After five years of renovations, delays and even the replacement of former head Anne Baldassari, the Pablo Picasso Museum in Paris’s Marais District has reopened to strong reviews and even stronger attendance.  “There is a lot of fluidity,” says new director Laurent Le Bon. “One can move around much more easily than before, one has a freedom which goes well with the spirit and the works of Picasso.” (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…)

Miami collector Gary Nader has announced plans for his new museum, focusing on Latin American art and featuring about 600 paintings, drawings and sculptures from his personal collection.  “The influence of Latin America in the U.S. is extremely prominent,” he says. “We want to tell the story.” (more…)

The Louvre is reportedly loaning over 300 works to its new museum in Abu Dhabi, The Guardian reports, including works by Monet, Leonardo da Vinci, Van Gogh and Matisse.  “This will be the first time many of these works will travel to Abu Dhabi or even the Middle East, and are a rare opportunity to see important art from French museums,” said Sultan bin Tahnoon al-Nahyan, chairman of the Abu Dhabi Tourism & Culture Authority. (more…)

The Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney Studio in Greenwich Village, the arts studio and salon that once served as the original home of the Whitney Museum, has been named a National Treasure by the National Trust, calling it “the cradle of the modern American art movement.” (more…)

The New York Times profiles the work of Bernard Arnault in building the Museum for the Fondation Luis Vuitton’s expansive art collection, a massive structure in Paris’s Bois de Boulogne.  “We don’t speak of numbers when we speak of a dream,” he says when asked about the final cost of the building. “Let’s just say it is a very expensive sculpture.” (more…)

The Guggenheim Museum has announced plans to open a new location in New York City, which will house the institution’s archives and library, with possible new space for public engagement.   (more…)

Three of France’s most popular musuems, The Louvre, The Musee d’Orsay and The Palace of Versailles, will soon be open to visitors every day, the French government announced. The move “will allow better access for the public and better access to the works,” according to the French Culture Ministry. (more…)

Space Group, an iconic building in downtown Seoul, has been converted into an art museum.  The Ariano Museum, opened by collectoer Kim Chang-il opened this month with a show of works from Mr. Kim’s collection, over 200 pieces by 43 international artists, including notable pieces by Subodh Gupta and Marc Quinn.   (more…)

The Tate Modern has announced the attendance figures from the just-closed Matisse Cut-Outs show, which tallied over 500 million visitors during its run, making it the most highly attended exhibition in museum history.  “The fact that the works have not been brought together for 40 years captured people’s imaginations,” said Director Nicholas Serota. (more…)

The Texas Department of Transportation has reached a decision to classify the Prada Marfa installation by Elmgreen and Dragset as a museum, thus saving it from a possible removal.  “TxDOT appreciates and values the cultural significance of Prada Marfa, and we are happy to have found a win-win solution that keeps it in its current location,” said department deputy executive John Barton. (more…)

A recent article in Forbes analyzes current taxing strategies in the UK and Mexico, which allow fine artists to pay part or all of their taxes with their work.  Called “Acceptance-in-Lieu,” the program offers a tax alternative that allows governments to grow their national collection while collecting a higher percentage of owed tax.  “You have to admire the simplicity of it,” says contributor Robert Wood.  “Say an artist sells one to five pieces of art in one year. He then donates a work of equal value to the state. The more you sell, the more you hand over for taxes.” (more…)

Dia Art Foundation has announced Jessica Morgan (curator of international art at London’s Tate Modern) will take over for Philippe Vergne as director of the New York arts organization.  Morgan has a challenging road ahead of her, including stalled plans for Dia to build a new museum for its collection between Chelsea and the Meatpacking District, and will seek to negotiate the demands of such a space with the foundation’s longstanding commitment to living artists.  “It has to be a relationship that’s relevant to the current moment,” she says. “It can’t rest on a notion of its past.” (more…)

Tate Liverpool has announced plans to open an exhibition focusing on the work of Andy Warhol this November, the first major solo exhibition of the artist’s work in Northern England.  The expansive exhibition will include over 100 works from the artist’s career, and will also include a recreation of the Exploding Plastic Inevitable. (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…)

