Explore every episode of the podcast The Week in Art

As a biography of Edward Hopper is published, containing a wealth of new material, Ben Luke speaks to its author Louis Shadwick about his quest to find the truth behind the artist that he writes “has become more myth than man in the popular imagination”. In Georgia, the Kvareli Foundation for Contemporary Art, a new private museum, opens this weekend. The Art Newspaper’s digital editor, Alexander Morrison, speaks to Nino Sulkhanishvili, the creative director, about it. And this episode’s Work of the Week is E il naufragar m’è dolce in questo mare (1980) by Marisa Merz. This installation is the centrepiece of an exhibition at the Castello di Rivoli in Turin, one of three presentations in the Italian city marking the 100th anniversary of Merz’s birth. Ben talks to the co-curator of the Castello di Rivoli show, Marianna Vecellio.

Edward Hopper: A Life by Louis Shadwick, Yale University Press, out now in the US, $40 and published on 24 November in the UK, priced £30.

Kvareli Foundation for Contemporary Art opens on 2 November.

Marisa Merz – La danza delle ore, Castello di Rivoli, Fondazione Merz, GAM, Turin, Italy, until 4 April 2027.

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As protests engulf Paris, the Art Basel fair opened this week in the French capital and then it was announced that the fair would conclude on Friday, and not open as scheduled this weekend. The Art Newspaper’s global editor-in-chief, Ben Sutton, and our chief contributing editor, Gareth Harris, visited the fair before the announcement of the weekend closure and we hear what they made of it and the various satellite events and exhibitions around it. In Latin America, Brazil goes to the polls this weekend amid a so-called “blue wave” in which rightwing governments have come to power, often with the support of the US president, Donald Trump. Culture—and culture wars—have been central to their message and Ben Luke talks to our correspondent based in Buenos Aires, Mercedes Ezquiaga, about the weaponisation of the arts and heritage across the continent. And this episode’s Work of the Week is the “Blue China” Celestial Map by Yunyou Sanren, made in 1822. It is part of Night Maps, an exhibition at the Warburg Institute in London. Our digital editor, Alexander Morrison, spoke to John Tresch, one of the curators of the exhibition, about the work.

Art Basel Paris, until 23 October.

Night Maps, The Warburg Institute, London, until 17 April 2027.

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It’s Frieze week in London, and as usual we take the opportunity to take the temperature of the market in London, and more widely, at the fair. Joining Ben Luke in the tent in Regent’s Park is The Art Newspaper’s art market editor, Kabir Jhala. At Tate Modern, the annual commission for the Turbine Hall is Hold, a work by the Beirut-born artist Tarek Atoui, and Ben visits Tate Modern to talk to him. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Francesco di Giorgio’s Deposition of Christ from the Cross with a Group of Donors (Federico da Montefeltro and His Family), a bronze relief made in 1473–74. It is one of the highlights of an exhibition that opened this week at The Frick in New York, Siena: The Art of Bronze, 1450–1500. Ben talks to the curator of the exhibition, Giulio Dalvit.

Frieze London and Frieze Masters, until Sunday, 18 October.

Hyundai Commission: Tarek Atoui: Hold, Tate Modern, London, until 11 April 2027. You can see a list of the performances programmed for the space on the Tate’s website.

Siena: The Art of Bronze, 1450–1500, The Frick, New York, until 18 January 2027.

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Saturday, 10 October, marks the first anniversary of the ceasefire in Gaza. It has not put an end to the bloodshed, with figures released in August by the United Nations Human Rights Office stating that more than 1,200 Palestinians have been killed by Israel since last October. The Art Newspaper’s reporter Sarvy Geranpayeh has been reporting on the lives of Palestinian artists since soon after the first Israeli bombings in Gaza in October 2023, following the Hamas attacks in Israel on 7 October. She joins Ben Luke to discuss her latest conversations with four Gazan artists who have all experienced different levels of trauma, grief and displacement. A stunning new survey exhibition of the work of the US painter Robert Ryman opened this week at the Barbican Art Gallery in London, and Ben visits the gallery to talk to Wells Fray-Smith, the exhibition’s curator. And this episode’s Work of the Week is The Great Room (2020-ongoing) by the US artist Katherine Hubbard, the latest iteration of which was unveiled this week at Studio Voltaire in London. The Great Room responds through different forms of photographic work to the effects of LATE, a progressive brain disease, on Hubbard’s mother Antonette Berger, and the emotional experience of packing up a home in preparation for a move into residential care. Ben talks to Katherine about the work.

Robert Ryman: The Real Thing, Barbican Art Gallery, London, 9 October-28 February 2027

Katherine Hubbard: The Great Room, Studio Voltaire, London, until 10 January 2027.

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The French painter Auguste Renoir continues to divide critical opinion, something acknowledged by the curators of the new exhibition, Renoir and Love, at the National Gallery in London. But he remains enormously popular: the Gallery announced ahead of the show that it had broken records for advanced ticket sales. So what does the exhibition tell us about Renoir’s place in the radical developments in art in Paris between the 1860s and 1880s? Ben Luke visits the National Gallery to talk to Chiara di Stefano, its co-curator. In Belgium, the long-awaited Kanal Brussels, the museum of modern and contemporary art and architecture, established and funded by the Brussels-Capital Region and housed in a spectacular former Citroën garage, has become a political football, with debates over its future funding. Ben speaks to Senay Boztas, The Art Newspaper’s correspondent based in Amsterdam, about the latest developments. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Seated Sarong Figure (1938) by Ronald Moody. The work features in an exhibition at Orleans House Gallery in Twickenham, London, called Sculpting Life. Ben talks to the artist and curator Kedisha Coakley, who has made a new film about Moody for the exhibition.

Renoir and Love, National Gallery, London, 3 October-31 January 2027; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 20 February-13 June 2027.

Kanal Brussels opens 28 November.

Ronald Moody: Sculpting Life, Orleans House Gallery, London, 2 October-28 February 2027. Kedisha Coakley’s film is premiered at the gallery on 30 October.

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At the Grand Palais in Paris a new exhibition explores Paul Cezanne’s influence on artists from his own time to now. In Paris, Ben Luke speaks to Xavier Rey, the director of the Musée National d’Art Moderne at the Centre Pompidou, who is one of four curators of the exhibition, Cezanne and Us. In New York, the Guggenheim has just opened Taryn Simon’s latest project, called Father Country I Do Love You. It is the first solo exhibition by an artist whose principal medium is photography to be staged in the museum’s celebrated rotunda and, remarkably, the largest display of new work ever staged at the Guggenheim. The Art Newspaper’s editor-in-chief, Ben Sutton, speaks to Taryn Simon about the show. And this episode’s Work of the Week is René Magritte’s Le Plaisir (Pleasure) (1946), a gouache on paper which is part of an exhibition at Gagosian in London called This Is Still Not a Pipe: The Afterlife of Magritte. The exhibition’s co-curator is Jasper Sharp and our digital editor, Alexander Morrison, went to the gallery to talk to him.

Cezanne and Us, Grand Palais, Paris, until 17 January 2027.

Taryn Simon: Father Country I Do Love You, Guggenheim, New York, until 14 March 2027

This Is Still Not a Pipe: The Afterlife of Magritte, Gagosian, Grosvenor Hill, London, until 12 December.

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After a four-year restoration, the Bardi Chapel in the Basilica of Santa Croce in Florence, in which Giotto depicted scenes from the life of St Francis of Assisi in the early 14th century, has reopened. Ben Luke talks to Emanuela Daffra, superintendent of the Opficio delle Pietre Dure, which conserves Italian heritage, and Donata Grossoni, art historian at the Opera di Santa Croce, about the work and the project to restore it. The 18th edition of the Biennale de Lyon called To pass from one dream to another, opens on Saturday, across France’s third largest city. This edition has been devised by the Australian-born, Berlin-based curator Catherine Nichols, and Ben speaks to her about the show. And this episode’s Work of the Week is The Juggler (The Magician) by Remedios Varo, made in Mexico City in 1956. The painting is one of more than 70 works by the Spanish-born Surrealist in the first major survey of her work in Europe, which begins this week at the Louisiana Museum in Humlebæk in Denmark, and travels to the Moderna Museet in Stockholm next year. Ben speaks to Tere Arcq, the co-curator of the exhibition, about the painting.

