The Pentagon has cracked down on Guantanamo Bay prisoners’ art, claiming that all works created while in the notorious prison is the property of the U.S. government. “My clients were told that their art would no longer be processed for release,” says Ramzi Kassem, a professor at the City University of New York School of Law and lawyer who represents three men held at Guantánamo Bay. “And then one of my clients was told that, even if he were ever to be released, that he would not be able to take his art with him, and that it would be incinerated.” (more…)

The Whitney has acquired 32 works from the 2017 edition of the Whitney Biennial, Art News reports, among them Samara Golden’s mirrored installation The Meat Grinder’s Iron Clothes. “The committees really came together and were extremely generous, as they wanted to mark the occasion of the first biennial in the new building,” says chief curator Scott Rothkopf. “It took a village in a way to acquire so many works, because it wouldn’t be possible with our ordinary budget.” (more…)

John Baldessari is interviewed in The Guardian this week, as he prepares a body of large-scale emoji paintings continuing his conflations of text and image. “The way it started, was when I first saw emojis I thought, ‘How would they look if they were blown up large?’” he says. “Which I did and I liked the way they looked. I said, ‘I’m gonna make some paintings with giant emojis.’ And that’s it.” (more…)

Jake Gyllenhaal is preparing for an untitled Netflix film that will see him play an art critic in Los Angeles, Art News reports. An unnamed source notes the film is a “revealing look at the art market in L.A. that involves billionaire collectors, gallerists, auctions, and sales.” (more…)

Maria Balshaw is profiled in Bloomberg this week, as she continues to push for her new vision for the Tate. “The goal I have for the Tate is one where an artistic vision is held alongside, and absolutely permeates, a sense of our social mission,” she says. (more…)

Kehinde Wiley is featured in the Art Newspaper this week, as he prepares to debut his first feature film in London.  “The work speaks to a society willing to self-destruct instead of seeing itself in a new light. Strangely it’s about Brexit,” he says. (more…)

Documenta CEO Annette Kulenkampff is leaving her post with the institution, following an edition of the event that ran a major deficit of upwards of €5 million. “We overshot the budget because of circumstances that were unknown to us beforehand,” Kulenkampff has said of the situation. “That is bad, it shouldn’t have happened, and we must carry the responsibility for that.” (more…)

Trevor Paglen is profiled in The Guardian this week, as he continues his work spotlighting surveillance systems and information network. “I am not a journalist or an academic,” he says, “I don’t feel it incumbent on me to make sense of everything. What I am saying is, ‘This is an image of something in our world’. You might think you know what it is, but I am going to tell you something different.” (more…)

The Venice Biennale has set a new attendance record of 615,000 visitors, up almost a quarter from 500,000 two years ago.  The show’s popularity is attributed to “a growing desire to personally and directly discover the vitality of art in relation to the daily bombardment of sounds and images to which the world is subjected,” according to Biennale President Paolo Baratta. (more…)

The Museum of Modern Art and the Neue Galerie in New York have jointly acquired a 1907 self-portrait by Paula Modersohn-Becker, the Art News reports, marking a continued critical evaluation of the artist’s work. “She’s certainly one of the most important woman artists of the early 20th century, and a really important figure in that beginning moment of German Expressionism,” says Ann Temkin, chief curator of MoMA’s painting and sculpture department. (more…)

The Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson is relocating to the Marais neighborhood of Paris, and has appointed François Hébel as its director, the Art Newspaper reports. “For 15 years, the foundation has been referencing, organising, researching and scanning all kinds of documentation on Henri Cartier-Bresson and Martine Franck,” Hébel says. (more…)

Dealer Emmanuel Perrotin is profiled in Forbes this month, exploring the dealer’s recent move downtown, and his vision for his gallery. “It can be complicated and dangerous to work with a young artist. You can be very surprised by the evolution of their work. After a promising studio visit, the artist can offer disappointing pieces for the show,” he says. “You have to be very organized early on to avoid this kind of surprise and be ready to refuse a show.” (more…)

