BrooklynArtsCouncil

Winners of the Russian Art Focus Prize announced at Viennacontemporary

September 6, 2021

The winners of the Russian Art Focus Prize, an award for critical writing about the country’s cultural scene organised by the English-language magazine Russian Art Focus (part of The Art Newspaper network), were announced on Friday at the Viennacontemporary fair in Austria. The €6,000 prize is being split equally between two writers: the British journalist Theo Merz won “best publication” for his article “A tribute to the Russian avant-garde sets off a storm”, published in The Economist in 2019; and collective Agitatsia (made up of Dasha Filippova, Pavel Mitenko, Antonina Stebur, Vera Zamyslova and Anastasia Spirenkova) won “best research paper” for their article “Party of the Dead: Necroaesthetics and Transformation of Political Performativity in Russia during the Pandemic”, published in the online magazine ArtMargins.com in 2021.

Cuba on the brink: artistic voices refuse to be silenced

August 29, 2021

ast month, Amnesty International named the Cuban artists Hamlet Lavastida, Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara and four others as prisoners of conscience: “People imprisoned because of their political, religious or other beliefs who have not used or advocated violence.” Both artists, who are outspoken critics of government repression, have been held in maximum security prisons on trumped-up charges for several months. The statement from Amnesty is “a symbolic gesture to the many hundreds more who likely deserve the designation”, says the organisation’s Americas director, Erika Guevara Rosas, calling for the “immediate and unconditional release” of all those imprisoned.

As organizing accelerates, workers at the Brooklyn Museum vote to form a union

August 23, 2021

Full-time and part-time workers at the Brooklyn Museum have voted to form a union, Local 2110 of the United Auto Workers (UAW) has announced. The vote follows successful labour organizing efforts at a range of US museums including the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the New-York Historical Society, the New Museum, and the Hispanic Society of America.

Frieze Art Fairs return to Regent’s Park in October—so what has changed since 2019?

August 20, 2021

After a year’s hiatus, Frieze London and Frieze Masters return to their respective tents in Regent’s Park this October, with 276 galleries from 39 counties expected to take part.

Mies van der Rohe’s landmark Neue Nationalgalerie in Berlin ready for reopening after ‘surgery’ by David Chipperfield

August 13, 2021

The Neue Nationalgalerie, a masterpiece of 20th-century architecture by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, has undergone “surgery” at the hands of David Chipperfield, a leading architect of the present century. His aim, he says, was to “return this beloved patient seemingly untouched except for it running more smoothly”.

Art in motion: Autrostrada Biennale takes visitors on a journey through Kosovo

August 8, 2021

Far from the glitz and glamour of Venice or the shock and awe of Documenta in Kassel, Kosovo—a land-locked country that gained independence after years of violence during the breakup of the former Yugoslavia—is quickly becoming something of an anomaly on the biennial circuit.

Sacred rock-hewn churches at risk as rebel forces take control of Ethiopia’s Unesco World Heritage Site Lalibela

August 8, 2021

battle for the north Ethiopian state of Tigray, which borders Eritrea and Sudan. The conflict has killed thousands and displaced more than 1.7 million people who are now at risk of starvation.

Fourth suicide shuts down New York’s towering Vessel yet again

August 2, 2021

A 14-year-old boy has committed suicide by leaping from the Vessel, Thomas Heatherwick’s spiralling climbable structure in New York’s Hudson Yards development, prompting operators of the 150ft-tall attraction to close it down yet again. The decision comes just two months after the attraction reopened with revised security rules. A shutdown from January to May followed three earlier suicides that had unfolded in less than one year.

Follow the money: Christie’s bets on Hong Kong with vast new headquarters as clients in Asia spend over $1bn so far this year

July 28, 2021

Kong headquarters in 2024 where it will launch year-round auctions. The move, to the Zaha Hadid-designed luxury tower The Henderson, comes as Asian spending topped $1bn in the first half of 2021, accounting for a record 39% of all sales. Though the shift to Asia was in evidence long before the pandemic, buying in the region has certainly accelerated over the past year, with Asian buyers tripling versus the first half of 2020.