The Metropolitan Museum of Art will no longer accept gifts from members of the Sackler family linked to the maker of OxyContin. “The museum takes a position of gratitude and respect to those who support us, but on occasion, we feel it’s necessary to step away from gifts that are not in the public interest, or in our institution’s interest,” said Daniel H. Weiss, the president of the Met. “That is what we’re doing here.” (more…)

Czech Culture Minister Antonin Stanek will resign following protests over his dismissal of Jiri Fajt, the director of Prague’s National Gallery. “This is not acceptable in a 21st-century democracy,” said Marion Ackermann of the Dresden State Art Collections. “Fajt has been one of the best ambassadors for the Czech Republic. He has put so much energy into creating an international network and we all admire him enormously. This will cause a big rupture—it’s a great shame.” (more…)

Now, a British Court of Appeals has rejected an appeal by collector Rudolf Staechelin to overturn a $10 million commission to Simon de Pury and his wife Michaela for the $210 million sale of Paul Gauguin’s 1892 painting Nafea Faa Ipoipo? (When Will You Marry?).  “It is regrettable that for the first time in my long career in the art market, I was forced to take legal action against anyone, and in this case, a childhood friend. . . . I look forward to continuing to put all my energy into my activities in the world of art and philanthropy,” de Pury said in a statement.  (more…)

A group of Six Titian masterpieces will go on view at London’s National Gallery for the first time together since 1704, The Guardian reports.  “They rank amongst the most significant paintings of the 16th century and the all-time great visual statements on the themes of love and death,” says Matthias Wivel, the National Gallery’s curator of 16th-century Italian paintings. (more…)

Activist group Indigenous Womxn’s Collective staged a protest against Whitney Vice Chair Warren B. Kanders this week over his rol in the production of military supplies.  “Indigenous people and other people of color are violently under attack by Warren Kanders’s manufactured weapons of terrorism,” the group said in a statement read to attendees. “You, the Whitney, is harboring a terrorist who profits from violence against brown bodies. You want our art, but not our people.”  (more…)

The Museum of Modern Art has hired Lanka Tattersall as a curator in the drawings and prints department. “With its unparalleled permanent collection, MoMA is an extraordinary place from which to build and question our understandings of art in our time,” Tattersall said in a statement. “I eagerly look forward to supporting artists by bringing their inventive, challenging and generative works and ideas to the museum.” (more…)

A piece in the NYT discusses the market behind the works on view at the Venice Biennale, and the collectors who seek out works on view at an event proffered as free of commercial impetus.  “Art and the market are always connected, but maybe in the past there was too much of a market,” says collector Patrizio Sandretto Re Rebaundengo. (more…)

A piece in the LA Times this week notes the challenges the LACMA renovation’s new concrete walls will pose for the mounting of work. “Faith in concrete’s sober virtue reminds me of all the cooing back in 2008-2010 over “column-free space” in Renzo Piano’s LACMA designs for BCAM and the Resnick Pavilion. Wide-open, uninterrupted interiors without pesky ceiling supports were touted as representing curatorial freedom and artistic respect — the liberty to subdivide interior museum space in whatever way might best flow from the art being shown,” writes Christopher Knight. “Yes, but: Art installation budgets roughly tripled when BCAM and Resnick opened, several people with direct knowledge of the column-free plan told me. Earthquake-zone building codes guide construction of those temporary interior walls. The structural demands approximate those for permanent walls — including their expense.” (more…)

The Guardian has a lengthy piece on Lee Krasner this week, touring her Long Island home and reviewing some of the abstract works she made after the death of her husband, Jackson Pollock.  “It’s mind-boggling,” says Helen Harrison, director of the artist’s Springs home. “Straight away she does this wonderful, colourful, upbeat work. Painting was her antidote to grief.” (more…)

Collector Jorge Pérez has established the CreARTE Grants Program, giving $1 million in grants to support arts and culture programs in Miami-Dade County.  “We wanted to create a fund to provide more funding for innovation, passion, creativity, and collaboration in the arts,” Pérez said. “Artistic endeavors are economically hard. We want to create opportunities for artists to pursue their careers that helps narrow the gap.” (more…)

The estate of Robert Indiana has filed suit to stop reproduction of his works, including his iconic LOVE and HOPE works, arguing that the licensing agreements for those works ended when he passed away. “We’re giving them notice that we are terminating the agreements, and this requires the judge to let us amend our pleading down there (in New York),” says attorney James Brannan. “We are hopeful the judge will do it. We are early enough in the case that I think we can.” (more…)

