The Hong Kong Museum of Arts closes its doors next month for a three-year, $120 million renovation that will expand exhibition space, as well as raise the museum ceilings in exhibition spaces, a much-needed change that had caused problems for the institution.  “There were some exhibits from overseas which could not be shown at the museum because of the height problem,” says Chan Shing-wai, assistant director of leisure and cultural services. (more…)

Following widespread protests, the Frick is expected to cancel a planned expansion that would have eliminated a rare piece of landscape architecture.  “It just became clear to us that it wasn’t going to work,” says an anonymous museum official.  “It won’t be the best plan, but we will go back and prioritize.  There was just a number of voices out there and we heard them.” (more…)

Smithsonian outpost The Freer Gallery of Art in New York will close next January for renovations, a major project that will add additional lighting and updated technological capabilities for the museum.  “Some of it will be very subtle, but we are trying to take it back to the way it opened in 1923,” says Katie Ziglar, director of external affairs. (more…)

The Wall Street Journal profiles the ongoing collaboration between Rem Koolhaas and Dasha Zhukova to create the new home for Zhukova’s Garage Museum of Contemporary Art in Moscow’s Gorky Park.  “The building is basically a found object,” Koolhaas says. “We are embracing it as it is.” (more…)

The Smithsonian is reportedly receiving an additional $14.5 million in government funding next year, bringing the total funding received for 2015 to $819.5 million.  Most of the funding will go to maintenance and salaries for the Institution’s various outposts and services, while some has been set aside for an ambitious renovation project for the Smithsonian’s South Mall. (more…)

The New York Times looks at the nearly $67 million in upcoming renovations slated for the Louvre in Paris, and president Jean-Luc Martinez’s vision for a more visitor-centered experience.  “I lived in a suburb that was very modern, and everything was new,” Martinez tells the NYT. “And when I arrived here, everything was ancient. Imagine for a child, to see five centuries of art, some as old as two or three millenniums. In this space, I felt the depth of human history.” (more…)

The Whitney Museum has set the opening date for its new, Renzo Piano-designed building in the  Meatpacking District location on May 1st of next year.  The news came this week during the Museum’s annual gala benefit. (more…)

Frank Gehry is reportedly in talks with Philip Vergne and the rest of the MOCA board regarding a potential renovation of the Geffen Contemporary branch in downtown Los Angeles.  “It is a priority and a necessity to make the Geffen a true public space and to use the plaza and the canopy as a civic, urban and spontaneous gathering place for our visitors and for the citizens of downtown. It should be a town square,” Vergne says. (more…)

Upon a further budget review, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors has added an additional $54 million to the $84.7 million earmarked for arts organizations in the Californian metropolis.  The money will allow for major renovations to a number of LA Arts organizations and institutions. (more…)

The New York Times profiles the reopening of the SculptureCenter in Long Island City, Queens, following its expansive renovation, and its take on the presentation of the work within its space.  “There are plenty of white boxes in New York, and we don’t want to be another one,” says executive director and chief curator Mary Ceruti.  “People come here ready to see art because they’ve made the effort, and that’s a good thing. Would I like more people to make that effort? Yes, and that’s part of why we did this.” (more…)

The New York Times reports on the opening of the third and final section of the High Line Park renovation, stretching a loop from 30th to 34th Street and looking out on to the Hudson River.  The $35 million renovation was recently the site of an expansive installation by artist Carol Bove, with more projects planned for the future. (more…)

Art Basel has announced a new crowdfunding initiative, created in collaboration with Kickstarter, which will provide a platform for fundraising on art projects around the globe.  The first round of grant proposals include collections to build new studio space at London’s Gasworks, a major restoration project by SculptureCenter, and more. (more…)

Jean-Luc Martinez, director of The Louvre, is in The Art Newspaper this week, discussing his ambitious plans to renovate and “revolutionize” the centuries old museum.  Martinez’s plans involve rehanging, relighting and relabeling most of the works in the museum galleries, and is the beginning of what the director sees as a “complete makeover” of the museum. (more…)

