Why Frida Kahlo Continues to Dominate the Art Market https://ift.tt/UAC5Q8p

Frida Kahlo’s 1940 self-portrait, El sueño (La cama), sold last night, November 20th, at Sotheby’s New York for $54.66 million, becoming the most expensive artwork by a woman artist ever sold at auction and the most valuable Latin American piece in history. The lot was the star of Exquisite Corpus, a private collection of more than 80 works that captured the breadth, depth, and daring of Surrealism. Presented at the auction house’s new Breuer Building headquarters, El sueño (La cama) had been auctioned in 1980 for $51,000.

The sale of the work opened at $22 million and quickly rose with bidders in the room and on the phone. It hammered down in just four minutes for $47 million, bringing the final price with fees to $54.66 million. With this result, Kahlo broke her previous record of $34.9 million achieved in 2021 by Diego y yo (1949). The previous record for a female artist, Georgia O’Keeffe’s Jimson Weed/White Flower N 1 (1932), sold for $44.4 million at Sotheby’s in 2014 (if adjusted for inflation, the price for this work would be $60.5 million).

The symbolism behind Frida Kahlo’s defining self-portrait

In El sueño (La cama), Kahlo appears reclining on a floating bed wrapped in vines, while a skeleton crowned with flowers holds a bouquet covered in dynamite above the canopy. Created shortly after her divorce from the artist Diego Rivera and only months after the assassination of her lover, Leon Trotsky, the work returns to one of the central motifs in her iconography: the bed as a space of pain, convalescence, and creation. Kahlo spent long periods bedridden due to an illness she had as a child and from the aftermath of a bus accident that nearly killed her at age 18. The presence of the calaca (or skeleton), a key figure in the Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) celebration, reaffirms the artist’s engagement with the inevitability of death as expressed through Mexican tradition.

“I never painted dreams. I paint my own reality,” Kahlo (1907–1954) once wrote. Many Surrealist artists, including André Breton, tried to place her within their movement, but she rejected that label from the outset. In a letter written after meeting members of the movement in Paris in 1939, she dismissed them as “a bunch of crazy bastards.”

As with so many female artists of her time, the true significance of Kahlo’s work was not recognized during her life. For decades, she was known primarily as Rivera’s wife, and the monetary value of her work was nowhere near what it is today. In 1939, for example, she wrote in a letter describing her astonishment when the actor Edward G. Robinson purchased four of her paintings for $200 each after she exhibited at the Julien Levy Gallery in New York, one of the few gallery shows she had during her lifetime.

Her reevaluation began in the 1980s with the publication of historian Hayden Herrera’s Frida: A Biography. Herrera’s research found that the painter’s feminist significance first took shape within the Chicano community, where migrant women living along the U.S. border saw in Kahlo a figure they could identify with. Chicano feminism then embraced her as a standard-bearer of the movement. The influential nonprofit Galería de la Raza, founded in San Francisco in 1970 and dedicated to promoting Chicano and Latino art and culture, was among the first to champion Frida outside Mexico. Many major artists from Judy Chicago to Julian Schnabel would also go on to pay tribute to both her work and figure.

Frida Kahlo’s rise from overlooked artist to global icon

La venadita (little deer), 1946
Frida Kahlo
MCA Chicago

Since that formative period of re-recognition, Kahlo has ascended to become a global cultural force. Her biography, aesthetics, activism, pain, and vitality formed a visual language that fascinated entire generations. “The market sometimes responds to trends, to things that become fashionable, but Frida Kahlo is the exception. She has remained in demand since the 1980s. She transcends any trend,” Anna Di Stasi, senior vice president at Sotheby’s, told Artsy. In her view, “Kahlo’s work is a testimony to her biography, a very Mexican exercise in introspection that also dialogues with contemporary discourses on the body, gender, and identity. These connections activate the desire of collectors.”

Her auction records, she added, “open the field for many other Latin American artists.”

One of the places where this impact can be seen is Malba in Buenos Aires; its artistic director, Rodrigo Moura, emphasizes both Kahlo’s pictorial power and symbolic relevance. On display are Diego y yo (1949) and Autorretrato con chango y loro (1942), works that the collector Eduardo Costantini, the museum’s founder, acquired in 2021 and 1995, respectively. The latter is one of the collection’s highlights and cost $3.2 million when it was purchased 30 years ago.

“Frida is a tremendous painter, and curiously, little is said about that. She is also a symbol of Latin culture, a figure who embodies difference and brings discussions of gender and identity to the forefront,” Moura told Artsy. The visibility generated by her records, he said, “opens doors and increases interest in the art of the region.”

A new Frida Kahlo museum in Mexico City

The painter’s magnetism also found a new chapter with the opening of the Museo Casa Kahlo in Coyoacán, Mexico City, located just a few minutes’ walk from the famous Casa Azul. The space, opened in September, is dedicated to her formative years and the intimate life she shared with her family, especially her bond with her father, Guillermo. “Frida has so many facets and so much strength in each one that she continues to attract attention,” said the museum’s director, Adán García Fajardo. “Some see a story of breaking barriers, or a sisterly, supportive figure. Frida speaks to many audiences.”

Regarding the value of her works, García Fajardo recalled a conversation on taking out insurance for the museum, which houses original and unpublished pieces: “Whatever value you assign to it, if it is lost, burned, or stolen, it is beyond replacement,” he recalled. “No amount in dollars, pounds, or euros can compensate for such a loss, because a work by Frida Kahlo is irreplaceable.”

Latin American Surrealist women on the rise

The ongoing interest in Kahlo is also reflected in the growth of the market for Latin American women artists linked to surrealism. In 2024, Leonora Carrington’s Las distracciones de Dagoberto (1945) reached $28.4 million. Thirty years earlier, it had sold for $299,500.

Remedios Varo’s Revelación (El relojero) (1955) sold for $6.22 million at Christie’s earlier this year, narrowly surpassing its previous record of $6.19 million set in 2020. Other artists from the region, such as Kati Horna, Maria Martins, and Tarsila do Amaral have also seen significant increases.

