A recent report has noted the impact on climate change on a number of historical and natural sites, noting the increased risk of flooding in places like Venice and Ravenna, and the likely damage caused by continued climate change. “Italy is a rich country and it needs to take its responsibilities seriously; it is time to act on this,” Mechtild Rössler, the director of the Unesco World Heritage Centre, says. (more…)

Artist Larry Bell gets a profile in Art Newspaper this week, as he opens his new show at ICA Miami. “I’ve always considered everything I’ve done to be experimental,” he says. (more…)

The Hammer has announced the curators for the 2020 edition of the Made in LA Art Biennial, tapping Myriam Ben Salah, a Paris-based writer and curator, and Lauren Mackler, a Los Angeles-based curator, artist, and graphic designer. “I look forward to what Myriam Ben Salah and Lauren Mackler will bring to this exhibition. They are both deeply engaged with the contemporary art scene in Los Angeles, so we’re eager to see the fresh perspectives they bring,” says Ann Philbin, director of the Hammer Museum. (more…)

Artist KAWS has sparked a feverish demand for a series of prints at Art Basel Miami Beach, with collectors lining up for a lottery to win a chance to buy one of 100 prints priced at $65,000, showcasing the artist’s thriving market. “They always sell out and as soon as they sell out the price goes up,” said Anna Becker, a potential buyer who arrived too late. “Anything you buy by KAWS at this point is an investment. It’s like scalping tickets.” (more…)

A new UBS Investor Watch Pulse Report notes increasing movement towards online arts purchases.  “The technological trends changing the economy are increasingly changing the art market,” says Karl Ruppert, the market head of Florida private wealth management at UBS.  “There are potential opportunities presented through future growth of the online art market to attract new buyers at different price levels, which is beneficial to the health of the overall market. For gallerists, fairs, auction houses, artists and collectors, digital tools will be a key area of growth over the next five years.” (more…)

Canada Gallery will leave the Lower East Side for TriBeCa, Art News reports, setting up at 60 Lispenard Street, just below Houston between Church and Lafayette. “Sometimes being on the earlier end of everyone’s lease coming up, you are kind of at an advantage,” co-founder Phil Grauer says. “This place in Tribeca was one of the few spaces that made sense.” (more…)

Don and Mera Rubell are profiled in Bloomberg this week, taking the publication on a tour of their collection and discussing their place in Miami’s thriving collector class. “It was very selfish of us thinking ‘Wouldn’t it be amazing to bring Art Basel here?”’ Mera Rubell says. “And that’s what happened.” (more…)

Daniel Buren at Bortolami, via Art Observed

The doors have opened at the Miami Beach Convention Center yet again for another December sales event at Art Basel Miami Beach, as collectors, dealers and artists flock to its cavernous halls and pack its renovated structure for several days of sales and showings.  The fair’s place as the final major sales event of the year always seems to bring a last flutter of enthusiasm before the last weeks of December give dealers a chance to catch their breath, and this year was no exception, with collectors packing into the queue early in the morning for a first crack at the event’s VIP opening.   (more…)

Bloomberg Philanthropies has named Jackson, Mississippi, a winner of its 2018 Public Art Challenge, bringing a $1 million grant for a project around the concepts of food access and nutrition. “The city is overjoyed to have been selected in this process,” mayor Chokwe Lumumba said in a statement. “To be able to aid in the aesthetic appeal of the city while delivering a message of healthy eating for the citizens of Jackson is a truly remarkable opportunity, and we are ecstatic and look forward to seeing this project come into fruition.” (more…)

Charlotte Prodger, via Independent

The 2018 Turner Prize winner is artist Charlotte Prodger, taking home the £25,000 prize for her essayistic video work, drawng from her show at Bergen Kunsthalle in Norway. The artist, who shoots entirely on an iPhone, beat out Luke Willis Thompson and the collective Forensic Architecture to win the prize, capping off a prizer run that was marked by outcry and protest over the nominees and their work. (more…)

Frieze Magazine will tap Rebecca Ann Siegel as its new publisher, promoting her up from her place as publisher and co-founder (alongside NYT’s Jason Farago) of Even, which will end its run. “Jason and I did something that most people thought was impossible—we started a serious, high-quality print art magazine from scratch, and it actually made a little money,” Siegel said. “As a founder, you’re responsible for just about everything, from the mail room to customer service to advertising to logistics.” (more…)

Anna Coliva, the director of the Galleria Borghese in Rome, has been reinstated after a public outcry over her suspension for alleged gym visits while clocked in at work. “I am happy with this agreement,” Coliva told our Italian sister newspaper, Il Giornale dell’Arte. “I have worked with the ministry for 30 years. Now I can return to work without the anguish of the past months, even if some bitterness remains for everything that happened.” (more…)