The Wall Street Journal reports that, after five years and a €52 million renovation, the Picasso Museum in Paris will reopen on October 25th. The museum, which is housed in a 17th century mansion built by a favorite of Louis XIV, was founded by the city in 1985 to house what would become the largest Picasso collection in the world. Closed for renovation in 2009, the museum was meant to reopen in 2011 but pushed back the date twice thanks to delays and controversies such as the museum’s decision to dismiss its director Anne Baldassari. (more…)

A New York Times article argues against the Frick Museum‘s plan to construct a tower in its gated garden, citing recent, less-than-popular expansions at the Morgan Library and the MoMA as evidence why the Frick should hold off from this “self-inflicted wound”. The tower would be part of a larger renovation and expansion, which would result in 40,000 new square feet, of which only 3,600 sq. feet would be exhibition space.   (more…)

After several years of petitioning, Jeff Koons has been granted approval to gut a pair of houses the artist purchased at 11 and 13 E. 67th St, and to combine them into a colossal mansion.  “It must be nice to not only be an artist but to be your own Medici,” comments one local renter. (more…)

The Miami Beach Convention Center will undergo a renovation project that will include more than $5 million saved up for art commissions that are to be integrated throughout the site. It is uncertain how the rebuilding will affect Miami Art Basel, as well as other art fairs such as Design Miami. The physically expansive exhibition of Design Miami’s current show “Design At Large” presents more instances of big spaces. “Having a big, dramatic space was a real impetus, because it enables us to show something unexpected,” Design Miami’s executive director Rodman Primack said.

(more…)

Following concerns over possible damages during a renovation at the Four Seasons Restaurant in New York, Pablo Picasso’s immense stage curtain painting Le Tricorne will be moved to the New York Historical Society.  “It’s going to be at a good home, where even more people will see it,” Landmarks Conservancy President Peg Breen said. (more…)

The Frick Collection has announced an ambitious expansion plan that will add a new six-story wing to the Upper East Side space.  The new wing will include a a new rooftop garden, and 60,000 square feet of new exhibition space, totaling 50 percent more room for short-term exhibitions and 24 percent more for a permanent art collection. (more…)

After a number of considerations have been addressed, the takeover of the Corcoran by the National Gallery of Art is set to get underway, with George Washington University also preparing to take over the institution’s art school.  “I think there’s a euphoria that we have a wonderful solution here,” says Corcoran interim director and president Peggy Loar. “The one thing we need to work at is to maintain that synergy between the collections and curators along with the faculty and the students.” (more…)

Chuck Close is in the Wall Street Journal this week, discussing his recently renovated apartment in the East Village.  Close bought the apartment in 2011, and has installed a number of works from his collection, as well as painting the walls a bright red, inspired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  “All artworks that interest me are constructed,” he says.  “They don’t have to be massive works. They just have to engage me.” (more…)

2050 5th Avenue, via Art Observed

There’s something particularly fitting about the conversion of Harlem’s Mt. Moriah Church by artist Ugo Rondinone.  Long interested in conflations of the human and the spiritual through physical sculpture and architecture (particularly the artist’s ongoing Human Nature series of human rock sculptures installed last year at both Rockefeller Center and Gladstone Gallery), the space fuses its towering facade with both studio and exhibition space inside.  Last week, Rondinone opened his studio and gallery, still under construction, for a private tour, showcasing the artist’s impressive architectural project, and his new exhibition in the space, a series of monochrome paintings by artist Wesley Martin Berg.

 A work by Wesley Martin Berg, via Art Observed (more…)

The British Government has placed an export ban on The Infant Moses trampling Pharaoh’s Crown, a 17th century painting by Nicolas Poussin which was originally purchased for £14 million by a private collector as part of a sale to raise funds for the renovation of Woburn Abbey.  “It would be a terrible shame if this dramatic work by Poussin was to be moved abroad permanently,” says Cultural Minister Ed Vaizey. “I hope that a UK buyer can be found and that the painting remains here in the UK where it can be enjoyed by the British public.” (more…)

Theaster Gates is profiled in the current issue of the New Yorker, talking about his work, his life in Chicago, and his current project working with the University of Chicago’s Arts Incubator to renovate and develop an artistic community on Chicago’s South Side.  “I told the artists, ‘We need to make the building work’… That was wrong. We don’t need to make the building work. We need to support you.” (more…)