In addition to Frida, the top five auction sales from Latin American artists include Rivera, whose Baile en Tehuantepec (1928), sold for $15.7 million in 2016; Cuban artist Wifredo Lam, whose Omi Obini (1943) sold for $9.6 million in 2020; and Rufino Tamayo, whose Trovador (1945), sold in 2008 for $7.2 million.

But even with the growing momentum of other Latin American artists, Kahlo remains unmatched at the top of the market.

Although it now has a new owner, El sueño (La cama) will embark on an extensive international tour: it will be part of the exhibition “Frida y Diego: The Last Dream,” which will open at the New York’s Museum of Modern Art in March 2026; then it will travel to London’s Tate Modern for “Frida: The Making of an Icon”; and finally it will arrive at the Fondation Beyeler in Basel in 2027 for “Frida Kahlo. The Painter.”

The auction result and tour underscore how Kahlo’s magnetism not only endures but continues to rise, crossing borders and finding new audiences.

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$55 million Frida Kahlo self-portrait breaks record for a woman artist at auction. https://ift.tt/TbovCjY

Frida Kahlo’s El sueño (La cama) (1940) sold for $54.66 million at Sotheby’s on November 20th, breaking the auction record for a woman artist. El sueño (La cama) was part of Sotheby’s Exquisite Corpus Surrealism evening auction, which brought in $98.1 million. This self-portrait depicts the artist asleep in bed, covered in vines. Above the bed, a skeleton wired with dynamite is asleep, holding a bouquet of flowers.

This painting was made during a time of suffering for Kahlo. Her ex-lover Leon Trotsky was assassinated the year before this painting was completed, and in the same year, she was divorced from her husband, Diego Rivera.

Two collectors faced off in a 5-minute bidding war for the artwork. El sueño (La cama) was last seen at auction in 1980, when it sold at Sotheby’s for $51,000, meaning the new price is over 1000 times its previous sale. The sale of the work also breaks Kahlo’s auction record, which was set when Diego and I (1949) sold for $34.9 million at Sotheby’s in New York.

The previous auction record for a work by a woman artist is Georgia O’Keeffe’s Jimson Weed/White Flower No. 1 (1932), which sold for $44 million at Sotheby’s in 2014. Although the figure is smaller, $44 million would be $60.5 million in today’s dollars after inflation.

“This record-breaking result shows just how far we have come, not only in our appreciation of Frida Kahlo’s genius, but in the recognition of women artists at the very highest level of the market,” Anna di Stasi, head of Latin American art at Sotheby’s, said in a statement.

Several other auction records were set during the Exquisite Corpus sale, including Dorothea Tanning’s Interior with Sudden Joy (1951), which sold for $3.22 million. Her auction record was set earlier this year by Endgame (1944), which sold for $2.35 million in May. Austrian Surrealist Wolfgang Paalen’s Fata Alaska (1937) sold for $1.06 million, beating the record set by Taches solaires (1938), which sold for $911,100 at Christie’s in 2023.

Two Hans Bellmer works broke his auction record in the same night. Les Bas rayés (1959) sold for $942,000. However, earlier in the night, Mains et bras (ca.1950–52) sold for $508,000. Both lots beat his previous record of $414,700, set by Milles filles (1939) at Sotheby’s in September.

The Surrealism sale was followed by Sotheby’s modern evening sale, a white glove sale that achieved $97 million. The leading lot for the sale was René Magritte’s Le Jockey Perdu (1942), which sold for $12.34 million, just above a $12 million high estimate.

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How Beatrice Bulgari’s Start in Film Fuelled a Lifelong Commitment to Video Art https://ift.tt/fdcXSxZ

One of the leading proponents of video art, Beatrice Bulgari, has a life rooted in cinema. She was a costume designer for more than two decades and, in 2012, founded her own production company, In Between Art Film, which has worked with artists including Yervant Gianikian and Angela Ricci Lucchi.

Bulgari is best known to cinephiles for her costume work on the Oscar-winning Cinema Paradiso (1988). Set in her birthplace of Sicily, Italy, the film centers on a flashback to film director Salvatore Di Vita’s childhood and burgeoning friendship with the town’s cinema projectionist. In an iconic final scene, an adult Salvatore watches a projected montage of kisses. These snippets of transgression had been scissored out of their original film reels years before at the behest of a local priest, who would censor movies in advance of their public screening.

The montage evokes the “in between” quality—of both narrative cinema and fine art—that makes time-based media so unique. Bulgari explains that a video artist has the capacity, often in a short space of time, “to give you a different empathy, a different reflection.”

Art has been a consistent thread in Bulgari’s life. As well as her personal collection of contemporary art (which includes works by Damien Hirst, Lucio Fontana, and Alighiero Boetti), Bulgari has maintained a passion for the moving image. In Between Art Film has fostered relationships with institutions such as Tate Modern and the film festival Lo Schermo Dell’arte in Florence, where it developed FEATURE EXPANDED, a program helping video artists transition into feature films. In 2019, Bulgari founded the nonprofit Fondazione In Between Art Film, which commissions and produces work by exciting moving image artists and has staged exhibitions across Europe (including at the past two Venice Biennales).

Bulgari had always collected art, but after discovering the work of Italian duo MASBEDO (which reminded her of Michelangelo Antonioni) in 2010, her passion was reignited: “I again started to be in love with contemporary art and cinema.” She thought the artists were ready to work on a bigger production, while retaining the “artisinality” of their video artwork.

