Sunday, August 23, 2026

Ateneum launches Modern Classics series with Elga Sesemann retrospective

Elga Sesemann: Train (1968). Finnish National Gallery Collection / Ateneum Art Museum, collection Yrjö and Nanny Kaunisto. Photo: Finnish National Gallery / Jenni Nurminen.
HELSINKI.— An exhibition of works by Elga Sesemann opens the Ateneum’s new Modern Classics series of exhibitions. The exhibition, which covers Sesemann’s entire career, is the first comprehensive overview of her work. Independent and original, Sesemann was a reformist in modern-era art, drawing the attention of critics and the art public already with her first exhibitions. Elga Sesemann’s (1922–2007) life story is an exceptional and interesting example of a professional woman artist making a career for herself in Finland. Sesemann and her family moved to Helsinki as evacuees from Vyborg during the Winter War. The artist’s very first solo exhibition in Helsinki, in 1945, immediately drew the attention of critics and the art audience. The young artist, then 23 years old, was a promising, original colourist, whose paintings were compared to those of Edvard Munch and Helene Schjerfbeck. Sesemann’s artistic oeuvre is extensive, and she enjoyed an active career, with her expression constantly evolving, until the mid-1990s. In her art, Sesemann repeatedly returned to memories of her childhood and youth in Vyborg, as well as to her evacuation, which began after the outbreak of the Winter War. Her works deal with the impact of war, being forced to leave home, and having life disrupted. The artist’s personal experiences contribute to building a collective memory, enabling the exploration of questions about identity, existence and outsiderness. The works are also relatable in the context of the current state of the world. Description of image Sesemann created expressive, semi-abstract paintings of people, landscapes and interiors. The atmosphere of the works reflects post-war desolation and melancholy. In the self-portraits and portraits, people have vacant looks in thei...
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Sam Houston portrait miniature and Peruvian shrine highlight Colorado sale

BOULDER, COLO.— An eclectic mix of American history, devotional art, Indigenous craftsmanship, luxury watches, jewelry and natural history will come together on August 24, when Artemis Fine Arts opens its American Frontier | Ethnographic | Tribal Art auction in Boulder, Colorado. Curated by Bob Dodge, the sale reaches well beyond the American frontier suggested by its title, bringing together objects from Latin America, New Zealand, Southeast Asia, Europe and prehistoric North Africa. The auction begins at 9 a.m. Mountain Time and includes material described by the auction house as legally acquired and guaranteed as catalogued. Among the most visually arresting lots is a Peruvian portable devotional shrine, or demanda, dated 1857, estimated at $8,000 to $12,000. Closed, the painted wooden cabinet presents the
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Doug Argue exhibition explores scale, palimpsests, and weightlessness

NEW YORK, NY.— I didn’t know Doug Argue, nor did I feel the slightest bit guilty about not knowing him. But one thing was immediately clear: the painting magnetized me. It was breathtaking, overwhelming in every way. It depicted, in a very simple central-perspective arrangement, hundreds—thousands—of cages stacked one above another, each containing a chicken. This painting became known as The Chicken Painting in Minnesota and, by now, far beyond. I asked Doug what he had received for a painting like this, a work on which he had spent three years. Forty-four thousand dollars. Nothing for an unparalleled masterpiece. With this painting and several others, Doug Argue achieved recognition far beyond Minnesota and New York. Visitors to One World Trade Center in New York will also have encountered his work: three enormous
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LACMA presents major Eileen Cowin retrospective Between Panic and Paradise

LOS ANGELES, CA.— The Los Angeles County Museum of Art presents Eileen Cowin: Between Panic and Paradise, the Los Angeles–based artist’s first major museum exhibition. Often blurring the distinction between nonfiction and fiction, Cowin’s provocative photography and video works have explored romance and confrontation, the personal and the political, and the monotony and mystery of daily life, for more than 50 years. Between Panic and Paradise spotlights major themes across Cowin’s career, from early experimentation with material processes to the artist’s interest in text and cinematic conventions to new reflections on aging. The exhibition brings together more than 50 works from LACMA’s collection, the J. Paul Getty Museum, and the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, with multiple exposures, Polaroids, inkjet prints, and video, spanning from
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New photography book documents historic Johnson Publishing Company headquarters

