Garage in Moscow has launched a new initiative to cater to disabled visitors.  “For the general Russian audience, there is a lack of information on contemporary art,” says Garage curator Anastasia Mityushina, continuing that programming accessible to the disabled “is like 1% of that.” (more…)

The British Museum has issued its annual attendance report, stating that the 2015-2016 year was its most successful on record.  The Museum welcomed 6.9 million visitors over the course of this period.  “This year the British Museum has proved once again it is a museum for London, the UK, and the world with a diverse program onsite, offsite, and online,” says Richard Lambert, chair of the British Museum’s board of trustees. (more…)

The New York Times looks at a growing trend towards galleries and exhibition spaces hosted in the homes of artists, as high real estate prices encourage holding shows closer to home.  “Artists are the tastemakers now,” says Emily Weiner, who runs a space called The Willows from her Brooklyn Heights apartment. “We don’t wait for galleries to pick us up.” (more…)

Artist Lee Ufan has declared that 13 works held in connection with an alleged forgery case are all authentic, complicating an ongoing investigation and a year of research by forensics experts.  “I concluded that there is not anything strange with a single piece,” said Lee. “The use of breath, rhythm and color were all my techniques.” (more…)

The LA Times looks again at the crisis at the USC Arts Program, interviewing former faculty and students about the continued departures by both parties.  “The administration is primarily concerned with revenue,” says tenured professor and artist Frances Stark. “They see the students as customers purchasing degrees, never as scholars or practitioners within an evolving field.” (more…)

Trevor Shimizu, Sophia’s Teddy (2016), via Art Observed

Currently on view at 47 Canal, Trevor Shimizu has realized a swirling fantasia of parenthood, a series of paintings, sculpture and video that turn the act of parenting into an otherworldly, almost surreal experience through his ragged, often comedic sensibility.     (more…)

Guy and Myriam Ullens, founders of the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art in Beijing, are looking for a new owner to continue their mission of supporting new Chinese art.  “I have been a patron of the arts in China for over thirty years and have found this a hugely interesting and fascinating experience,” Guy Ullens says. “I’m now in my eighties and need to look at how to hand over the stewardship of the UCCA and my art collection to younger patrons of the arts.”  (more…)

In an attempt to expand its footprint on the West Coast, Sotheby’s has hired Gagosian Los Angeles Director Candy Coleman as a contemporary art specialist.  “Candy is an established market powerhouse, and she brings to Sotheby’s extensive private sale experience, as well as a commitment to artists over the long term,” Amy Cappellazzo, the chairman of the fine art division at Sotheby’s. (more…)

Henry Moore, Reclining Figure Festival (1951), via Christie’s

Adding one final sale to the end of a long two weeks of auctions, Christie’s “Defining British Art” Sale this past evening notched an impressive last set of sales for the spring season, pushing a 29-lot sale of works ranging from Impressionist Masterpieces to Modernist Sculpture to Contemporary pieces to an impressive £99,479,500 final tally.  The sale saw only two works go unsold over the course of the evening, and offering an exclamation point at the end of a week that did much to challenge assumptions over the impact of the Brexit on market health in Europe.

John Constable, View on the Stour near Dedham, full-scale sketch (c. 1821), via Christie’s

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The WSJ looks at the collection of Greek magnate Basil Goulandris, which currently sits at the center of a major legal dispute surrounding the ownership of a series of works sold to an offshore corporation shortly before Goulandris passed away.  The works were intended for a museum in Athens, but many in Goulandris’s family are fighting for what they consider their inheritance.  “I’m keeping my walls empty until my paintings come home to me,” says Goulandris’s niece Aspasia Zaimis, who is suing for the works. (more…)

Sotheby’s Helena Newman spoke with the New York Times this week, registering her disregard for the Brexit’s influence on the European auction market.  “Whatever is going on, if you have something really great or really rare, that will ride out any concerns,” she says. “There continue to be global collectors who are looking for museum-quality work.” (more…)

The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam has made 250,000 works from its huge collection available for free online viewing or free download.  The museum’s impressive collection of Dutch Masters and 17th Century European works will now be available for all to view online and download for use. (more…)

An arrest has been made in connection with the theft of a trailer housing works by Matisse and Chagall earlier this year, the LA Times reports.  Robert Michael Slayton was taken into custody when the trailer was found, stripped, in his backyard, with $120,000 worth of art still in his possession.  Some works remain missing. (more…)