Wildenstein & Co. is being sued for allegedly selling a fake Pierre Bonnard painting in 1985, the Art Newspaper reports.  “If Wildenstein reviewed the catalogue raisonné and discovered that the Bonnard Painting was not listed there, its failure to advise the Trust was a material omission that operated as a fraud on the Trust,” the case notes. (more…)

The NYT interviews a group of artists on the politics of the current Whitney Biennial, and how they see their work relating to the problems currently roiling both the museum and institutions nation wide. “So many things feel unchangeable because of history, or politics,” says Calvin Marcus. “I try to get people to question their daily surroundings, and hope that art helps recalibrate.” (more…)

A piece in the NYT this week charts the ongoing political challenges museums are facing from the public over board decisions and ethics. “In practical terms, museums are on the spot,” writes Holland Carter. “Even without expansion bloat, they’re too expensive and unprofitable to be fiscally self-sustaining. Government art support in the United States is less than meager (and would be zero if the current administration had its way). Which leaves private, frequently corporate, money to lean on, and the good possibility that some of that money is tainted.” (more…)

Painter Thomas Nozkowski, whose abstract paintings, drawings, and prints create swirling, otherworldly effects, has passed away at the age of 75, Pace Gallery confirmed. “Tom was a great, innovative painter and a wonderful friend,” gallerists Arne and Marc Glimcher said in a statement. “He leaves a space that cannot easily be filled; but what an incredible gift he has been to all of us. He added brilliance to every life he touched, and his work changed the way we all see the world.” (more…)

Artist Eva Rothschild is profiled in The Guardian, as she opens her show at the Irish Pavilion in Venice. “The weird thing about Venice,” she says, “is that it’s the shiniest show in the world, and everyone else has done it before, except for the artists.”  (more…)

A letter by Vincent Van Gogh gushing to critic Albert Aurier over a review of one of his shows is on view at the Van Gogh Museum, The Guardian reports. “I rediscover my canvases in your article, but better than they really are – richer, more significant,” Van Gogh wrote. (more…)

The Getty Research Institute has appointed Pietro Rigolo as its assistant curator of modern and contemporary collections, Art News reports. “I am looking forward to joining my colleagues in implementing and diversifying our collections, envisaging new ways to present such relevant holdings, produce new knowledge, and engage our global public of researchers, students, and local communities throughout Southern California,” Rigolo said in a statement. (more…)

The Massachusetts College of Art and Design in Boston will unveil a new MassArt Art Museum in February 2020, Art News reports, funded in part by Pace founder Arne Glimcher. “Our primary goal has always been to show what’s new and to make contemporary art accessible to everyone, and the MassArt Art Museum will make that truly possible,” says Lisa Tung executive director of the school’s Bakalar & Paine Galleries. “Our artists will also feel supported to realize their vision, and our students will be invited into the process to learn from the professional artists they aspire to be.” (more…)

Japanese collector Yusaku Maezawa, the buyer of a selection of Basquiat works in recent years, is selling some of his collection this year, raising concerns about his future commitment to the market.  “Yes, I have no money. I spend it so quickly,” he said on Twitter this week. (more…)

MOCA LA head Klaus Biesenbach has named Mia Locks, curator of the 2017 Whitney Biennial, senior curator and head of new initiatives of the institution, beginning in July. “As a contemporary art museum, MOCA needs to anticipate and respond to the world around us, and Mia will help us to lead efforts to support the issues that artists care about most,” Biesenbach said in a statement. “For example, museums have to address pressing issues of equity and inclusion, and climate and ecology, among others. I know Mia will help bring attention to these issues and support MOCA in being a responsible citizen among citizens.” (more…)

Miami Beach and Miami-Dade County have invested $620 million in a renovation of the circa-1957 Miami Beach Convention Center, including a massive program of public art, part of the city’s attempt to redefine itself in the wake of its art fair explosion. “For all of the fairs in New York—Frieze, Armory, Independent, antique shows, et cetera—I think New York would survive perfectly well without them. L.A. is always trying to get in on the action,” says Jonathan Schwartz CEO of Atelier 4. “Only Miami seems to have actually been transformed by the art-fair phenomenon.” (more…)

Artist Tamara Dean has won the $50,000 Moran contemporary photographic prize has for her image Endangered, part of a series which explores climate change and the Great Barrier Reef.   (more…)

A hidden Cupid has been discovered underneath Vermeer’s Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window, Art Newspaper reports. “This is the most sensational experience of my career,” says Uta Neidhardt, the senior conservator at Dresden’s Gemäldegalerie. “It makes it a different painting.” (more…)