NEW YORK, NY.— Prominent photographer Barbara Karant's three-year documentation of the abandoned Johnson Publishing Company headquarters is thoughtfully curated into 820 Ebony/Jet: Visions of the Johnson Publishing Company, an American Icon (MW Editions, Hardcover $65.00). Kaleidoscopic patterns, marbled swirls, and jewel-toned, Afrocentric interiors retain the vibrant spirit of a Black publishing empire, even as the empty rooms mark the sense of its loss. Available for purchase October 13, 2026, the title features a foreword by Deborah Willis and essays by Aaron Bryant, Cheryl Finley, Carla Williams, Jon Ott, Brenna Wynn Greer, and E. James West. Johnson Publishing Company, home to the iconic Ebony and Jet magazines, was the most influential Black-owned media corporation of its day. The exuberant interiors captured by Karant remained largely unchanged from 1972 to 2012, and each of the eleven floors
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Ernesto Neto opens dual-venue exhibition Vonta de vi dada dada in Sao Paulo

SAO PAULO.— Fortes D’Aloia & Gabriel presents Vonta de vi dada dada a new solo exhibition by Ernesto Neto, opening simultaneously at the gallery’s Barra Funda and Jardins spaces in São Paulo. Bringing together a new body of sculptural installations, works on paper, and textual interventions, the exhibition expands the artist’s long-standing investigation into the interdependence of bodies, materials, and living systems. Spread across the two venues, sculptures made from crocheted cotton, braided cords, bamboo, corten steel, and clay take on organic configurations that evoke insects, roots, mountains, forests, and other hybrid forms, proposing sculpture as a field of relationships, movement, and continuous transformation. At the core of the exhibition is a new series of wall-based sculptures that Neto calls InsePás: tensile, cellular structures that extend across walls, ceilings, and architectural corners like living organisms
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Petit Palais announces major exhibition exploring Brussels around 1900

PARIS.— The Petit Palais will present the remarkable exhibition Brussels 1900, plunging the public into the heart of the Belgian capital’s vibrant art scene, whose influence would have a lasting mark on European art at the turn of the twentieth century. In the autumn of 1900, visitors to the World Fair, held in the newly inaugurated Grand Palais in Paris, discovered as part of the exhibition devoted to foreign nations, a Belgian section that sparked unanimous enthusiasm. Featuring almost one hundred-and-fifty paintings and sculptures from Belgium, it proved to be a veritable revelation. Such recognition and admiration from Parisian audiences cemented Brussels’ status as a major European arts hub in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The exhibition captures this extraordinary cultural effervescence through over two hundred-and-fifty works, including paintings, sculptures, decorative arts, posters, jewellery, photographs, architectural designs, and the graphic
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Amanda Ross-Ho replicates childhood home in new Mattress Factory installation

PITTSBURGH, PA.— Mattress Factory is presenting Untitled Second Floor (ONE BIG DARK ROOM) by Amanda Ross-Ho. Untitled Second Floor (ONE BIG DARK ROOM) is a 75% scale model replicating the second floor of Ross-Ho's Chicago childhood home. Using memory, hyperbole, duration, and myth-making to register loss and comprehension, this installation is the most recent in an ongoing body of work using archival research as material and framework. In the late ‘70s to early ‘80s the artist's mother, Laurel M. Ross, produced a series of photographs looking inward at the densely adorned rooms of their home. Treating these images like continuity shots used for film production, Ross-Ho replicates the home as a set, aided by her own recollection and architectural details sourced from an online Zillow listing. The impossibility of stable translation between these three corrupted and incomplete sources turns the home into an apparatus for staging new interpretations. “It's not like I have to strain to remem
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Seoul Museum of Art hosts Jae-Eun Choi solo exhibition Where Beings Be

SEOUL.— Seoul Museum of Art presents Where Beings Be, a solo exhibition by Jae-Eun Choi (b. 1953), one of Korea’s leading contemporary artists. Her multidisciplinary practice—spanning sculpture, video, installation, and architecture—has uniquely illuminated the relationships between nature and all life within multilayered dimensions of space and time. Choi relocated from Korea to Japan in 1975 and there immersed herself in Sogetsu-style ikebana at the Sogetsu School, then a pivotal hub for avant-garde art activities in Japan. Studying the practices of Sofu Teshigahara and Hiroshi Teshigahara, she experienced firsthand the transformative shift in which avant-garde ikebana broke from its traditional definitions and expanded into land-based experimentation, a formative moment that significantly shaped her artistic practice. Since that time, Choi has sustained an active international presence, including representing the Japanese
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Blockbuster Tate Britain retrospective comes to the Smithsonian