Artist Mel Chin is preparing an augmented reality project for Times Square, which will illustrate the potential impacts of climate change on one of the city’s most recognizable areas. “We’re working on a mass phenomenon, extending from 45th to 47th streets in the air, that can convey the gravity of what we have before us,” he said. (more…)

The grave of Walburga “Wally” Neuzil, Egon Schiele’s young muse, has been found in Croatia, the Art Newspaper reports, and will be commemorated by a monument. “It’s an interesting monumental project for the European identity,” says researcher Robert Holzbauer. (more…)

Christie’s will offer the first set of works from the collection of David Rockefeller next year in a standalone sale.  The offerings include Fillette aÌ€ la corbeille fleurie (1905), a Rose Period Picasso estimated at $70 million, and Matisse’s Odalisque couchée aux magnolias (1923), which is already estimated to break the artist’s auction record of $41 million.  (more…)

The Art Market Monitor has a strong analysis around the sale of da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi, exploring the motivations of its seller, Dmitry Rybolovlev, and the strategies Christie’s used to attract its buyer, including the inclusion of the Andy Warhol piece, and the spectacle drummed up around the sale by near constant lines to see the painting. “Among the smart moves Christie’s made was bringing the work to San Francisco where there were lines around the block to see it,” Marion Maneker writes. “More importantly, Christie’s got calls from major Silicon Valley figures who had previously been tough to contact. (For those wondering who bought it, there’s a greater chance it went to someone with crazy tech money than someone in Asia).” (more…)

A missing piece of Rene Magritte’s The Enchanted Pose has been found underneath another of the artist’s works, Reuters reports. Pieces of the artist’s painting were painted over by Magritte to create other works, leaving the location of its pieces a longstanding mystery. (more…)

The NYT reports on the recent gift of $80 to the Met, noting that the donation may signal a new level of stability for the museum after several years of financial and institutional turbulence. We’ve made really good progress,” says Daniel H. Weiss, the Met’s president and chief executive. (more…)

A lost 17th Century masterpiece by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo has been rediscovered in North Wales. “It is an absolute masterpiece,” art scholar Benito Navarrete Prieto says. “Magnetic.” (more…)

The Telegraph has an interesting article on the wildly successful recent cycle of art sales, noting collectors’ increasing draw towards liquid assets like art.  The piece draws connections to other assets currently burgeoning on the market, including Bitcoin, and notes the appeal of these goods as collectors seek stable investments outside national currencies and stock. (more…)

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has received $80 million from trustee Florence Irving, the Art News reports.  “The Irvings have been inspirational donors in building the museum’s collections and galleries of Asian Art since 1987,” says Daniel H. Weiss, the museum’s president and CEO. “This additional gift is truly transformative for the Met, and will ensure that the legacy of scholarship, programming, and collection-building they have been so instrumental in building will continue to thrive.” (more…)

Artist Laura Owens has penned a public statement on the current pressure her project space, 356 S. Mission, is facing from anti-gentrification activists. “Alongside the protesters’ demands to close, we have also heard the voices of artists, community groups, families, and individuals in the area who want 356 to remain open,” she writes. “In addition to urgent basic needs and facilities, people in all neighborhoods, of all ethnicities and classes, benefit from quality education and art. We do not believe that access to one should sacrifice the other in a healthy and thriving society. I have always been and remain committed to engaging in productive dialogue that results in effective actions to battle the issues facing our communities.” (more…)

Darsie Alexander has been appointed the Susan and Elihu Rose Chief Curator at the Jewish Museum in New York, Artforum reports. “The Jewish Museum has a remarkable collection that includes contemporary art, historical objects, material culture, and Jewish ceremonial art,” she says. “This combination allows for a lively dialogue between culturally diverse works related to Jewish identity and the groundbreaking work of artists who have shaped art history in profound ways.” (more…)

Agnes Gund’s recently announced Art for Justice organization has announced $22 million in its first round of grants to arts and criminal justice organizations to fight mass incarceration in the United States. “My hope is that the work supported by the Art for Justice Fund will help create a groundswell that drives reforms well beyond these specific programs,” she says. “The problem of mass incarceration touches every community across the country, and we need to work together to find creative solutions to build a better, safer future for all our children.” (more…)