What followed was The Lack (2014), a feature-length film exploring solitude through four stories, centered on six women characters. MASBEDO directed the film, while Bulgari produced, co-wrote, and even used her house as a filming location. This period marked “the beginning”: Her company went on to cultivate many artist and filmmaker relationships.

rtsy spoke with Bulgari at Camden Arts Centre in London during a major exhibition by British-born Nigerian artist Karimah Ashadu. “Tendered” showcases three of Ashadu’s films, alongside accompanying sculptural pieces. A new film titled Muscle (2025), co-produced by the Fondazione, focuses on a group of bodybuilders in Lagos pushing themselves to extremes, giving a close view of hypermasculinity in West African society.

Leonardo Bigazzi, a curator at the Fondazione, first brought Ashadu’s work to Bulgari’s attention, and the Fondazione has since worked with the artist on several projects, including Machine Boys (2024), which won the Silver Lion at the Venice Biennale. Bulgari wants to go further than acquiring a work by an artist and prefers ongoing relationships; “this is one of the other aims of the Fondazione, because you support, you produce, you show, and then you have to follow,” she emphasized.

Video art is not the easiest medium for a collector to engage with, and it can seem daunting at first. Bulgari admits that it’s niche; “it’s still something that people are not used to.” But she would encourage curious collectors not to simply follow the art market.

Instead, she advises that if something captures your attention and moves you, then at that moment “it’s important to take the risk,” she said. Time-based media does not regularly come up at auction, unless—as Bulgari points out—you are a huge star like the late Bill Viola. (Viola’s video diptych Ablutions (2005) sold for $144,900 at Sotheby’s in January.)

But collecting video art can be rewarding on a deeper, more personal level. Bulgari recalls purchasing a small video work by a young artist who stopped producing shortly afterward. To Bulgari, the work has lost none of its value, and instead she describes treasuring it as “a precious thing, a moment of the life of the artist.”

Most moving-image art is produced in an edition—usually of six—she explains, though the number can vary. Distribution is tightly controlled, and collectors can rest assured it won’t circulate freely. The way to discover this kind of art is often physical, so she advises attending film festivals, exhibitions, and biennales.

Collectors can also commission moving-image work on a subject they feel deserves attention. A good example of this is “MASCARILLA 19 – Codes of Domestic Violence,” one of the Fondazione’s first projects in 2020, inspired by a newspaper article Bulgari came across during the pandemic. “Mascarilla 19” was a code word, introduced by the Spanish government, which victims of domestic abuse could use in a local pharmacy to alert the staff there that they were in danger.

“Can you believe that we need all these kinds of strategies to save women?” Bulgari asked at the time. Out of this grew a major commission with eight artists, including Eva Giolo, Iván Argote, Janis Rafa and Silvia Giambrone, making work in response to this “emergency within the emergency.” Bulgari is happy to offer advice to the artists she is working with, but doesn’t expect them to follow it: “I like to be involved. Sometimes I say, ‘Are you sure that you want to go in this direction?’ If the artist says ‘Yes, absolutely,’ I let them go.”

“Can you believe that we need all these kinds of strategies to save women?” Bulgari asked at the time. Out of this grew a major commission with eight artists, including Eva Giolo, Iván Argote, Janis Rafa and Silvia Giambrone, making work in response to this “emergency within the emergency.” Bulgari is happy to offer advice to the artists she is working with, but doesn’t expect them to follow it: “I like to be involved. Sometimes I say, ‘Are you sure that you want to go in this direction?’ If the artist says ‘Yes, absolutely,’ I let them go.”

For Bulgari, embracing nontraditional media is not only about art ownership but about engaging with culture while trusting her instincts. Hold On Miss! Isabella Ducrot Unlimited is a 2024 documentary by Monica Stambrini that offers an intimate portrait of the 96-year-old Italian artist (an old friend of Bulgari’s, who didn’t start painting until her fifties). Bulgari decided to produce the film after meeting Stambrini, who had amassed over 150 hours of footage. Curious, she asked the filmmaker to send her a couple of minutes, and based purely on the strength of this teaser, which she described as “magic,” Bulgari was on board: “I said, ‘This is incredible. So OK, let’s go!’”

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Olga de Amaral and Firelei Báez set new auction records at Christie's sale. https://ift.tt/MSIWVQK

On November 19th, Christie’s 21st century evening sale in New York brought in $123.58 million, breaking auction records for three women artists: Olga de Amaral, Firelei Báez, and Joan Brown. (All prices include fees).

Báez’s Untitled (Colonization in America, Visual History Wall Map, Prepared by Civic Education Service) (2021) sold for $1.11 million, more than five times its high estimate of $200,000. This broke the artist record, set earlier in the day at Phillips, when Daughter of Revolutions (2014) sold for $645,000.

Before yesterday, her auction record was set in 2024, when Josephine Judas GOAT (it does not disturb me to accept that there are places where my identity is obscure to me, and the fact that it amazes you does not mean I relinquish it) (2017) sold for $567,000 at Christie’s New York. Baez is currently the subject of a traveling exhibition at MCA Chicago, which opened on November 15th. The eponymous show, organized by ICA Boston, first opened at the Des Moines Art Center and ran from June 14th to September 21st

De Amaral’s Pueblo H (2011) sold for $3.12 million, more than five times its high estimate of $600,000. This beat the artist’s previous auction record, which was set by Imagen perdida 27 (1997) when it sold for $1.16 million at Phillips in New York in May.

Meanwhile, Brown's After Alcatraz Swim #2 (1975) sold for $596,000. Her previous auction record was set by The Kiss (1976), which sold for $475,000 at Tajan in 2023.

The top sale of the night was Christopher Wool’s Untitled (RIOT) (1990), which sold for $19.84 million. This work is a rare example from Wool’s 75 word paintings to feature blue enamel rather than black.

The sale also featured 19 works from the collection of Chicago-based collectors Stefan Edlis and Gael Neeson, which collectively sold for $49.22 million. The top lot of their collection was Andy Warhol’s The Last Supper (1986), which sold for $8.12 million.