WASHINGTON, DC.— The Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art will present the exhibition “James McNeill Whistler,” uniting the London-based Tate Britain’s major retrospective on the American artist with unique Whistler works held exclusively at the Smithsonian museum. Open Friday, Feb. 12, 2027, to Sunday, July 11, 2027, the exhibition offers an unprecedented look at the entire range of work of one of the most innovative and controversial artists of the 19th century. It presents these insights into James McNeill Whistler’s life, art and global inspirations at the museum founded by his friend and patron, Charles Lang Freer. “James McNeill Whistler” is the first major international retrospective on the artist in 30 years and brings together works from 20 major collections across Europe and the U.S., including the National Gallery of Art, the Detroit Institute of Arts and the White House. The National Museum of Asian Art is the travelling exhibition’s only stop i
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Haines Gallery presents new selection of shaped paintings by Rebekah Goldstein

SAN FRANCISCO, CA.— Haines Gallery is presenting a new selection of shaped paintings by Rebekah Goldstein, whose richly worked abstractions blur the line between painting and object. The three intimately scaled works — Dial "J" For Johnny (2025), Pound For Pound (2026), and Easy Way Out (2026) — offer a close look at an artist whose surfaces are built slowly, sometimes over a period of years. Goldstein’s paintings begin with a process that is deliberately open-ended. Color is layered, removed, covered and reconsidered, while gesture and structure compete for attention. Saturated passages of paint meet irregular edges and built-up surfaces, giving the works a physical presence that goes beyond the conventional rectangular canvas. That sense of accumulation is central to Goldstein’s practice. Her paintings draw on autobiographical experience as well as architectural and art-historical references, but they are not planned toward a predetermined conclusion. Instead, each work develops its
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David Peter Francis hosts US debut of French artist Unglee

NEW YORK, NY.— David Peter Francis will present Le souvenir du temps, a solo exhibition by the French artist Unglee—his first in the United States. This much is true: Unglee makes photographs. Unglee makes films. Unglee first became known for his experimental films. Unglee’s experimental films oftentimes took the tulip as subject. Unglee cultivated countless varieties of tulips. Unglee loves tulips. According to an obiturary, Unglee was born in 1918. Unglee must be currently 108 years old. In this obituary, Unglee is survived by his ex-wife Arleen and son. Unglee has published multiple obituaries. Unglee likes to do things more than once. Unglee has died at least four times. Unglee had two wives. Unglee had an affair. Unglee loves drama. Unglee produced radio-dramas, broadcasted over France Culture radio. Unglee conducted interventions within the press. Some are advertisements. Unglee advertises his perfume.
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MoMI commemorates Jim Henson's 90th birthday with a four-day extravaganza

ASTORIA, NY.— Museum of the Moving Image, home of The Jim Henson Exhibition, will commemorate Jim Henson’s birthday (September 24, 1936) with a special four-day celebration, September 24–27, in honor of what would have been his 90th year. This fun, long weekend for fans of all ages features a slew of special guests, screenings, puppet workshops, a collectible swap meet, live music in the courtyard, and more! Anchoring the MoMI weekend is The Jim Henson Exhibition, a dynamic experience exploring Henson’s groundbreaking work for film and television and his transformative impact on culture, where the public can come face-to-face with 50 beloved characters from the worlds of The Muppet Show, the Muppet movies, Fraggle Rock, Sesame Street, and other productions released during Henson’s lifetime. The Museum will offer daily guided tours over the weekend (advance tickets available). Among the highlights of the Jim Henson Birthday Celebration
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Christ was the greatest of all artists.
Vincent van Gogh

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New publication Relational Paths explores Indigenous art and reconciliation

Relational Paths. Art Beyond Reconciliation. Ideas and Creations from Sápmi and Abya Yala is a result of a multi-year programme initiated by OCA – Office for Contemporary Art Norway, KORO – Public Art Norway and Sámiráđđi – the Saami Council. Building on long-standing critiques of “reconciliation” as a reliable construct for confronting destructive colonial legacies on Indigenous communities, this new book proposes various modes of relational forms as a more productive framework for acknowledging history, confronting the present and considering new reparative futures. The collaboration and publication were prompted by but have no formal connection to the Norwegian Parliament’s establishment of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 2018. “This publication explores how art, justice, and reconciliation can be understood through

