April 2, 2026
Your morning brew of art world media
Welcome to Art Spell, a daily, comprehensive roundup of art news and reviews for the visual arts community. Today’s Editor’s Pick is Whither Biennials? On the Crisis of Global Art by Tina Rivers Ryan for Artforum. Art world veterans reflect on the evolving role of biennials, offering both critique and ideas for how the format can better serve the future.
The Art Newspaper
Kabir Jhala, Vaccine billionaire buys $17.9m Raja Ravi Varma, setting new record for Indian painting at auction
Carlie Porterfield, Art crowd saddles up at the High Desert Art Fair
Fred Voon, New York’s Jewish Museum opens Paul Klee exhibition without its centrepiece
Lisa Movius, National Museum of Korea Seoul sees a surge in visitor numbers
Kabir Jhala, Vaccine billionaire buys $17.9m Raja Ravi Varma, setting new record for Indian painting at auction
Lisa Movius, Exhibition of Emirati art in Seoul becomes a relic of pre-war UAE life
Artforum
EDITOR’S PICK - Tina Rivers Ryan, Whither Biennials? On the Crisis of Global Art: In 2003, Artforum convened a roundtable of curators and artists to discuss the phenomenon of “the large-scale exhibition—from Documenta to the Venice Biennale, as well as any number of other biennials that cropped up around the world during the past decade.
Katherine Rochester, Bettina’s Obsessive Geometries: The Search for a Fourth Dimension
From the Editors, Reina Sofía’s Refusal to Loan Picasso’s Guernica Opens Old Political Wounds in Spain
From the Editors, The Louvre is Still the World’s Most Visited Museum, 2025 Study Shows
From the Editors, Hired Amid Great Fanfare, Patricia Marroquin Norby, Met’s Inaugural Curator of Native American Art, Quietly Left
From the Editors, Trump’s $400 Million East Wing Ballroom Plans Temporarily Nixed By Judge
Artnet
Jeppe Ugelvig, At Art Basel Hong Kong, Wet Paint Hits Galleries, Malls, a Semi-Secret Space, and More
Richard Whiddington, Two Monet Paintings, Unseen for a Century, Resurface at Auction
Eileen Kinsella, Experts Sound Alarm Over the New Normal of Museum Heists
Vivienne Chow, Veteran Advisor Patti Wong on How the Auction Market Is Recalibrating
Vivienne Chow, Price Check! Here’s What Sold—and For How Much—at Art Basel Hong Kong 2026
Richard Whiddington, Sinners, Maurizio Cattelan Is Taking Confession
Vittoria Benzine, Historic Watch Recovered From Titanic’s Wealthiest Passenger Heads to Auction
Eileen Kinsella, Trump Ballroom Construction Plans Halted by Federal Judge
ARTnews
Maximilíano Durón, Frieze New York to Include Whitney Biennial Commission and New $50,000 Acquisition Fund
Maximilíano Durón, Teresinha Soares, Brazilian Artist Behind Erotic-Inflected Works That Slyly Defied Taboos, Dies at 99
Brian Boucher, With 18 Exclamation Marks, a DC Judge Orders a Stop to Trump’s Ballroom Project: ‘Please!’
Andy Battaglia, A New Immersive Art Exhibition on the Sistine Chapel Is Coming to New Jersey Mall
Leigh Anne Miller, Caravaggio Documentary Will Premiere on Marquee TV Next Week
Daniel Cassady, China Orders Nationwide Museum Audit After Missing Masterpieces Scandal
Daniel Cassady, The $5.5 M. Online Sale of a Triceratops on Pharrell’s Auction Platform Joopiter Says A Lot About Where the Market Is Headed
George Nelson, Maurizio Cattelan’s Latest Work is Hotline for People to Confess Their Sins… to Him
ArtReview
Rosalind Jana, What Really Defines a Schiaparelli Look?
From the Editors, Colectivo Los Ingrávidos wins Schering Stiftung Award
BOMB
Caitlin Lorraine Johnson, Megumi Shauna Arai by Caitlin Lorraine Johnson
Cultured
John Vincler, When Painting Tips Into Disaster: Doron Langberg’s Landscapes at Jeffrey Deitch
Family Style
Kin Woo, Make Yourself at Home
Frieze
Zoë Hopkins, What Can We Learn from Édouard Glissant’s Art Collection?
Matthew Rana, The Negative Aura of Catherine Christer Hennix
The Guardian
From the Editors, ‘It’s amazing’: stolen 2,500-year-old Romanian gold helmet has been found
Jesse Dorris, Made in Fire Island: how artists were at the heart of the LGBTQ+ mecca
Imogen West-Knights, A truckload of F1 KitKats, a painting of fish: what is it that makes heists so delicious?
Hyperallergic
From the Editors, Opportunities in April 2026
From the Editors, 10 Art Books for Your Spring Reading List
Isa Farfan, Could Colorado Create the Country’s First Artist Corporation?
Aruna D’Souza, Kamrooz Aram Breaks Down the Grid
Rhea Nayyar, The Best April Fools’ Jokes in the Art World This Year
Lisa Yin Zhang, Remembering Glen Baxter, Pat Steir, Melvin Edwards
Aaron Boehmer, A Palestinian-American Photographer’s Intimate Gaze
The New York Times
Deborah Solomon, Gainsborough’s Powdered Wig Portraits Are Suddenly Hot in New York
Yinka Elujoba, A Senegalese Artist Who Crossed Boundaries Others Didn’t Dare
Rosa Lyster, The Age-Old Obsession With Living Forever
Observer
Christa Terry, One of the World’s Rarest Watches Is Coming to Auction in May
Nick Hilden, 10 Books That Authors Think Everyone Should Read
Chenoa Baker, La Biennale de Québec: What Shifts When Ice Splits
Daniel Grant, When It Comes to Licensing, Some Artists Cash in While Others Push Back
Dan Duray, One Fine Show: “Ming Smith: Jazz Requiem—Notations in Blue” at the Portland Museum of Art
Puck
Marion Maneker, Eastern Promises
Sculpture
Chris Sharratt, Failure as Methodology: A Conversation with Andrew Gannon
The Wall Street Journal
Julie Brener Davis, The New Museum-Heist Playbook: In and Out in Three Minutes Flat
Judith H. Dobrzynski, ‘Frida: The Making of an Icon’ Review: A Painter’s Many Meanings
Kelly Crow, A First Look at the $720 Million Overhaul of Lacma, L.A.’s Buzziest Museum
Art Spell is a subscription-based daily roundup of art news and reviews to help you stay current with what’s being reported on in the visual arts community. The profits from Art Spell are donated to organizations supporting art journalists and writers.