In addition to the record-breaking sales, the evening also featured other seven-digit results for works by women artists that exceeded pre-sale estimates. Cindy Sherman’s Untitled Film Still #13 (1978) sold for $2.27 million, three times above its high estimate of $700,000. Agnes Martin’s Untitled #12 (1989) sold for $6.05 million, flying past its $5 million high estimate. Amy Sherald’s A Clear Unspoken Granted Magic (2017) sold for $4.1 million, jumping ahead of its $3 million high estimate.

“With spirited participation from start to finish, tonight’s sale was an undeniable signal of the strong market for quality works from the post-war and contemporary eras,” said Kathryn Widing, head of 21st-century evening sales at Christie’s.

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Carvalho announces U.S. representation of Élise Peroi. https://ift.tt/a2H87y9

Textile artist Élise Peroi is now represented by New York–based gallery Carvalho. The announcement follows her 2025 exhibition at the gallery, “For Thirsting Flowers,” which marked her U.S. debut. The gallery will present a solo booth of her work at Frieze Los Angeles in February 2026.

Based in Arles, Peroi works within an expanded textile practice that brings together painted fabric and architectural elements. Her constructions often begin with wooden armatures that are woven with narrow strips cut from her own silk paintings, producing semi-transparent panels that shift with the light. These works emphasize her commitment to heritage and craft traditions. Earlier this month, she was also featured in the Artsy Vanguard 2026, which highlights the artists moving culture forward.

“This is a moment of distinct international momentum and recognizability for Peroi, which is especially striking to see accompanying a deeply meticulous and quiet practice,” gallery founder Jennifer Carvalho said in a statement. “Hers is a refined and honed pursuit, rooted in a singular approach to visual and spatial disciplines.”

Born in Nantes, France in 1990, Peroi studied textile design at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, completing an MFA in 2015. Recent solo and group exhibitions across Europe include a solo exhibition at Le Kiosque Centre D’action Culturelle in France, “The Rose That Grew From Concrete” at the Museo di Sant’Orsola in Florence, which is currently on view. This week, she also received the Pierre Cardin Prize in sculpture.

In her recent Artsy Vanguard interview, Peroi described her practice as rooted in a desire to continue weaving at all costs, explaining that her work “eventually found its voice in the contemporary art field.” She also noted the therapeutic qualities of her work: “When I start weaving, I feel like I’m moving forward. I see something taking shape,” she said. Other recent solo exhibitions include “Vent Dominant” at Paris’s Galerie Anne-Sarah Benichou in 2025 and “House of Crystal” at Hermès in Amsterdam in 2024.

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$236.4 million Gustav Klimt portrait becomes second most expensive painting ever sold at auction. https://ift.tt/6JjnwP1

Gustav Klimt’s Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer (1914–16) sold for $236.4 million at Sotheby’s on November 18th, becoming the second most expensive painting ever sold at auction. The hammer fell after 20 minutes of bidding among six bidders during the inaugural sale at Sotheby’s new headquarters in New York, the Breuer Building. (All prices include fees).

Part of two Sotheby’s evening sales, the Klimt was featured among 24 lots from the Leonard A. Lauder Collection. This white glove sale brought in $527.5 million. The night continued with the Now & Contemporary sale, which brought in $178.5 million. Jean-Michel Basquiat’s Peso Neto (1981) led the second sale, achieving $48.3 million, slightly above its $45 million high-estimate.

Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer, a six-foot-tall painting, depicts Lederer, a young Austrian heiress and daughter of Klimt’s patrons, draped in a Chinese robe. The Nazis nearly confiscated the painting; however, it eventually returned to Erich Lederer, Elisabeth’s brother, in 1948. He first sold it in 1983 to a private collector. It entered American philanthropist Leonard A. Lauder’s collection in 1985 and hung in his house in New York. Lauder died on June 14th at 92. Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer is thought to be one of two full-length Klimt portraits in private hands, according to the New York Times.

Klimt’s previous auction record was set in 2023, when Dame mit Fächer (1917) sold for $108 million at Sotheby’s. Two other Klimt masterpieces were featured in the Sotheby’s sale, including Blumenwiese (Blooming Meadow) (ca. 1908), which sold for $86 million, and Waldabhang bei Unterach am Attersee (Forest Slope in Unterach on the Attersee) (1916), which sold for $68 million.

The most expensive painting sold at auction to date is Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi (ca. 1500), which sold for $450.3 million at Christie’s in 2017. The Klimt portrait has now surpassed Andy Warhol’s Shot Sage Blue Marilyn (1964), which sold for $195 million at Christie’s New York in May 2022.

One of the buzziest lots of the evening, Maurizio Cattelan’s solid golden toilet America (2016), sold for $12.1 million. Last month, Sotheby’s announced that it would put America, a functioning toilet made from 101.2 kilograms of solid gold, up for auction, with its price tied to its bullion value—a figure based on its precious metal content. The sale hammered at its $10 million opening bid, just slightly above the cost of the gold used to make it.

Several additional records were set throughout the evening, including those for Antonio Obá and Yu Nishimura. British painter Cecily Brown’s High Society (1997–98) sold for $9.8 million against its high estimate of $6 million. The artist’s previous record was set by Suddenly Last Summer (1999), which sold for a record-breaking $6.78 million at Sotheby’s New York in May 2018.

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The White House acquires $7 million Norman Rockwell painting. https://ift.tt/jPfQSEJ

American artist Norman Rockwell’s So You Want to See the President! (1943) was acquired by The White House Historical Association at Heritage Auction House in Dallas on November 14th. The work sold for $7.25 million, accounting for nearly half of the sale’s $14.76 million total and setting a new record for a work on paper by Rockwell. (All prices include fees.)

So You Want to See the President! was commissioned by Stephen T. Early, President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s press secretary, during World War II. The four-panel painting on paper features vignettes of various characters, including soldiers, civilians, and senators, in the White House waiting room. It hung in the White House from 1978 through 2022 on a loan from Early’s family, before returning to the private collection of his descendants, the Elam family.