The Bardi Chapel, Basilica of Santa Croce, Florence, now open, santacroceopera.it

The 18th Biennale de Lyon, To pass from one dream to another, opens on Saturday, 19 September and continues until 13 December.

Remedios Varo, Louisiana Museum, Humlebæk, Denmark, Friday, 18 September until 10 January 2027. It travels to the Moderna Museet in Stockholm in 2027.

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It is one of the museum events of the century so far: the Bayeux Tapestry has been lent from its dedicated museum in Bayeux in Normandy, France, to an exhibition at the British Museum in London, which is now open to visitors. The Art Newspaper’s digital editor, Alexander Morrison, visits the British Museum to speak to Lloyd de Beer, one of the show’s four curators, to discuss this momentous exhibition. In Iran, it has emerged that more than 140 heritage sites have been damaged in the war with the US and Israel. Our reporter Sarvy Geranpayeh tells Ben Luke more about the extent of the damage and the local and international response. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Lady in Blue, Tschabalala Self’s new sculpture for the Fourth Plinth, the site for contemporary art commissions in London’s Trafalgar Square. Ben spoke to Tschabalala about the work.

The Bayeux Tapestry, British Museum, until 11 July 2027. Next ticket release, 21 October; members priority booking reopens 6 October.

Tschabalala Self’s The Blue Lady, Fourth Plinth, London, until 2028.

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In this first episode of the autumn season, we are focusing on the news you might have missed in a busy couple of months in the art world in July and August. The Art Newspaper’s global editor-in-chief Ben Sutton joins host Ben Luke to talk about the latest news from the Americas, including US museums, and pays tribute to some of the major artists who died in the past couple of months. Our art market editor, Kabir Jhala, updates us on news from the market over recent weeks. And Catherine Hickley tells Ben Luke about news outside the US in her field, museums and heritage. Plus, we ask them all to name two exhibitions and events in the coming months that they’re looking forward to seeing.

Their tips for forthcoming events:

The 90s: Art and Fashion, Tate Britain, London, 8 October 2026 – 14 February 2027

Frieze Abu Dhabi, 19–22 November 2026.

I, Gustave Courbet. Painter and Rebel, Museum Folkwang, Essen, Germany until 8 November

Franz Marc: The Quest for a Better World, K20, Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, 12 September-24 January 2027

Taryn Simon: Father Country I Do Love You, Guggenheim, New York, 18 September-14 March 2027

Teresa Margolles: En el lugar de los hechos (At the Scene), MoMA PS1, New York, 24 September-February 2027

The Week in Art is brought to you with sponsorship from Getty.

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This last episode of the current season begins with Frida Kahlo. Tate Modern in London this week opened Frida: The Making of an Icon, an exhibition that began at the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston earlier this year and which explores the Mexican artist’s paintings but also her influence on other artists and wider cultural forms. Ben Luke speaks to Tobias Ostrander, the co-curator of the exhibition. This week also marked 10 years since Brexit, the UK vote to leave the European Union. Ben speaks to Alexander Herman, the director of the Institute of Art and Law in London, about the impact of the UK’s withdrawal from the EU on art and cultural heritage laws. And this episode’s Work of the Week is the Visconti-Sforza Tarot, a deck of cards made by Bonifacio Bembo in 1456-58. Forty-five cards from the deck, which are held in the collections of the Morgan Library and Museum in New York and the Accademia Carrara in Bergamo, are reunited in the Morgan Library and Museum’s new exhibition, called Tarot! Renaissance Symbols, Modern Visions. Ben talks to one of the show’s curators, Joshua O’Driscoll, about it.

Frida: The Making of an Icon, Tate Modern, London, until 3 January 2027

Tarot! Renaissance Symbols, Modern Visions, Morgan Library and Museum, New York, 26 June-4 October

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Kabir Jhala, The Art Newspaper’s art market editor, joins Ben Luke to discuss this year’s Art Basel, the big sales and the wider mood music. Pierre Huyghe has an exhibition at the Beyeler Foundation in Riehen, just outside Basel, and Ben speaks to him about it. And this episode’s Work of the Week is As Seen Below – The Dome, a Skyspace by the US artist James Turrell, which opens this week at ARoS, the museum in the Danish city of Aarhus. Ben speaks to the museum’s director, Rebecca Matthews, about the work, and to Stine Louring, an anthropologist and specialist in lighting design, who is leading a research collaboration between ARoS and Aalborg University exploring the neurophysiological and experiential effects of visiting As Seen Below.

Art Basel in Basel continues until Sunday, 21 June.

Pierre Huyghe, Beyeler Foundation, Riehen, Basel, until 13 September.

As Seen Below – The Dome, a Skyspace by James Turrell, ARoS, 19 June.

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The exhibition Project a Black Planet: The Art and Culture of Panafrica began its life at the Art Institute of Chicago before travelling to Museu d’art contemporani de Barcelona (Macba) in Barcelona and now to the Barbican in London, in each case changing in relation to the particular circumstances of its location. One of the show’s curators is Elvira Dyangani Ose, the director of the Barcelona museum, and Ben Luke speaks to her about the show. Among the books shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction in the UK, which was awarded this week, is Daisy Fancourt’s Art Cure: The Science of How the Arts Transform Our Health. Ben discusses her research and how it can be implemented. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Sculpture with Colour (Oval Form) Pale Blue and Red (1943), by Barbara Hepworth. It features in Hepworth in Colour, a new exhibition at the Courtauld Gallery in London, and The Art Newspaper’s digital editor, Alexander Morrison, speaks to the show’s curator, Alexandra Gerstein, about the work.

Project a Black Planet: The Art and Culture of Panafrica, Barbican Art Gallery, until 6 September. To find out more about the wider events across the Barbican visit the centre’s website.

Daisy Fancourt: Art Cure: The Science of How the Arts Transform Our Health, US: Celadon Books, $28.99; UK: Cornerstone Press, £22.

Hepworth in Colour, Courtauld Gallery, London, 12 June-6 September

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After years of civil war and continuity violence, Yemen’s heritage has suffered hugely, with buildings damaged across the country and antiquities looted. Yet across the country, there is a determination to protect and restore its historical landmarks and cultures. Ben Luke speaks to Melissa Gronlund, one of The Art Newspaper’s reporters on the Middle East, about these efforts. At the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., the exhibition American Icon: The US Flag in Art opens this weekend. Ben speaks to the gallery’s chief curatorial and conservation officer, E. Carmen Ramos, about the exhibition. And this episode’s Work of the Week is “Untitled” (Revenge) (1991) by Felix Gonzalez-Torres, one of the late Cuban-American artist’s sculptures using hundreds of wrapped candies. The work was first exhibited in Madrid in 1991 and is being shown there for the first time since that initial presentation in a survey show of Gonzalez-Torres’s work at the Museo Reina Sofía, which opened last week. The exhibition’s curators are Alejandro Cesarco and Nancy Spector and Ben spoke to them about the work.

American Icon: The US Flag in Art, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 6 June-6 December

Felix Gonzalez-Torres: Sweet Revenge, Museo Reina Sofía, Madrid, until 12 October

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The Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. has faced unprecedented scrutiny and government interference since President Trump came to power. Now, its long cherished plans for a Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum on the National Mall in D.C. have been dealt a blow because the US House of Representatives has struck down a bill to build the museum. Ben Luke talks to Elena Goukassian, The Art Newspaper’s senior editor of museums and heritage in New York, about the partisan rift that led to failure of the bill, as well as other developments relating to the Smithsonian. As part of London Gallery Weekend, which begins on 5 June, the British artist Oliver Beer will show new paintings and related sound and video works in an exhibition, The Sky in the Cave, at Thaddaeus Ropac. The show relates to Beer’s opus Resonance Project: The Cave, in which he brought eight singers into a prehistoric painted cave in the Dordogne in France to respond to its particular acoustic frequencies. Among them was the singer songwriter Rufus Wainwright, and Ben speaks to Oliver and Rufus about their collaboration. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Painting with Two Balls by Jasper Johns. It is part of a new retrospective of the American artist’s work at the Guggenheim Bilbao, Night Driver. Ben talks to the exhibition’s curator, Enrique Juncosa.