The Jewish Museum announces autumn exhibition Sacred Splendor

The Jewish Museum will present a major exhibition this fall that brings Jewish and Christian sacred art from medieval to early modern Europe into dialogue, illuminating complex, interconnected histories across more than six centuries. Sacred Splendor: Jewish Ritual Art and Christian Treasures from St. Vitus Cathedral in Prague features Christian reliquaries on loan from St. Vitus Cathedral—the most extensive presentation of this treasury ever exhibited outside Europe—together with Jewish treasures never before shown in the United States. Through a robust presentation of over 160 objects, the exhibition examines shared urban and artistic environments, and the distinct ritual and theological frameworks that shaped sacred art across Central Europe. Highlights include rarely seen medieval Jewish-owned objects from hoards buried

Tina Kim Gallery to present Maia Ruth Lee solo exhibition Double Vision

Opening September 10, 2026, Tina Kim Gallery will present Double Vision, Maia Ruth Lee’s second solo exhibition with the gallery. Interrogating migration as simultaneous perception, Lee conditions identity within multiple histories, temporalities, and systems of knowledge. Lee’s exhibition takes its title from Homi K. Bhabha’s The Location of Culture. The migrant’s double vision simultaneously inhabits both the place left behind and the place occupied as the condition for a complete understanding of the migrant’s life. Double vision becomes both a metaphor and a new way of working memory as material. Across both gallery spaces, Lee’s work expands and contracts image and sculpture, memory and record. Forms stack, unfold, mirror, and reassemble, building identity as a continuous accumulation, complicating the narrative

National Museum of Asian Art to host annual Chuseok festival in September

The Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art presents its annual celebration of Chuseok, or Korean Thanksgiving, featuring music and dance performances, family-friendly activities, art and food vendors, hands-on crafts and more. Free and open to the public, the festival will be held Saturday, Sept. 19, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. and is centered on the art of Tal (탈), or Korean masks. The festival brings this centuries-old tradition to a contemporary stage with a headlining performance by Insun Park & Generals. Traveling to Washington, D.C., from Seoul, South Korea, the group blends Korean traditional music, mask dance rhythms and contemporary rock. Lead singer Insun Park, a master of Korea’s renowned Gangnyeong mask dance tradition, incorporates dance throughout the performance. Additional musical performances co-

Thomas Demand retrospective The Stutter of History opens at Fundación Proa

Together with the Foundation for the Exhibition of Photography (FEP), Proa presents “Thomas Demand: The Stutter of History,” the first retrospective in Argentina dedicated to the renowned German artist. Curated by Douglas Fogle, the exhibition brings together more than sixty works—large-format photographs, videos, and wallpapers—spanning three decades of a practice situated between sculpture, photography, and conceptual art. Demand’s arrival in Buenos Aires constitutes one of the most significant events of the cultural season. Following its presentation at institutions such as the Jeu de Paume in Paris and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, the exhibition arrives in Proa’s galleries with a survey that offers an in-depth approach to a body of work as unique as it is timely. The artist works with a highly personal method: he begins with photographs

NEW INC, New Museum's cultural incubator, announces Thirteenth Member Cohort for 2026-27

NEW INC, the New Museum’s cultural incubator, today announced its thirteenth annual cohort for the September 2026 to June 2027 program cycle. The cohort of 83 new members working at the intersection of art, design, technology, and entrepreneurship will participate in NEW INC’s yearlong program, which includes a values-centered business education curriculum, mentorship, and opportunities to showcase their work to the public, including NEW INC’s annual festival, DEMO at the close of the program year. In addition to its new cohort members, this year NEW INC will welcome 21 Anchor Members, established professionals joining NEW INC from adjacent industries and universities. Organized in partnership with Melco Group Inc., the Tokyo Geidai New York Project will welcome Tokyo University of the Arts (Geidai) to NEW INC

Mark Rothko's son donates signature painting in "Avery, Gottlieb & Rothko: By the Sea" exhibition