“Stephen T. Early’s close relationship and legacy with FDR was unrivaled, and through this artwork, Rockwell gave us a glimmer of this palpable relationship, rooted in trust, collaboration, and confidence,” said Nile Elam in a press release. “So You Want to See the President! reiterated the public’s access to the highest public office in the free world at an uncertain and unpredictable time in America’s history.”

In a statement, Stewart McLaurin, president of the White House Historical Association, said that Rockwell’s work “will now be part of the Association’s educational mission to preserve and share the rich history of the White House.”

The White House Historical Association, a private nonprofit, was founded by First Lady Jackie Kennedy in 1961. This is the most expensive work ever purchased by the association, according to ABC News. It previously acquired The Builders (1947) by Jacob Lawrence in 2007 for $1.5 million. This work hangs in the White House Green Room.

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Art Basel Hong Kong announces exhibitors for its 2026 edition. https://ift.tt/Gce4xLl

Art Basel Hong Kong has announced 240 galleries for its 2026 edition, the same number as this year’s fair.

The 13th edition of the fair will once again take place at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre, and will run from March 27th to 29th, 2026, with VIP preview days on March 25th and 26th.

“The 2026 edition of Art Basel Hong Kong is a celebration of the city’s status as Asia’s global hub for culture. Hong Kong’s unique strengths—its tax-free status, free-port heritage, logistical ease, multilingual accessibility, and unrivalled connectivity—continue to underpin its position as a gateway to the region’s rich cultural diversity and dynamic art market,” said Angelle Siyang-Le, director of the fair, in a statement.

Some 32 galleries will make their debut at Art Basel Hong Kong, including Tokyo’s A Lighthouse called Kanata, Seoul’s Sun Gallery, and Madrid’s 1 Mira Madrid / 2 Mira Archiv, and some 14 galleries are returning to the fair after a hiatus, including carlier | gebauer and Waddington Custot. The fair’s main Galleries sector will include 182 galleries. More than half of the participants operate a gallery space in the Asia-Pacific region. This consists of 29 galleries with spaces in Hong Kong, including Flowers and Pearl Lam Galleries.

On the other hand, many exhibitors that have participated in the Galleries sector will not be returning. Some galleries have closed since the last edition, including Blum, Clearing, Peres Projects, and Venus Over Manhattan. Other galleries not returning include Bortolami and Michael Werner Gallery.

In addition to the Galleries sector are Discoveries, focused on emerging artists and galleries, and Insights, focused on 20 curated projects by artists from the Asia and Asia-Pacific regions. New this year is Echoes, a sector that will spotlight works created within the past five years in presentations featuring up to three artists. Some participants include Hong Kong–based Double Q Gallery, bringing Polish artist Natalia Załuska, and Madrid’s Max Estrella, presenting Vietnamese American artist Tiffany Chung.

Pakistani American artist Shahzia Sikande was also tapped for the fifth Art Basel and M+ commission. The public artwork, titled 3 to 12 Nautical Miles, will feature an animation on the exterior of the museum’s facade in the West Kowloon Cultural District.

Chinese multimedia artist Ellen Pau will spearhead the fair’s film program—the first time an artist has curated this section. The fair’s Encounters sector, dedicated to large-scale installation, will be curated by four Asia-based curators for the first time. This team will be led by the director of Mori Art Museum, Mami Kataoka, who will work alongside Isabella Tam, curator at M+; Alia Swastika, Jakarta-based curator and writer; and Hirokazu Tokuyama, a senior curator at the Mori Art Museum.

Click here for the full list of exhibitors.

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Marina Abramović was told “nobody has time” for “The Artist Is Present,” she reveals. https://ift.tt/9phtjFC

The Artist Is Present, Marina Abramović’s landmark performance staged at the Museum of Modern Art in 2010, is widely considered a high mark of her career. Yet the Serbian artist revealed that she was warned by a MoMA curator that “nobody has time” for what would become arguably her most iconic performance, in which she sat across from museum visitors every day for three months. Abramović recounted the incident in an interview on the Louis Theroux Podcast.

During preparations for her 2010 MoMA retrospective, according to Abramović,the then-director of MoMA PS1, Klaus Biesenbach, told her that the idea for The Artist Is Present was “totally ridiculous.” He added that, in New York, “nobody has time to sit in this chair.”

The reception proved otherwise. Abramović sat silently in the museum’s atrium for the duration of the exhibition, while more than 1,500 people took turns facing her. The chair that Biesenbach referred to, she said, “was never empty.”

In the interview, Abramović also discussed her views on the art market, contrasting her approach with that of Damien Hirst. She told Theroux she has “never” made work with commercial value in mind, while praising Hirst for using the market strategically.

Later in the conversation, Abramović addressed her long association with physical endurance and injury. She emphasized that she does not seek out pain in private life; instead, her work intends to confront cultural fears around pain and suffering. She described herself as a mirror for audiences, noting that, “if I can liberate myself from the fear of pain, you can do the same.”

Earlier this year, Abramović appeared on The Artsy Podcast to discuss her new NFT project and ​​mindfulness in the digital realm. Next year, she will become the first living woman artist to be featured in a solo exhibition at Venice’s Gallerie dell’Accademia. Scheduled to coincide with the artist’s 80th birthday, the show will feature several of her endurance-based performances.

The Louis Theroux Podcast is available on Spotify now.

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Met Gala announces its 2026 theme, focusing on costume art. https://ift.tt/xFE2sTu

On November 17th, the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art announced its 2026 spring exhibition: “Costume Art.” This theme will inspire the glitzy Met Gala on May 4, 2026.

The spring exhibition will open on May 10, 2026, inaugurating a nearly 12,000-square-foot gallery suite adjacent to the Great Hall, known as the Condé M. Nast Galleries. This new space will give fashion a more important location in the Met’s galleries. “It’s a huge moment for the Costume Institute,” curator in charge Andrew Bolton told Vogue. “It will be transformative for our department, but I also think it’s going to be transformative to fashion more generally—the fact that an art museum like The Met is actually giving a central location to fashion.”