Oliver Beer: The Sky in the Cave, Thaddaeus Ropac, London, 5 June—31 July. Oliver and Rufus will be in conversation at the gallery on Friday 5 June, 12.00;

Visit rufuswainwright.com

Jasper Johns: Night Driver, Guggenheim Bilbao, 29 May-12 October.

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This season’s much anticipated auctions in New York have brought some records and eye-popping prices, including for works by Jackson Pollock, Constantin Brancusi and Mark Rothko, and some more middling results. Ben Luke talks to Judd Tully, who has been reporting on some of the sales for The Art Newspaper. The largest show of the art of James McNeill Whistler in Europe for more than 30 years has just opened at Tate Britain in London, and travels later in the year to the Netherlands, where it forms two shows, at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam and The Mesdag Collection in The Hague. Ben takes a tour of the Tate show with its lead curator Carol Jacobi. And this episode’s Work of the Week is the frieze made by Edvard Munch in 1922 for the women’s canteen of the Freia Chocolate Factory in Oslo. The frieze remains in the collection of the Freia chocolate company today, but is on temporary loan to MUNCH, the museum in the Norwegian capital for the exhibition Edvard Munch and the Chocolate Factory. Our digital editor, Alexander Morrison, went to Oslo to speak to the curator of the exhibition, Ana María Bresciani, about the frieze.

James McNeill Whistler, Tate Britain, London, until 27 September 2026; before splitting into two parallel presentations in the Netherlands, Whistler: Dandy and Disruptor, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam; Whistler: Loving The Netherlands, The Mesdag Collection, The Hague, both 16 October-10 January 2027.

Edvard Munch and the Chocolate Factory, MUNCH, Oslo, until 11 October.

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The latest edition of Frieze New York is open now and we hear all about this year’s fair from The Art Newspaper’s editor-in-chief in the Americas, Ben Sutton, and our art market editor, Kabir Jhala. Cupid Complaining to Venus (1526-27), a painting by Lucas Cranach the Elder in the National Gallery in London has long been known to have a complicated provenance and was once in the possession of Adolf Hitler. In The Art Newspaper’s May print edition, a photograph of the work in Hitler’s Munich apartment is reproduced for the first time in an English-language publication. Ben Luke talks to Martin Bailey, our special correspondent in London, who has been following this story since the 1990s, about the latest news. And this episode’s Work of the Week is the Glamour Posse series from the early 1990s by the British photographer Ajamu X. The work features in Gender Stories, a UK touring exhibition that this week opens at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool, and Ben speaks to the head of the gallery, Charlotte Keenan.

Frieze New York continues until Sunday, 17 May, Esther continues until 16 May and Tefaf is on until 19 May.

Gender Stories, Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, 16 May-31 August.

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It’s Venice Biennale opening week and so, as ever, this episode is our Venice special. The Biennale comprises many aspects: an international exhibition that this year features more than 100 artists in the Central Pavilion in the Giardini—Venice’s easternmost gardens—and the Arsenale, the historic Venetian shipyards, as well as national pavilions and, across the city, countless official collateral exhibitions alongside major museum shows, performances and other interventions. We bring you our immediate impressions of this year’s offering: Louisa Buck, Jane Morris and host Ben Luke review the main exhibition, In Minor Keys, curated by the late Koyo Kouoh and realised by five of her collaborators. Ben talks to two artists: Gabrielle Goliath whose work for the South African pavilion was cancelled and is being staged in a church in the heart of Venice, and Lubaina Himid, who is showing in the British pavilion in the Giardini. He also meets the writer and thinker Saidiya Hartman, two of whose essays have inspired a production called Minor Music at the End of the World, staged at Venice’s Goldoni Theatre and featuring contributions from, among others, the artists Arthur Jafa, Precious Okoyomon and Okwui Okpokwaseli. And The Art Newspaper’s digital editor, Alexander Morrison, talks to Daniella Kaliada, one of the team behind Official. Unofficial. Belarus., a collateral art project by Belarus Free Theatre. Finally, we always end our Venice specials with a historic masterpiece, and in this episode’s Work of the Week, we look at two: Jacopo Tintoretto’s The Last Supper and The Israelites in the Desert of 1591-92, the pair of paintings made for the presbytery of the Basilica of San Giorgio Maggiore. The paintings have just returned to the basilica after a major conservation project, funded by the charity Save Venice, and Ben spoke to Save Venice’s Senior Researcher, Gabriele Matino, about them.

In Minor Keys, 9 May-22 November

Gabrielle Goliath: Elegy, Chiesa di Sant’Antonin, 5 May-31 July

Predicting History: Testing Translation, British Pavilion, 9 May-22 November

Official. Unofficial. Belarus., Chiesa di San Giovanni Evangelista di Venezia, 9 May-22 November

Visit savevenice.org

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The largest career survey of the great 17th-century Spanish master Francisco de Zurbarán since the 1980s opens this weekend at the National Gallery in London. It presents a more rounded perspective on an artist best known for his austere paintings of saints and other religious subjects. Ben Luke takes a tour of the show with its co-curator, Francesca Whitlum-Cooper. The latest edition of the Carnegie International, held at the Carnegie Museum of Art and several other venues in Pittsburgh, also opens this weekend. This 59th iteration of the exhibition, which happens every four years, is called If the word we, and Ben speaks to the director of the museum, Eric Crosby. And this episode’s Work of the Week is one of the five painted versions of Ennui, made around 1914 by Walter Sickert. The painting features in the exhibition Walter Sickert: Working Notes at Charleston in Lewes in Sussex, UK, part of the organisation based in the former home of the Bloomsbury linchpins Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant. Ben talks to Robert Travers, the founder of the gallery Piano Nobile, who curated the exhibition in partnership with Charleston.

Zurbarán, National Gallery, London, 2 May-23 August; Musée du Louvre, Paris, 7 October-25 January 2027; Art Institute of Chicago, 28 February-20 June 2027

If the word we, 59th Carnegie International, 2 May-3 January 2027

Walter Sickert: Working Notes, Charleston in Lewes, 2 May–11 October 2026.

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This Sunday, 26 April, marks the 40th anniversary of the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear reactor in Soviet Ukraine. It is the most serious disaster ever to occur in the nuclear power industry, with widespread effects then and now. An exhibition at the Nikolaikirche in Potsdam, Germany, called The Chernobyl disaster: 40 years ago and yet still relevant, continues until Monday 27 April, and Ben Luke speaks to one of its organisers, Olha Kovalevska. A new exhibition at Munch, the museum in Oslo, explores the work of Paula Rego, with new research on her interest in the artist after whom the museum is named, Edvard Munch. Ben speaks to the curator of the exhibition, which is called Paula Rego: Dance Among Thorns, Kari J. Brandtzæg. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Convolvulus (1940) by Gluck, the mononymous British painter. The picture is part of the exhibition called Handpicked: Painting Flowers from 1900 to Today, which opens this weekend at Kettle’s Yard in Cambridge, UK. Ben speaks to its co-curator, Naomi Polonsky, about the work.

The Chernobyl disaster: 40 years ago and yet still relevant, Nikolaikirche, Potsdam, Germany, until 27 April.

Paula Rego – Dance Among Thorns, Munch, Oslo, 24 April-2 August; Paula Rego: Story Line, Victoria Miro, London, until 23 May.