A monumental and generous gift was made to the Cape Ann Museum by artist Mark Rothko’s son, Dr. Christopher Rothko, who donated his father’s 1934 watercolor and gouache painting, Untitled (wharf, Gloucester, Massachusetts), to the Museum’s permanent collection today. The painting is a signature piece in the current exhibition, Avery, Gottlieb & Rothko: By the Sea, which tells the story of Mark Rothko, Adolph Gottlieb, and Milton Avery, three New York artists and friends who summered together on Cape Ann off and on for over three decades. “My father said that all art was inherently of its time. But sometimes, even with a master of abstraction like Mark Rothko, art can also be inherently of its place,” Dr. Rothko said. “The richly-hued watercolor of Gloucester Harbor that I am gifting to the Cape Ann Museum, is such a piece, capturing details

CMCA announces major contemporary painting exhibition Because the Sky is Blue

CMCA announced Because the Sky is Blue, a rich examination of critical histories of painting and the status of painting as a critical practice in our present moment. Setting works by well-known artists strongly associated with Maine alongside a mix of fresh voices from outside the region, it reflects CMCA’s renewed commitment to advancing and enriching artistic discourse through ambitious thematic exhibitions. Organized by CMCA Curator Grant Wahlquist and accompanied by an illustrated publication with a contribution by Patricia Hickson, the exhibition runs from October 2, 2026 – January 17, 2027. “This is an exhibition of paintings that do many things at once,” explains the exhibition’s curator, Grant Wahlquist. “Many of them are monochromes, or at least they seem to be at first. Look closer, and these paintings may tell you they are also many

The Oklahoma City Museum of Art announces New Board Chair, Board members

The Oklahoma City Museum of Art announced the appointment of Lawrence Davis as its new Board Chair. Additionally, three community leaders have joined OKCMOA’s Board of Trustees. Davis has supported OKCMOA for over two decades. He joined the Board of Trustees in 2022 and has since served as chair of the Audit Committee and on the Finance & Investment, Resource Development, and Collections, Exhibitions, & Film Committees. Davis, retired President and Managing Director of MAP Energy LLC’s Natural Gas Division, currently serves in the following leadership roles: • Treasurer, Oklahoma Geological Foundation • Board Member, Oklahoma City Philharmonic • Board Member, St. Anthony Foundation • President, Oklahoma Hillels “The Oklahoma City Museum of Art is central to our city’s cultural landscape,

Counterpublic announces opening program for 2026 triennial Coyote Time

Counterpublic shared the opening programming for Coyote Time featuring artists in dialogue, live performances across Triennial sites, and a shared meal at the International Institute of St. Louis with artist Rirkrit Tiravanija, among many other events. The exhibition’s nearly 50 commissioned works converse with neighborhoods, monuments, and historical buildings to envision a shared near future in a time of global upheaval. In its third iteration, Counterpublic continues to look to artists to process our present culture and contemplate future realities. The works on view critique and explore issues around education, climate change, technology, immigration, and Native sovereignty both in the context of St. Louis as well as globally. In partnership with neighboring institutions and museums, Coyote Time offers a deep and thoughtful exploration

Abby Kortrijk launches "Abby & Friends" with three exhibitions

With Abby & Friends, Abby emphatically positions itself as an open house that collaborates, invites and connects. Every spring, the Kortrijk museum invites befriended art organisations to help curate a programme that brings together different voices, perspectives and working methods within a single museum visit. The result is not a sum of separate presentations, but a layered and polyphonic parcours in which three exhibitions complement, challenge and deepen one another. For this first edition, Abby welcomes two partners, each with a distinct position in the contemporary arts field: • Be-Part is a leading platform for contemporary visual art in South-West Flanders and acts as a laboratory for the creation and presentation of new art in Kortrijk and Waregem. • Wit.h stands alongside artists who identify as Crip for activist reasons and who deviate
Flashback: On a day like today, German-born photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt died
Alfred Eisenstaedt (December 6, 1898 - August 24, 1995) was a German-born American photographer and photojournalist. He is best known for his photograph of the V-J Day celebration and for his candid photographs, frequently made using a 35mm Leica camera. In this image: Harold Gray, chairman of the board of United Technologies Corp., points to a print as he discusses the photo with photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt at Manhattan's International Center for Photography in New York on Jan. 22, 1981. The display of photographs titled "Eisenstaedt Germany" was organized by the Smithsonian Institution of Washington and made possible by United Technologies.

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