“Costume Art” will pair nearly 200 artworks with approximately 200 garments and accessories. The exhibition will survey representations of the dressed body across primarily Western art from prehistory to the present. This exhibition intends to better integrate the fashion and art worlds, continuing a trend for both industries in recent years.

The Met Gala is one of the most important events for the museum's Costume Institute. This celebrity-packed red-carpet party opens the exhibition with a major fundraiser for the institution. Previous years’ themes have included “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style” in 2025 and “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion” in 2024.

“This immensely creative and collaborative exhibition will demonstrate the Museum’s innovative and forward-thinking approach to presenting Costume Institute exhibitions, and will highlight The Met's unique ability to position fashion within the context of more than 5,000 years of art represented in its collection,” said Max Hollein, director of the Met, in a statement.

Garments will be displayed on mannequins raised on six-foot platforms, with corresponding artworks integrated directly into the structures. Palestinian Canadian artist Samar Hejazi has been commissioned to create mirrored heads for the mannequins.

According to the museum, the exhibition will focus on different themes around the body, such as “Naked Body,” “Classical Body,” “Pregnant Body,” “Ageing Body,” “Anatomical Body,” and “Mortal Body,” among others. The museum will additionally cast real bodies for certain presentations, a gesture intended to broaden representations of beauty and counter standardized mannequin forms.

The Met Gala has yet to announce its hosts. Fashion giant Anna Wintour stepped down as Vogue’s editor-in-chief earlier this year; however, she still works as the magazine’s editorial director. This means Wintour will still supervise the celebrity-packed event in the Spring.

The fashion sponsors for this exhibition are Jeff and Lauren Bezos, Saint Laurent, and Condé Nast. The exhibition will be open through January 10, 2027.

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When a Mailman Became Van Gogh’s Muse https://ift.tt/XIMkuHj

A bearded man sits on a wicker chair against a pale blue background, wearing a dark blue, double-breasted uniform. The gold buttons of his garment shine from his chest and on his head is a jaunty mailman’s cap. He is the picture of humble workmanship, portrayed with casual immediacy.

The mailman is not one of Vincent van Gogh’s best-known subjects: sunflowers, interiors, himself. But this particular mail carrier, captured in the artist’s 1888 painting Postman Joseph Roulin, was a major influence on his life and work. Van Gogh met Roulin in Arles, France, and painted him—along with his wife and three children—many times. These portraits, completed shortly before the artist was hospitalized for his mental health in early 1889 and ultimately died the following year, reveal Van Gogh’s deep admiration for family life and the formal ambitions that came to the fore late in his career.

Today, portraits of the entire Roulin family are brought together for the first time in Europe at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. “Van Gogh and the Roulins. Together Again at Last,” on view through January 11, 2026, is organized in collaboration with the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and features 14 of roughly 25 known Roulin portraits, which are now scattered across the globe.

Van Gogh in Arles

While living in Paris, Van Gogh had been inspired by the city’s experimental spirit and the developing aesthetics of Post-Impressionism. But the city exhausted him. He had no money to pay models to sit for the portraits he yearned to paint and lacked the charisma to persuade Parisians himself. Overstimulated and longing to paint in nature again, he decamped to Arles in the summer of 1888 with an ambition to found a community of artists. Fellow painter Paul Gauguin joined him later that year, and the two lived together in the so-called “Yellow House” (captured in The Yellow House (The Street), an 1888 painting also included in the exhibition).

When he arrived in Arles without his friend Gauguin, Van Gogh struggled socially. Shy and awkward, the artist still struggled to find sitters. That was until he met Joseph Roulin. “He had a tough time when he tried to make friends—he was a difficult person to get along with—but he found a real friend in the postman,” said Teio Meedendorp, senior researcher at the Van Gogh Museum, in a tour of the show. Roulin was a blue-collar laborer who handled luggage and cargo. Van Gogh admired his honesty, politics, and the industrious, working-class spirit that he embodied.

In Van Gogh’s initial portrait of Roulin, his arms are stiff and his facial expression awkward, perhaps conveying his discomfort at being the center of attention. The artist also, characteristically, seems to have amended the painting halfway through, changing the perspective to place Roulin’s arms onto a chair and table.

Van Gogh idolized portraitists like Rembrandt and Frans Hals, and he wanted to use formal innovations he observed in Paris to make advances in portrait painting himself. “Painting portraits was the most important thing—the important subject, in fact, for an artist, and especially the modern portrait,” said Meedendorp, explaining Van Gogh’s mindset. Most of all, Van Gogh wanted to focus on depicting working-class people rather than the elites who had traditionally had their portraits painted, often in luxurious surroundings that signified power. The rough, monochromatic background of his first portrait of Joseph Roulin hints at the artist’s vision for the modern portrait: less concerned with depicting detail, or flattering his subject, than with creating an immediate, authentic impression.

Portraits of the Roulin family

Roulin was also a family man and represented a vision of domestic idyll that Van Gogh yearned for. “Family life was for him one of the most important things in life—something he never had,” said Meedendorp. He saw in the Roulins “an ideal situation—a simple, hardworking man, a charming wife, their children.”

After painting Roulin, Van Gogh also portrayed the mailman’s wife, Augustine, and their three children: Armand, Camille, and Marcelle. To Van Gogh’s excitement, he was able to paint the entire family in several sittings, which took place at the Yellow House. The most famous of his portraits of Augustine is known as La Berceuse (1889), which means “the lullaby” or “woman who rocks the cradle.” Seated in a chair similar to the one in which Van Gogh painted her husband, Madame Roulin symbolizes homely motherhood, holding in her hand a thread used to rock a nearby cradle. Van Gogh produced five versions of this portrait, three of which are on view in “Van Gogh and the Roulins.” All depict Madame Roulin looking away from the viewer: stoic and noble.