Handpicked: Painting Flowers from 1900 to Today, Kettle’s Yard, Cambridge, 25 April-6 September

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Two museum openings feature on this week’s podcast—V&A East in London and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

In our 300th episode in 2024, Gus Casely Hayford, the director of the V&A East, told us about the community-driven programming at the museum and its connection with its local environment in East London. Now, as the museum opens, he takes Ben Luke on a tour of its commissions, displays and its first exhibition, The Music is Black: A British Story. In California, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Lacma) has just opened its new building by the Swiss architect Peter Zumthor, which cost more than $700m, and has generated some controversy. Ben speaks to our correspondent in Los Angeles, Jori Finkel, about the new building and the debate about its scale, its cost, its suitability for LA and whether Angelinos and tourists will take to Zumthor’s building. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Satan Smiting Job with Sore Boils (around 1826) by the great 18th-century artist and poet, William Blake. The work is part of a new exhibition at the National Gallery of Ireland, called William Blake: The Age of Romantic Fantasy, which opened this week. Ben speaks to the exhibition’s co-curator, Anne Hodge, about the work.

V&A East opens on Saturday, 18 April.

Lacma member previews begin on 19 April, before the full opening to non-members in early May.

William Blake: The Age of Romantic Fantasy, National Gallery of Ireland, until 19 July.

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Three artists who in different ways connect to the Surrealist movement are the subject of this week’s podcast. At the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the first major US survey of the full career of Marcel Duchamp since 1973 opens this weekend, before travelling later in the year to Philadelphia. Ben Luke talks to its curators at MoMA, Ann Temkin and Michelle Kuo. A new book, Dorothea Tanning: A Surrealist World, exploring the extraordinary life and work of the Surrealist artist, is published this week by Yale University Press and Ben speaks to its author, Alyce Mahon. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Down Below (1940), a painting by another of the great women artists of Surrealism, the British Mexican painter Leonora Carrington. It was made while she was hospitalised in Santander in Spain in the early stages of the Second World War, before her pivotal journey to Latin America. The picture is part of an exhibition at the Freud Museum in London, The Symptomatic Surreal, which also features drawings from Carrington’s sketchbooks. We speak to Vanessa Boni, the curator of special projects at the museum, about the work and the show.

Marcel Duchamp, Museum of Modern Art, New York, 12 April-22 August; Philadelphia Museum of Art, 10 October-31 January 2027

Dorothea Tanning: A Surrealist World by Alyce Mahon, Yale University Press, $45 or £30 (hb)

Leonora Carrington: The Symptomatic Surreal, Freud Museum, London, until 28 June 2026

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The UK government last week issued a response to a report ostensibly exploring the future of the funding body Arts Council England but containing an idea that has prompted much debate: that the government should consider changing its policy of free admission for all to national museums in England, and charge tourists an entry fee. Ben Luke discusses the report and the charging issue with Gareth Harris, The Art Newspaper’s chief contributing editor, and one of our London-based correspondents, Dale Berning Sawa. Last weekend in New York, the Metropolitan Museum of Art opened Raphael: Sublime Poetry, amazingly the first full career survey of the Italian Renaissance master in the United States. Seven years in the making, it explores Raphael’s remarkable output across his short life, from his earliest years in his native Urbino to his work for two Popes in Rome, where he died aged just 37 in 1520. We talk to the show’s curator, Carmen Bambach. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Senga Nengudi’s Performance Piece (1977), a series of three photographs depicting one of the iterations of the US artist’s landmark sculpture and performance work RSVP. The photographs are part of a small exhibition focusing on Nengudi’s performances at the Whitechapel Gallery in London, and Ben talks to the exhibition’s curator Hannah Woods.

Raphael: Sublime Poetry, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, until 28 June.

Senga Nengudi: Performance Works 1972-1982, Whitechapel Gallery, London, until 14 June.

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The Grand Palais in Paris this week unveiled an enormous exhibition focusing on the final 13 years of Henri Matisse’s life and work, a project conceived by the Centre Pompidou. The show includes abundant examples of the celebrated gouache cut-outs, his works for the Chapel of the Rosary in Vence, and his final paintings, drawings, and illustrated books, among much else. Ben Luke interviews the exhibition’s curator, the Centre Pompidou’s Claudine Grammont, in Paris. The latest edition of Art Basel Hong Kong opened this week amid much uncertainty about the Hong Kong art world after a prolonged downturn in the Chinese economy. Yet, some commentators are suggesting that Hong Kong has turned a corner. The Art Newspaper’s chief contributing editor, Gareth Harris, has been in Hong Kong this week and tells us what he discovered. And for this episode’s Work of the Week, we focus on a related painting and dress. The painting is Salvador Dalí’s Necrophiliac Spring (1936), which was owned by the fashion designer Elsa Schiaparelli; the dress is the Tears Dress with Veil, from Schiaparelli’s Circus Collection of 1938, made with a fabric designed by Dalí. The painting and the garment are in Schiaparelli: Fashion Becomes Art at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, which opens this weekend, and Ben talks to Rosalind McKeever, one of the three curators of the exhibition, about the pairing.

Matisse 1941-1954, Grand Palais, Paris, until 26 July. You can read more on the show, and get the full details on a wealth of Matisse shows opening in various museums and galleries in 2026, on the website or app.

Art Basel Hong Kong continues until Sunday, 29 March.

Schiaparelli: Fashion Becomes Art, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, 28 March-8 November

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The New Museum in New York opens its new extension, designed by Shohei Shigematsu and Rem Koolhaas of the architectural practice OMA, this week. Ben Luke talks to Massimiliano Gioni, the New Museum’s artistic director, and the co-curator of the inaugural exhibition in the new building, called New Humans: Memories of the Future. We then speak to one of The Art Newspaper’s editors-at-large, Georgina Adam, who has just published a new book NextGen Collectors and the Art Market. And this episode’s Work of the Week is an example of a Wardian Case, a wooden box with a glass cover developed by the physician Nathaniel Bagshaw Ward in the early 1830s. This example is part of the exhibition In Bloom: How Plants Changed Our World, at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford. Ben speaks to Shailendra Bhandare, co-curator of the exhibition.

The New Museum and New Humans: Memories of the Future open on 21 March.

NextGen Collectors and the Art Market, by Georgina Adam, Lund Humphries, £19.99

In Bloom: How Plants Changed Our World, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, 19 March-16 August

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As the war in the Middle East continues to rage, Ben Luke speaks to The Art Newspaper’s reporter on Iran and other countries in the region, Sarvy Geranpayeh, about the response of cultural communities in Iran and Lebanon, and the damage to heritage in both countries. The latest edition of the Art Basel and UBS Global Art Market Report has been published and shows that the market has returned to growth. But the details show a more complicated story, which Ben explores with the writer of the report, Clare McAndrew. And this episode’s Work of the Week is VOLUME (III – White Bay Power Station, Australia) a new work by the Indigenous American artist Cannupa Hanska Luger. This sculpture and sound installation featuring seven ceramic dingo skulls is part of the latest edition of the Sydney Biennale in Australia, and has gained an unintended topicality due to a recent tragedy involving the death of a backpacker in Queensland. Ben speaks to our reporter in Australia, Elizabeth Fortescue, about the work and the wider context.

Rememory: the 25th Biennale of Sydney, 14 March-14 June

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As the war against Iran instigated last week by Israel and the United States continues to spread through the Middle East, we explore how it affects tourism in the Arabian Gulf, of which art and culture more generally have been a cornerstone. One of The Art Newspaper’s Middle East correspondents, Melissa Gronlund, joins Ben Luke to discuss the latest news. The 82nd biennial at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York opens this weekend and our editor-in-chief in the Americas, Ben Sutton, and Elena Goukassian, our senior editor of museums and heritage, tell us what they thought of it. And this episode’s Work of the Week is the Vision of Zacharias in the Temple (1633) by Rembrandt. Researchers at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam have demonstrated that the painting, which had previously been documented as a copy of a lost original, is in fact an authentic work by the Dutch master. We speak to Jonathan Bikker, curator of 17th-century Dutch paintings, who was part of the team that secured the attribution to Rembrandt. The picture is now on view to the public at the Rijksmuseum.