A new participatory work by Rikrit Tiravanija has been installed at the Leeum Samsung Museum of Art in Seoul.  The work, titled Demo Station No. 5, is an open stage installed inside the museum, allowing for performances, relaxation and iteration between guests, artists and members of the institution. “I want people to move around like they are in their daily life. Part of my interest is always to break down the distance between what we think of as art or high art and what we do in our daily life,” Tiravanija says. (more…)

Pierre Hyghe is profiled in the New York Times this week, previewing the artist’s long awaited retrospective at LACMA, and noting the demanding focus Huyghe’s work often requires of curators, in particular his pieces incorporating live animals and actors.  “We have meetings just to talk about the living elements, which isn’t something that usually happens to you as a curator,” says organizer Jarrett Gregory. (more…)

The Centre Pomidou has announced that it will be opening a temporary pop-up location next year in the Spanish city of Málaga, the home town of Pablo Picasso, and will bring a series of exhibitions of works from the Pompidou Collection to the city.  In turn, Málaga will pay a fee of €2.1 million, which offsets the deficit currently faced by the Pompidou for its 2014 operating budget.  “The current financial situation is pushing us to be creative in ways we did not have to be before,” said president Alain Seban. (more…)

James Turrell’s Meeting, permanently installed at MoMA PS1 in Long Island City, is currently closed, as the museum seeks out a strategy for its restoration.  Commissioned in the late 1970’s, the work has remained opened to the public for over 40 years, but needs touch-ups to the walls, flooring and benches surrounding the open air in the middle of the space.  “We are going to get it back as close as we can to the original state, but we want it to be easier to maintain and use less power,” Turrell has said. (more…)

French artist Bernar Venet has launched a new non-profit organization, The Venet Foundation will exhibit a collection of works the artist collected from close friends like Donald Judd, Yves Klein and Sol LeWitt under conditions that Vernet felt were ideal for exhibiting their works, including a subjective element to the foundation that fits quite well alongside the artist’s conceptual practice. (more…)

Phyllida Barlow at Tate Britain (Installation View), all images via Tate Britain

‘Our era has been defined by falling monuments’ says Phyllida Barlow in an interview with The Guardian about her Tate Britain commission. She points out the tragedy, triumph, beauty and the immense grief evident in the collapse of a public icon; underlining the extraordinary range of emotive qualities that such a public piece of imagery conveys.  Barlow is delivering another major show defining the notion of monuments in a collaboration with Tate Britain as a part of the museum’s annual artist commissions. (more…)

Dan Graham, Hedge Two-Way Mirror Walkabout (2014), All Images Via Kelly Lee for Art Observed

The annual rooftop commission at The Metropolitan Museum of Art always manages to draw a crowd, whether it be Imran Quereshi’s bloody installation last year, or Tomás Saraceno’s vastly popular Cloud City.  For this year’s Rooftop Commission at , the Met has sided with a more heritage artist, Dan Graham, working in conjunction with Swiss landscape architect Günther Vogt to create the work Hedge Two-Way Mirror Walkabout (2014).  Graham, 71, known for his conceptual bent and exploration of multiple mediums, including drawing, painting, sculpture, photography, installation, and performance art, has long focused on how architecture directly impacts its occupants and shapes their experiences of looking, a strikingly perfect fit for the Met’s scenic view and unique location.

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An article in the Washington Post this week highlights one favorable effect of the Corcoran Gallery of Art’s merger with the National Gallery: permanently free admission to the museum collection.  As of today, the merger is official, making the Corcoran collection part of the National Gallery, and open to all visitors. (more…)

Marlene Dumas is profiled in the New York Times this week as she prepares for a major career retrospective at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, and reviews her ongoing investigations of history, painting and her take on her success as a female artist.  “It’s not that I don’t want to be known,” she says, but “I want the other women artists to do well, and then I’ll be pleased to do well.” (more…)