop.com. £14.99 or the equivalent in your currency.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As the British Museum opens Hawaiʻi: a kingdom crossing oceans, Ben Luke takes a tour of the exhibition with the museum’s head of Oceania, Alice Christophe. We also hear about the museum’s fresh approach to the stewardship of its collection of Hawaiian objects and materials. In Venice, one of the most famous palazzi on the Grand Canal, the Ca’ Dario, is up for sale and we discuss the building, its history and its supposed curse with the founder of The Art Newspaper and former chair of the Venice in Peril charity, Anna Somers Cocks. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Bathtub (1961-87), a late work made by Joseph Beuys, cast in bronze after his death in 1986. It is at the centre of a new show of Beuys’s work at the Thaddaeus Ropac gallery in London, and I speak to Thaddaeus Ropac about the sculpture and its long journey to completion.

Hawaiʻi: a kingdom crossing oceans, British Museum, London, until 25 May 2026.
Joseph Beuys: Bathtub for a Heroine, Thaddaeus Ropac, London, until 21 March.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.