Whitney Biennial 2026, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, 8 March-23 August

Rembrandt’s The Vision of Zacharias in the Temple is now on view at the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.

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Following the tragic death of Koyo Kouoh last May, the details of her final project—In Minor Keys, the international exhibition of the 2026 Venice Biennale—were unveiled this week by the collaborative team that will carry through her vision for the show. Ben Luke speaks to The Art Newspaper’s editor-at-large Jane Morris, about the show’s themes and strands and the artist list. The Barbican Art Gallery in London has opened a new exhibition of the work of the Colombian artist Beatriz González, who died in January, aged 93. Ben takes a tour of the show with its curator, Lotte Johnson. And this episode’s Work of the Week features in another major new London show: Tracey Emin: A Second Life, at Tate Modern. Our digital editor, Alexander Morrison, speaks to the outgoing director of Tate, Maria Balshaw, who has curated the Emin exhibition, about The Last of the Gold (2002), an embroidered blanket that has never been shown publicly until now.

The Venice Biennale, 9 May-22 November.

Beatriz González, Barbican Art Gallery, until 10 May. You can hear our interview with Doris Salcedo in which we discuss González’s influence on A brush with… Doris Salcedo, wherever you get your podcasts.

Tracey Emin: A Second Life, Tate Modern, London, 27 February-31 August.

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After opening a major building project in May last year and announcing the details of another in September, which is due to open in the early 2030s, the National Gallery in London has revealed, quite unexpectedly, that it has to make serious cuts, including to its staff, in the face of a deficit that could rise to £8.2m in the coming year. Martin Bailey, The Art Newspaper’s special correspondent in London, tells us more. In The Hague in the Netherlands, the Mauritshuis has just opened a new exhibition called BIRDS – Curated by The Goldfinch & Simon Schama. Since The Goldfinch, the 17th-century painting by Carel Fabritius, is not able to speak, Schama tells Ben Luke about the show, including Fabritius’ remarkable picture. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Sunbeams or Sunlight. Dust Motes Dancing in the Sunbeams, Strandgade 30 (1900) by the Danisj painter Vilhelm Hammershøi. The picture is one of the many highlights of a new exhibition, Hammershøi: The Eye that Listens, at the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid. The curator of the exhibition, Clara Marcellán, joins Ben to discuss the painting.

BIRDS – Curated by The Goldfinch & Simon Schama, Mauritshuis, The Hague, The Netherlands, until 7 June.

Hammershøi: The Eye that Listens, Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, until 31 May 2026; Kunsthaus Zürich, 3 July-25 October. Visit the Vilhelm Hammershøi Digital Archive, hammershoi.smk.dk.

Buy The Art Newspaper's book The Year Ahead 2026 at theartnewspapershop.com

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On 4 July 2026 the US will mark the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, the nation’s founding document. But huge divisions in US society and culture are symbolised in a number of disputes relating to its history and the representation of its people. The latest furore came this week, when it emerged that the Trump administration had removed the rainbow Pride flag from the Stonewall Monument, the landmark for LGBTQ+ rights in New York. Ben Luke speaks to Ben Sutton, The Art Newspaper’s editor-in-chief, Americas, about this and other flashpoints as the US grapples with its history, and we explore the cultural initiatives that are marking the semiquincentennial. One of London’s best known and longest-established art dealers, Stephen Friedman, has announced the closure of his London gallery, following that of his New York space last year. Ben speaks to our contributing art market editor, Anny Shaw, about the fallout from the closure and the significance for the wider London art market. And this episode’s Work of the Week is the Tudor Heart, an intricately decorated golden pendant with links to Henry VIII and his first wife, Katherine of Aragon. The British Museum has raised £3.5m to acquire the work, following a four-month fundraising campaign. Our digital editor, Alexander Morrison, talks to Rachel King, the curator of Renaissance Europe and the Waddesdon Bequest at the museum, about the pendant.

The Tudor Heart pendant is now on view at the British Museum.

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The first Art Basel Qatar art fair is now open in Qatar’s capital, Doha, and The Art Newspaper’s art market editor, Kabir Jhala, joins Ben Luke to discuss its impact, as well as reflecting on the wider artistic outlook in Qatar and the Middle East. The author of a new catalogue raisonné of the work of Albrecht Dürer argues that a painting of the artist’s father in the National Gallery in London, long thought to be a copy after Dürer’s original, is in fact an autograph work. Our special correspondent in London, Martin Bailey, tells us about the arguments for and against its authenticity. And this episode’s Work of the Week is actually a pair of works. That is because there is a compelling double header opening at the Albertinum in Dresden this weekend, the exhibition Paula Modersohn-Becker and Edvard Munch: The Big Questions of Life. The exhibition’s co-curator Andreas Dehmer discusses Selbstbildnis mit Hand am Kinn or Self-Portrait with Hand on Chin (1906) by Modersohn-Becker and Vampir or Vampire (1895) by Munch with our digital editor, Alexander Morrison.

Art Basel Qatar continues until Saturday, 7 February.

Christof Metzger, Albrecht Dürer: The Complete Paintings. Selected Drawings and Prints, Taschen, £175 (hb)

Paula Modersohn-Becker and Edvard Munch: The Big Questions of Life, Albertinum, Dresden, 8 February-31 May.

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The South African culture minister, the right-wing populist Gayton McKenzie, is attempting to cancel the project for South Africa’s pavilion at the forthcoming Venice Biennale, proposed by the artist Gabrielle Goliath and curator Ingrid Masondo. Goliath and Masondo have appealed to the country’s president and submitted a case to its high court to overturn McKenzie’s decision. Ben Luke speaks to Charles Leonard, who has been reporting on this story for The Art Newspaper over the past few weeks. The art dealer Marian Goodman, who founded her gallery on New York’s 57th Street in 1977 and represented many of the world’s leading artists over recent decades, has died aged 97. Ben talks to one of The Art Newspaper’s New York writers, Linda Yablonsky, about this titan of the New York art world. And this episode’s Work of the Week is The Card Players, made between 1893 and 1896 by Paul Cezanne. The painting is in a major new exhibition of the French artist’s late works at the Beyeler Foundation in Basel, Switzerland. We talk to the exhibition’s curator, Ulf Küster, about it.

Cezanne, Fondation Beyeler, Riehen, near Basel, Switzerland, until 25 May.

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The Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art in Washington, D.C. this week opens Here: Pride and Belonging in African Art, a new exhibition focusing on LGBTQ+ artists from across Africa and its diaspora. Ben Luke talks to its co-curator, Kevin Dumouchelle, about the exhibition and forthcoming book. We explore the cultural effects of the protests in Iran that began at the end of last year, and the brutal crackdown that followed, with Sarvy Garenpayeh, one of The Art Newspaper’s reporters on the Middle East. Sarvy has attempted to contact art workers after the Iranian government cut off the internet two weeks ago. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Louise Nevelson’s Moon Garden Plus One (1958), a landmark installation first staged in New York that is being reprised, at least in part, in a new survey of the American sculptor’s work at the Centre Pompidou-Metz in Metz, France. We speak to the curator of the exhibition, Anne Horvath.

Here: Pride and Belonging in African Art, National Museum of African Art, Washington, D.C., 23 January–23 August. The related book, published by Smithsonian Books, will be available later this year.

The London gallery Ab-Anbar, which was founded in Tehran in 2014, has announced that it has extended its solo exhibition of the Iranian artist Amin Bagheri’s work until 22 February. The gallery has been hosting what it describes as “moments of togetherness for its London community: a space to gather, talk, and be together”, in solidarity with the people of Iran.