The Dia Art Foundation has acquired 155 works by the Minimalist artist Charlotte Posenenske from four series she created toward the end of her artistic career. “It is rare to have an opportunity to bring a single artist’s work into our collection in such volume,” Jessica Morgan, the director of Dia Art Foundation, said in a statement. “This major acquisition exemplifies Dia’s unique commitment to sustained engagement with an artist’s practice.” (more…)

Artist Tania Bruguera and Bienal de La Habana organizers Luis Manuel Otero Alcantara and Yanelys Nuñez were arrested Monday for planning a sit-in at the Ministry of Culture in Havana, protesting a recent state decision in Cuba to allow the government wider ability to censor artwork in the nation. “The new laws restrict the creativity of the Cuban people and criminalize independently produced art, limiting the ability to determine who can be an artist to a state institution,” the group said in a recent statement. (more…)

A federal jury in New Hampshire has ruled that a former college professor and her son defrauded Wall Street investor Andrew J. Hall by selling him a series of fake paintings they claimed were by Leon Golub. “I am even happier for Leon Golub and his legacy that was being impaired by this whole business,” says Hall. “I hope it’s cleared the air.” (more…)

The UK government has blocked the export of a JMW Turner painting while a buyer is sought to keep it in the UK, the Guardian reports. “Turner is one of Britain’s greatest ever artists, whose studies of British life still resonate with the public today, says arts minister Michael Ellis. “It has so much significance for artistic and historical reasons that it is right that we do all we can to save this masterpiece for the benefit of the nation.” (more…)

Whitney Director Adam Weinberg has responded to the calls to oust vice chair of the museum’s board Warren B. Kanders, a businessman who owns Safariland, a company that manufactures tear gas canisters and other products that have been used against asylum seekers on the U.S.-Mexico border, opening the floor to discussion on the museum’s path forward. “This ‘space’ is not one I determine as director but something that we fashion by mutual consent and shared commitment on all levels and in many ways,” he says. (more…)

Adam Chinn will leave Sotheby’s at the end of the year, with two new officers taking over in his place. “Sotheby’s is pleased to announce the appointment of John Cahill to the role of Executive Vice President, Chief Commercial Officer, and Ken Citron to the role of Executive Vice President, Operations & Chief Transformation Officer,” the auction house said in a statement. “The two new positions assume the previous role of Sotheby’s Chief Operating Officer held by Adam Chinn, who will be leaving the company at the end of the year. Cahill and Citron will join Sotheby’s in January, working closely with the Company’s leadership around the globe and reporting directly to Tad Smith, Sotheby’s CEO.” (more…)

Painter Alex Katz gets a profile in FT this week, as he reflects on his continued output and his relentless studio practice. “I’m fairly detached socially now. This is a real endgame,” he tells me, laughing. “I’m 91, for Chrissakes, and I’m cranking them out.” (more…)

Art Basel Miami Beach, via Miami New Times

Another year come and gone, another sojourn for the global art community to the southern tip of Florida for a week of fairs, exhibitions and parties on the streets of Miami and Miami Beach, all centered around the sprawling US hub of the Art Basel fair franchise, and spreading out across the city’s streets and parks, boardwalks and beaches.

Liz Larner, via Regen Projects

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Robert Morris, via NYT

Artist Robert Morris, a defining voice of American conceptualism, and a contributing force in the development of an American post-war avant-garde, has passed away at the age of 87. The artist, who embraced a complex and ever-shifting series of investigations into the production, elaboration and understanding of both the art object and its function in both exhibition and broader cultural modes, passed away after a battle with pneumonia.  

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Untitled San Francisco has unveiled its 55 exhibitor list for next year’s fair, featuring galleries from 16 Cities.“For our third edition of Untitled Art, San Francisco we continue to grow the presence of international galleries,” says Manuela Mozo, executive director of Untitled, Art. “The range of emerging to established galleries will present dynamic works that reflect global representation of the art world.” (more…)

Artist Ryan McNamara is interviewed in New York Magazine this week, as he opens a new show downtown and reflects on his recent practice. “I think it’s a little ridiculous right now that any of us are supposed to be thinking about one thing,” he says. “You know? I think there’s this formal artist thing where you’re supposed to have this easily recognizable idea that you’re presenting to the world. And this is just not that easily identifiable. That’s kind of like being a queer person. You’re at brunch with your family and then you’re at the sex club.”

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Collectors Leon and Debra Black have donated $40 million to MoMA for the construction of the Debra and Leon Black Family Film Center. “As a lifelong lover of film,” Mr. Black said in a statement, “my family and I are honored to have our name associated with the Film Center of this great institution.” (more…)