Van Gogh’s late style

In the Roulin portraits, Van Gogh refined many of the stylistic ideas that define his late work. Meedendorp described these paintings as “a turning point—the moment when he truly became a modern portraitist.” Instead of situating his sitters in naturalistic interiors, as he had in many of his earlier peasant character study paintings, he placed them against flat, vividly colored backgrounds that are expressive rather than representational.

Van Gogh’s portrait of Armand Roulin, for example, has a bright turquoise background—a flattened color plane that was new for its time and borrowed its technique from Japanese prints. Using color theory, he employed complementary colors to make his figure lifelike: Outlining the figure in deep blue and using yellow overpainting for the boy’s jacket gives a lifelike, 3D effect, the figure popping against the background.

The artist also added floral, ornate wallpaper to many of his later paintings, such as La Berceuse and a later portrait of Joseph Roulin from 1889.

In that painting, Van Gogh’s depictions veered even further from reality. Here, the mailman’s beard—which Van Gogh previously painted in short, simple tufts—is instead portrayed in flourishing, wavelike spirals. These swirling arabesques are immediately recognizable from perhaps his most famous work, The Starry Night (1889), painted a few months later.

Joseph Roulin’s friendship

Joseph Roulin continued to have a great impact on Van Gogh’s personal life even outside his art. In December 1888, Van Gogh experienced a mental health crisis that famously led him to cut off part of his ear. After this episode, it was Roulin who visited him daily, relaying updates to the artist’s brother, Theo. Yet, within weeks, Roulin was transferred to a new postal job in Marseille, France, leaving Van Gogh suddenly without the surrogate family that had steadied him.

In late January 1889, after another breakdown, Van Gogh voluntarily entered an asylum in nearby Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, France, hoping that isolation and routine might help him recover. His friendship with Roulin endured, even then, by letter. Van Gogh sent the Roulins paintings as New Year’s gifts.

For Van Gogh, the Roulins were inspiration and evidence of a life he could have lived. They were the last true companions of his Arles years. At the same time, as models and inspiration, they helped Van Gogh achieve something he had wished for throughout his artistic life: to be a truly modern portrait painter.

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Smithsonian and National Gallery reopen following 43-day U.S. government shutdown. https://ift.tt/bYo69hn

After a 43-day government shutdown, Washington D.C.’s major federally funded museums are preparing to reopen to the public. The National Gallery of Art and the 21 museums operated by the Smithsonian Institution are resuming operations on a staggered schedule as staff return and core services resume.

The shutdown, the longest in U.S. history, stemmed from a prolonged dispute in Congress over federal spending. Lawmakers reached a deal late Wednesday, November 12th, sending a funding bill to President Trump, who signed it into law that night. The closure had halted federal services nationwide, disrupted air travel, and forced federally funded cultural institutions to close for more than a month.

The Smithsonian Institution began reopening select museums on Friday, with the National Museum of American History, the National Air and Space Museum, and the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Virginia, resuming normal operations first. The National Museum of African American History and Culture, the National Museum of African Art, the National Museum of Asian Art, and the National Zoo will reopen on Saturday. All remaining museums and public buildings are set to reopen on a rolling basis by Monday, November 17th.

The National Gallery of Art also welcomed back visitors on Friday, opening its galleries in its West Building and sculpture garden. Its East Building will reopen on Saturday. The postponed exhibition, “The Stars We Do Not See: Australian Indigenous Art,” will officially open on Saturday after its original October opening was delayed.

Assessments from previous shutdowns indicate the financial toll of prolonged closures can be significant. A 2019 analysis by the American Alliance of Museums cited billions in losses tied to shuttered galleries, canceled programs, and reduced tourism in surrounding neighborhoods.

Other federally operated sites, including the Library of Congress, the U.S. Botanic Garden, and the National Archives, are also in the process of restoring public access.

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5 Artist Discoveries at Art Mumbai 2025 https://ift.tt/nqW9zIy

Art Mumbai returned for its third edition at the iconic Mahalaxmi Racecourse on Thursday, November 14th, with high expectations. Initiated in 2023, the fair has quickly established itself as a linchpin, thanks in part to the robust growth in India’s art market over recent years.

Leading 20th-century names continue to ride high in auctions (leading Indian auction house Saffron Art is one of Art Mumbai’s co-founders), younger artists are gaining increasing worldwide recognition, and a thriving diasporic and national collector base is propelling things further still.

Indicative of this growth, the number of galleries has gone up from 50 in the inaugural edition to 82 this year. Of particular note is the participation of international galleries like Galleria Continua and Lisson Gallery, which is making its fair debut. Some 15 galleries are from New York, London, and Dubai; however, many of them are diaspora-run or focus on South Asian art.

The number of galleries participating in the fair from New Delhi (29) also exceeds the number from Mumbai (21). The latter, India’s financial hub, is seen as an attractive proposition for galleries from the national capital to expand their pool of collectors.

Indeed, Mumbai has spearheaded India’s economic growth and is the vanguard metropolis for wealth creation in India as a whole, especially at the higher end. According to the Forbes 2025 World’s Billionaires list, Mumbai ranks sixth globally for billionaire concentration with 67 based in the city, four fewer than London, and ahead of cities like Shanghai and San Francisco. The exponential growth in private wealth in Mumbai, combined with a steep real estate boom, has added fuel to the Indian art market.

On Art Mumbai’s VIP day on Thursday, it was quickly clear that momentum remains strong. Most leading Indian galleries at the fair had sold the majority of their displays on day one, and international and debut participants were also in positive spirits. “The sheer number of new private buyers we have met and the speed of decision-making from liking to buying has truly amazed us,” said Harssh Shah of Ahmedabad, India–based Iram Art, which is making its debut.

Notable collectors at the fair included Kiran Nadar and Kito De Boer, who took part in a riveting fireside chat on the fair’s second day, where Nadar spoke about her collecting journey and outlined plans to open her new museum space in New Delhi by early 2028.