Louise Nevelson: Mrs. N’s Palace, Centre Pompidou-Metz, Metz, France, 24 January-31 August

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As the British Museum opens Hawaiʻi: a kingdom crossing oceans, Ben Luke takes a tour of the exhibition with the museum’s head of Oceania, Alice Christophe. We also hear about the museum’s fresh approach to the stewardship of its collection of Hawaiian objects and materials. In Venice, one of the most famous palazzi on the Grand Canal, the Ca’ Dario, is up for sale and we discuss the building, its history and its supposed curse with the founder of The Art Newspaper and former chair of the Venice in Peril charity, Anna Somers Cocks. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Bathtub (1961-87), a late work made by Joseph Beuys, cast in bronze after his death in 1986. It is at the centre of a new show of Beuys’s work at the Thaddaeus Ropac gallery in London, and I speak to Thaddaeus Ropac about the sculpture and its long journey to completion.

Hawaiʻi: a kingdom crossing oceans, British Museum, London, until 25 May 2026.

Joseph Beuys: Bathtub for a Heroine, Thaddaeus Ropac, London, until 21 March.

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It is the first episode of 2026. So we look ahead at the next 12 months with a guide to big museum openings, biennials and exhibitions. Ben Luke is joined by Jane Morris, editor-at-large at The Art Newspaper and Cultureshock, and Gareth Harris, chief contributing editor at The Art Newspaper, to discuss the key art fairs, major museum building projects and the top biennials of the year, and we pick our exhibition highlights.All of the events discussed and many more are featured in The Art Newspaper’s guidebook The Year Ahead 2026, an authoritative look at the year’s unmissable art exhibitions, museum openings and significant art events.

Visit theartnewspapershop.com. £14.99 or the equivalent in your currency.

Events discussed:

ART FAIRS: Art Basel Qatar, Doha, Qatar, 5-7 Feb; Frieze Abu Dhabi, 17-22 Nov;

MUSEUM OPENINGS: Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, date tbc; V&A East, opens 18 Apr; Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Lacma), opens Apr; Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, opens 22 Sep; Dataland, Los Angeles, opens spring; New Museum, New York, date tbc.

BIENNIALS: Venice Biennale, In Minor Keys, 9 May-22 Nov; Arthur Jafa and Richard Prince: Helter Skelter, Fondazione Prada, Venice, 9 May-22 Nov; Marina Abramović: Transforming Energy, Gallerie dell’Accademia, Venice, 6 May-19 Oct; Whitney Biennial, opens 8 Mar; Greater New York 2026, MoMA PS1, 16 Apr-17 Aug;

EXHIBITIONS: Gainsborough: The Fashion of Portraiture, Frick Collection, 12 Feb-11 May; Raphael: Sublime Poetry, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 29 Mar-28 Jun; Zurbarán, National Gallery, London, 2 May-23 Aug; Michaelina Wautier, Royal Academy of Arts, 27 Mar-21 Jun; James McNeill Whistler, Tate Britain, 21 May-27 Sep, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam, 16 Oct-10 Jan 2027; Seurat and the Sea, Courtauld Gallery, ​​13 Feb-17 May; Peggy Guggenheim in London: The Making of a Collector, Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice, 25 Apr-19 Oct; Royal Academy, London, 21 Nov-14 Mar 2027, Cezanne, Fondation Beyeler, Basel, 25 Jan-25 May; Leonor Fini, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt, 22 Oct-28 Feb 2027; Hilma af Klint, Grand Palais, 6 May-30 Aug, Matisse 1941-1954, Grand Palais, Paris, 24 Mar-26 Jul; Chez Matisse: The Legacy of a New Painting, Caixa Forum, Barcelona, 27 Mar-16 Aug; Fratino and Matisse: To See This Light Again, Baltimore Museum of Art, 11 Mar-6 Sep; Matisse’s Femme au Chapeau: A Modern Scandal, SFMOMA, San Francisco, 16 May-7 Sep; Marcel Duchamp, MoMA, New York, 12 Apr-22 Aug; Mary Cassatt: An American in Paris, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, 14 Feb-30 Aug; Mary Cassatt: After Impressionism, Art Institute of Chicago, 6 Sep-3 Jan 2027; Modern Iran and the Avant-Gardes, 1948-78, Vancouver Art Gallery, 11 Dec-2 May 2027; Spectrosynthesis Seoul, Art Sonje Center, Seoul, 20 Mar-28 Jun; Carol Bove, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, 5 Mar-2 Aug; New Humans: Memories of the Future, New Museum, New York, opens early 2026; Hurvin Anderson, Tate Britain, 26 Mar-23 Aug; Tracey Emin: A Second Life, 26 Feb-31 Aug; Ana Mendieta, Tate Modern, London, 9 Jul-10 Jan 2027.

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Frank Gehry, the architect behind the Guggenheim Bilbao, Geffen Contemporary at MoCA, Los Angeles, and the Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris, among other museums and art spaces, died last Friday at his home in Santa Monica, California. He was 96. Ben Luke discusses his long engagement with art, artists and museums with Paul Goldberger, the architecture critic and Gehry’s biographer. Serpentine and the US-based FLAG Art Foundation last week announced the creation of a prize for artists that will see £1 million being awarded over 10 years to five artists, so £200,000 to each recipient—the largest contemporary art prize in the UK given to a single artist. Ben speaks to Glenn Fuhrman, founder of The FLAG Art Foundation, and Jonathan Rider, its director, about the prize. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Sunlight (1978) by Joan Semmel. The painting features in a new exhibition opening at the Jewish Museum in New York this week, and we speak to the show’s curator, Rebecca Shaykin.

Paul Goldberger is the author of Building Art: The Life and Work of Frank Gehry, published in 2015 by Knopf, and Why Architecture Matters, published in 2009 by Yale University Press.

Joan Semmel: In the Flesh, Jewish Museum, New York, 12 December-31 May 2026

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The Art Newspaper’s editor-in-chief, Americas, Ben Sutton, and art market editor, Kabir Jhala, are in Miami Beach for Art Basel’s latest edition and discuss the top sales and the wider mood at the fair. As staff at the Musée du Louvre in Paris vote to strike, Ben Luke talks to Vincent Noce, our correspondent in Paris, about the deepening crisis at the museum, following the robbery in October. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Helene Scherfbeck’s The Tapestry (1914-16). It features in a new exhibition of the Finnish artist’s work opening this week at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. We talk to the curator of the exhibition, Dita Amory, about the painting.

Art Basel Miami Beach, 5-7 December 2025.

Seeing Silence: The Paintings of Helene Schjerfbeck, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 5 December-5 April 2026

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After a delayed application process and an aborted initial commission, the US has at last appointed its artist for next year’s Venice Biennale: the Utah-born, Mexico-based artist Alma Allen. The Art Newspaper’s editor-in-chief in the Americas, Ben Sutton, talks Ben Luke through this confusing saga. At the National Museum of Norway in Oslo a new exhibition, Deviant Ornaments, focuses on the expression and representation of queerness in Islamic art over more than a millennium. Ben talks to the curator of the exhibition Noor Bhangu. And this episode’s Work of the Week is the Cree artist Duane Linklater’s wintercount_215_kisepîsim (2022), a piece using recycled canvas from teepees, and referencing the deaths of First Nations children after they were separated from their families in the Residential School system in Canada. It’s part of an exhibition called Winter Count: Embracing the Cold, at the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa, and we talk to two of the four curators of that show, Wahsontiio Cross and Jocelyn Piirainen, about the work.

Deviant Ornaments, The National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design, Oslo, until 15 March 2026.

Winter Count: Embracing the Cold, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, until 22 March 2026

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Gustav Klimt’s Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer (1914-16) sold for the second highest price ever realised at auction at Sotheby’s in New York on Tuesday. It was the most notable of several big sales in the sold-out (or “white-glove”) auction of 24 works from the collection of the late billionaire Leonard Lauder, and has prompted some commentators to declare that the art market has turned a corner following a prolonged downturn. Ben Luke speaks to The Art Newspaper’s senior art market editor in the Americas, Carlie Porterfield, about this week’s auctions, and asks if they do mark a turning point in the art market’s fortunes. Cop 30, the United Nations Climate Change Conference, is taking place in Belém, Brazil, and ends on Friday. To coincide with the conference, the Gallery Climate Coalition is publishing a Stocktake Report, in which it gives hard data on the efforts of its members to reduce their carbon emissions. The Art Newspaper’s contemporary art correspondent in London, Louisa Buck, who is a co-founder of the coalition, tells Ben more. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Victorious Cupid (1601-02) by Caravaggio, a landmark work by the artist, made at the height of his fame in Rome. The painting is making a rare journey from its home at the Gemäldegalerie in Berlin to the Wallace Collection in London, where it is at the centre of an exhibition opening next week. Ben talks to the collection’s director, Xavier Bray, about the painting.

Caravaggio’s Cupid, Wallace Collection, London, 26 November-12 April 2026

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Studio Museum in Harlem, Grand Egyptian Museum, Stanley Spencer

As the Studio Museum in Harlem opens in its first ever purpose-built space, a new building by the architects Adjaye Associates, The Art Newspaper’s editor-in-chief in the Americas, Ben Sutton, speaks to Thelma Golden, the museum’s director, and Ben Sutton then gives reviews the building and the inaugural programming with Ben Luke. In Egypt, the long-awaited Grand Egyptian Museum, or GEM, has opened at last. Our digital editor, Alexander Morrison, talks to one of our Middle East correspondents, Melissa Gronlund, about this monumental institution. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Tree and Chicken Coops, Wangford by Stanley Spencer (1925). The painting features in the exhibition Love & Landscape: Stanley Spencer in Suffolk at Gainsborough’s House in Sudbury, which is in the heart of the eastern English county of Suffolk. Ben Luke speaks to Amy Lim, the co-curator of the exhibition, about the picture. 

The Studio Museum in Harlem opens 15 November. 

The Grand Egyptian Museum is open now.

Love & Landscape: Stanley Spencer in Suffolk, Gainsborough’s House, Sudbury, UK, 15 November-22 March 2026; Stanley Spencer Gallery, Cookham, UK, 4 April-1 November 2026.

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The Museum of Fine Arts (MFA) in Boston, US, has agreed to return two works from 1857 by the enslaved 19th-century potter David Drake to his present-day descendants. By the terms of the contract, one vessel will remain on loan to the museum for at least two years. The other—known as the “Poem Jar”—has been purchased back by the museum from the heirs for an undisclosed sum and now comes with “a certificate of ethical ownership”. Ben Luke talks to Ethan Lasser, the MFA’s chair of the art of Americas, about this landmark agreement. At the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the exhibition Wifredo Lam: When I Don’t Sleep, I Dream opens on Monday. Lam, who was of African and Chinese descent, is now widely regarded as a key, and singular, figure in Modernist painting. Connected in his long life to the Surrealists and Pablo Picasso, and to literary greats including Aimé Césaire and Edouard Glissant, his distinctive practice was above all centred on a profound engagement with Black diasporic culture. Ben talks to the two lead curators of the exhibition, Beverly Adams, curator of Latin American Art at MoMA, and the museum’s new director, Christophe Cherix. And this episode’s Work of the Week is the Adoration of the Magi (1488) by Domenico Ghirlandaio. The painting is in the Ospedale degli Innocenti, the first hospital for unwanted or orphaned infants, or foundlings, in Europe, built by the great Renaissance architect, Filippo Brunelleschi. The Innocenti, as it is called, is the subject of a new book, called The Innocents of Florence: The Renaissance Discovery of Childhood, by Joseph Luzzi, and Ben speaks to him about the painting and its significance in the Innocenti’s collection.

Wifredo Lam, Museum of Modern Art, New York, 10 November-11 April 2026.

The Innocents of Florence: The Renaissance Discovery of Childhood, published in hardback by WW Norton, from 11 November in the US, priced $29.99, and from 28 November in the UK, priced £23.

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The authenticity of the final self-portrait by Paul Gauguin, made in 1903 and housed in the Kunstmuseum in Basel, was earlier this year called into question. Now, the museum has completed its promised analysis, and confirmed that the painting is not a fake and is by Gauguin. Ben Luke talks to The Art Newspaper’s special correspondent, Martin Bailey, about the saga. In recent years, the late Indian sculptor Mrinalini Mukherjee has come to increasing prominence. Now, a show at the Royal Academy of Arts in London, called A Story of South Asian Art: Mrinalini Mukherjee and Her Circle, explores her work in the context of six other artists including her parents, Leela Mukherjee and Benode Behari Mukherjee. The exhibition’s curator, Tarini Malik, tells Ben more. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Character Head No.25 by Franz Xaver Messerschmidt, the 18th-century sculptor who was born in Germany, and lived in modern-day Austria and Slovakia. The bust features in the exhibition Franz Xaver Messerschmidt: More than Character Heads, at the Belvedere in Vienna, and we talk to the exhibition’s curators, Katharina Lovecky and Georg Lechner, about the work.

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A Story of South Asian Art: Mrinalini Mukherjee and Her Circle, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 31 October-24 February 2026.

Franz Xaver Messerschmidt: More Than Character Heads, Belvedere, Vienna, 31 October-6 April 2026.

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It is an event that has shocked the world and prompted a national reckoning in France: the robbery of eight jewels from the Apollo Gallery of the Louvre last Sunday. Ben Luke talks to Anaël Pigeat, editor-at-large of The Art Newspaper France and journalist at Paris Match, and Dale Berning Sawa, a regular contributor to The Art Newspaper, about the heist, the reaction, the political fallout and what it tells us about the place of culture in French society today. The Performa Biennial is celebrating its 20th anniversary edition from next week, and Ben talks to its founder RoseLee Goldberg about the biennial and the publication of the updated version of Goldberg’s classic book Performance Art: From Futurism to the Present. And this episode’s Work of the Week is On the Other Earth, a new installation by the choreographer Wayne McGregor. It is unveiled next week at Stone Nest in London, as part of a major exhibition of McGregor’s work at Somerset House, called Infinite Bodies. Ben speaks to McGregor about the installation.

The Performa Biennial 2025, 1–23 November. Performance Art: From Futurism to the Present, RoseLee Goldberg, Thames and Hudson, $29.95/£24.99.

Wayne McGregor: Infinite Bodies, Somerset House, London; On the Other Earth, Stone Nest, London, 30 October-22 February 2026; On the Other Earth is booked in one-hour slots, visit somersethouse.org.uk for more information.

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Amid much debate about the health of the art market, Frieze is back in London, with its two fairs, Frieze London and Frieze Masters. Ben Luke talks to The Art Newspaper’s art market editor, Kabir Jhala, about the mood in the big tents in Regent’s Park. Beyond Frieze, of course, is a vast parallel art world, with thousands of unrepresented artists and curators keen to realise their big ideas. Hypha Studios has for some years been finding vacant property in cities around the UK to provide free exhibition and studio space to artists, curators and other creatives. This week, it launched Hypha Curates, an online sales platform. Ben talks to the non-executive director of Hypha Studios, Will Jennings. And this episode’s Work of the Week is a drawing by Pierre-Auguste Renoir. A study in red and white chalk for one of his greatest works, the painting known as The Great Bathers in the Philadelphia Museum of Art, it’s a key piece in a new exhibition at the Morgan Library & Museum in New York, called Renoir Drawings. We speak to the exhibition’s curator, the director of the Morgan Library and Museum, Colin B. Bailey.

Frieze London and Frieze Masters, until Sunday, 19 October.

Visit hyphastudios.com and hyphacurates.com

Renoir Drawings, Morgan Library and Museum, New York, 17 October-8 February 2026; Musée d’Orsay, 17 March-5 July 2026.