As well as showcasing works by some of India’s leading and most in-demand artists, the fair also highlights the depth of the regional art scene through some of its leading galleries, from exciting emerging artists to names new to even the most seasoned fairgoer.

Here, we present five artist discoveries from Art Mumbai 2025.

Neha Vedpathak

B. 1982, Pune, India. Lives and works in Detroit

Showing with Sundaram Tagore Gallery.

Loop 1, 2021
Neha Vedpathak
Sundaram Tagore Gallery

Untitled (Yet), 2019
Neha Vedpathak
Sundaram Tagore Gallery

London, New York, and Singapore–based gallery Sundaram Tagore is showing three works by Neha Vedpathak at its booth. The Indian artist uses a self-invented technique she calls “plucking.” The precise, time-consuming process involves separating the fibers of handmade Japanese paper. She then paints, sews, and assembles the lace-like pieces into layered, sometimes delicate, sculptural reliefs.

“Her works are visually arresting and materially sophisticated. The delicate textures, layered surfaces, and subtle shadow play pull the viewer in,” said Sundaram Tagore, the gallery’s owner, noting how the artist’s transnational influences mirror experiences familiar to many in the Indian diaspora. “Her work bridges geographies and cultures, making her an ideal figure for platforms that seek to highlight global perspectives within contemporary Indian art,” he added.

Works by the artist were in high demand, with prices ranging from $5,000–$30,000.

Ramesh Mario Nithiyendran

B. 1988, Colombo, Sri Lanka. Lives and works in Sydney

Shown by Jhaveri Contemporary

Sgraffito Vessel IV, 2025
Ramesh Mario Nithiyendran
Jhaveri Contemporary

The occasion of Art Mumbai marks a major moment for Sri Lankan Tamil artist Ramesh Mario Nithiyendran, who is the subject of a solo exhibition at local tastemaker Jhaveri Contemporary and has additional works on view at the gallery’s booth.

“Our aim is to introduce Ramesh to this market during the fair concurrent to the exhibition at our gallery,” said Amrita Jhaveri, the gallerist.

The artist’s irreverent sculptures draw on influences from South Asian temple sculpture, folk idols, and comic and gaming aesthetics, and they are hyper-saturated in color and exaggerated in their features.

“What makes Ramesh distinct in our roster of artists is that while his expression is raw, polychromatic, and almost seductive in contrast to some of our other artists, he thinks in a very sophisticated and layered way about the medium of ceramics, including the way in which he addresses time in his works,” said Jhaveri.

The gallery declined to share prices.

Abir Karmakar

B. 1977, Siliguri, India. Lives and works in Baroda, India

Showing with Aicon Contemporary

Dead Hours - House No. 211, 2025
Abir Karmakar
Aicon Contemporary

Abir Karmakar’s painting Untitled (2025) is a large, eerie standout at a fair where vibrant color palettes were abundant.

Taken from the artists’ “Dead Hours” series, this ethereal representation of an unoccupied house in the small hours of the night feels like an apparition haunted by absence and tormented by memories.

The work, on display with New York’s Aicon Contemporary, depicts an actual empty house in Karmakar’s neighborhood in Sardar Nagar, Baroda, in western India. The artist examines the dichotomy of India’s urban environments, in which significant homeless populations survive cheek-by-jowl with empty surplus houses usually belonging to the rich.

Karmakar is a graduate of the Maharaja Sayajirao University in Baroda, which is famed for its association with the Baroda School of experimental artists that emerged in the late 1950s. The artist, who graduated in the early 2000s, is continuing that tradition, noted his gallerist, Projial Dutta.

“We take great pride in supporting Abir, because I find him one of the finest, if not the finest, of narrative painters from the Baroda School today,” Dutta shared. “He also paints in oil, which is a dying breed, and he deploys alla prima—layering paint wet on wet.”

The work is priced at $57,000.

Deena Pindoria

B. 1991, Madhapur, India. Lives and works in Baroda, India

Showing with Exhibit 320

Rising artist Deena Pindoria’s practice primarily involves traditional Ajrakh block printing on raw Kota Doria fabric made from both cotton and silk. The techniques and materials used are from her community and region in Kutch, western India, and she learned these practices by collaborating with local artisans.

In the exhibited set of 18 monochromatic digital prints and acrylics on Kota Doria and Kala Cotton at the booth of New Delhi’s Exhibit 320, she uses the purdah or veil as a metaphor, using it to build semitransparent layers and also drawing from her personal experiences with claustrophobia. The series, which depicts everyday scenes from her region, transforms these traditional fabrics into a landscape that the viewer must peer through.

“The [viewer’s] gaze is thus profoundly subverted, challenging the viewer to question their own role in the processes of visibility and erasure,” said the gallery’s founder, Rasika Kejriwal.

The gallery declined to share prices for the works.

Dinar Sultana

B. 1989, Joypurhat, Bangladesh. Lives and works in Dhaka, Bangladesh

Showing with Iram Gallery

Ahmedabad-based Iram Gallery is showing a large body of work by Bangladeshi artist Dinar Sultana at the fair, including 33 works on paper.

Sultana, who was born in a small rural district of Bangladesh, experienced a key inflection point when she moved to Shantiniketan in West Bengal, India, to study art. There, she developed a practice that involves making her own paper from recycled newspaper and flower-based pulps. “Dinar is a beacon for women from the rural community who have fought rigid patriarchal norms through her creative practice, and she has immensely grown as an artist in recent years,” said Iram Gallery founder Harssh Shah.

In the works here from her “Womb of Shells” series, the artist prominently uses Kolka, the traditional Bengali paisley motif. She deconstructs this written language, reconstructing paper and infusing it with materials like coal, graphite, and clay to create textured compositions that nod to themes of ecological rebalancing.

A name to watch, Sultana has recently been selected to participate in the upcoming edition of the Colomboscope contemporary arts festival in Sri Lanka’s capital.

Prices for the works here range from $1,200–$3,000.

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