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Tate Modern continues to explore the histories of Modern art beyond the European and North American canons that were once its focus. This week it opened the exhibition Nigerian Modernism, and The Art Newspaper’s digital editor, Alexander Morrison, speaks to the show’s co-curator, Osei Bonsu, and to one of the 50 artists in the exhibition, Jimoh Buraimoh. Before the 12-day war between Israel and Iran in June of this year, the art scene in the Iranian capital, Tehran, was thriving. Sarvy Geranpayeh, one of our correspondents for the Middle East, travelled to Tehran for The Art Newspaper and tells Ben Luke how the art world has responded in the aftermath of the conflict. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Cakes (1963) by Wayne Thiebaud, a painting in the National Gallery of Art in Washington that has travelled to the Courtauld Gallery in London for Wayne Thiebaud: American Still Life, the first UK museum exhibition of his art. We visit the show and speak to Barnaby Wright, its co-curator.

Nigerian Modernism, Tate Modern, London, until 10 May 2026.

Wayne Thiebaud. American Still Life, Courtauld Gallery, London, 10 October-18 January 2026.

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A new exhibition at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, UK, called Made in Ancient Egypt, reveals untold stories of the people behind a host of remarkable objects, and the technology and techniques they used. The Art Newspaper’s digital editor, Alexander Morrison visits the museum to take a tour with the curator, Helen Strudwick. One of the great revelations of the past two decades in scholarship about women artists is Michaelina Wautier, the Baroque painter active in what is now Belgium in the middle of the 17th century. The largest ever exhibition of Wautier’s work opened this week at the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, and travels to the Royal Academy of Arts in London next year. Ben Luke speaks to the art historian who rediscovered this extraordinary painter, Katlijne Van der Stighelen, who has also co-edited the catalogue of the Vienna show. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Robert Rauschenberg’s Bed (1955), one of the most important works of US art of the post-war period. It features in the exhibition Five Friends: John Cage, Merce Cunningham, Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, Cy Twombly, which this week arrives at the Museum Ludwig in Cologne. We speak to Yilmaz Dziewior, the co-curator of the exhibition.

Made in Ancient Egypt, Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, UK, 3 October-2 April 2026

Michaelina Wautier, Painter, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

30 September-22 February 2026; Royal Academy of Arts, London

27 March – 21 June 2026.

Five Friends: John Cage, Merce Cunningham, Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, Cy Twombly, Museum Ludwig, Cologne, Germany,

3 October-11 January 2026

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The Art Newspaper’s chief contributing editor, Gareth Harris, has just published a new book, Towards the Ethical Art Museum, which explores a range of issues affecting museums in the 21st century, from questions of provenance and restitution to funding and governance and responsibilities to staff and the communities the museums serve. He joins Ben Luke to discuss the book. One of the exhibitions of the year has just opened in Florence in Italy: the Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi and the Museo di San Marco are jointly presenting Fra Angelico, devoted to the great 15th-century Florentine master. Our digital editor, Alexander Morrison talks to Carl Brandon Strehlke, a curator emeritus of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and curator of the exhibition. And this episode’s Work of the Week is PsychoBarn (Cut-Up) by Cornelia Parker, an installation first made in 2023 and relating closely to the British artist’s 2016 project for the roof commission for the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Transitional Object (PsychoBarn). The work is in a major new group exhibition at the Kunstmuseum in Basel, Ghosts: Visualising the Supernatural and Luke speaks to its curator, Eva Reifert.

Towards the Ethical Art Museum, by Gareth Harris, published by Lund Humphries, out now in the UK, £19.99 (hb), published in November in the US and Canada, US $34.99, CA $46.99.

Fra Angelico, Palazzo Strozzi and the Museo di San Marco, Florence, 26 September-25 January 2026.

Ghosts: Visualising the Supernatural, Kunstmuseum, Basel, until 8 March 2026.

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Kerry James Marshall: The Histories at the Royal Academy of Arts in London is the largest ever European retrospective of the work of the US artist and has been greeted with universal critical acclaim. Ben Luke takes a tour of the exhibition with Mark Godfrey, its curator, and visits a related exhibition of Marshall’s graphic novel project, Rythm Mastr, at The Tabernacle in Notting Hill, London, with the co-curator of that show with Godfrey, Nikita Sena Quarshie. Last week, the National Gallery in London announced that it will build a major new extension, at a cost around £400m, of which £375m has already been raised. Project Domani, as it is called, is billed by the National as the largest transformation since it was founded, 200 years ago. The National will also expand its collecting boundary beyond 1900 in a major shift in the division of UK national collections. The Art Newspaper’s digital editor, Alexander Morrison, talks to the director of the National Gallery, Gabriele Finaldi. And this episode’s Work of the Week is The Three Dancers by Pablo Picasso, one of the greatest of all the many thousands of works by the Spanish artist. The painting was made in 1925 and Tate Modern is celebrating its centenary with an exhibition, Theatre Picasso, in which The Three Dancers is the centrepiece. Ben talks to Natalia Sidlina, co-curator of the exhibition, and to Enrique Fuenteblanca who, with the artist Wu Tsang, has designed the radical staging of the exhibition.

Kerry James Marshall: The Histories, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 20 September-18 January 2026; Kunsthaus Zürich, 27 February-16 August 2026; Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris, 18 September 2026-24 January 2027;

Rythm Mastr: The Chronicles, The Tabernacle, London, until 14 December.

Theatre Picasso, Tate Modern, London, until 12 April 2026.

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Earlier this year, we took a tour of the V&A East Storehouse, the Victoria and Albert Museum’s vast new complex in East London. This week, it opens the David Bowie Centre, a dedicated space to the music icon. It is the permanent repository of thousands of items from Bowie’s archive, which are on display and also available for personal study. Ben Luke explores the displays at the centre with the curator, Madeleine Haddon. Last week, a new biennial opened in Bukhara in Uzbekistan, part of a major cultural shift in the country. The Art Newspaper’s art market editor, Kabir Jhala went to Bukhara for the opening event and delivers his verdict, and we also hear from its curator, Diana Campbell. And this episode’s Work of the Week is a pair of paintings: Untitled (2025), a new piece by Hurvin Anderson, and West Indies (2014) by Kara Walker. They are part of an exhibition at Michael Werner Gallery in London, curated by the critic and writer Hilton Als, which explores the Dominican-born writer Jean Rhys. We went to the gallery to talk to Als about these two remarkable paintings and his fascination with Jean Rhys’s life and work.

David Bowie Centre, V&A East Storehouse, from 13 September.The Bukhara Biennial continues until 20 November.

Postures: Jean Rhys in the Modern World, curated by Hilton Als, Michael Werner, London, 12 September-22 November.

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Since we were last on air in June, the US government has announced what it calls a comprehensive internal review of activities at eight of the 21 museums under the umbrella of the Smithsonian Institution. Meanwhile, one of those museums, the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., saw the artist Amy Sherald cancel a long-scheduled exhibition of her work, citing censorship and institutional fear of the US government. Ben Luke talks to Ben Sutton, The Art Newspaper’s editor-in-chief in the Americas, about Donald Trump and his administration’s growing interference in museums, and whether Sherald’s act of resistance is an outlier or a marker of a wider art world response. The first major art fair of the new season, Frieze Seoul, is happening this week in the South Korean capital, after a period of political turmoil there. Our correspondent in Asia, Lisa Movius, visits the fair and gauges the mood. And this episode’s Work of the Week is Technology/Transformation: Wonder Woman (1978-79), by Dara Birnbaum. This landmark of video art is part of a new exhibition at San Marco Art Centre, or SMAC, a new space in the Procuratie Vecchie in St Mark’s Square, Venice. The show, called The Quantum Effect, explores the work of several leading contemporary artists in the context of quantum theory. I talk to the exhibition’s curators, Daniel Birnbaum—no relation—and Jacqui Davies, and to Ulf Danielsson, a physicist who has suggested quantum equations to accompany each of the pieces in the show.

Frieze Seoul until 6 September.

The Quantum Effect, SMAC, Venice, Italy, 5 September-23 November.

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