SGFARA

Grace Hartigan’s Artistic Kinship with Midcentury Poets

Unknown photographer, Grace Hartigan, n.d. Grace Hartigan Papers, Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse University Libraries. By 1954, artist Grace Hartigan no longer doubted herself. Her bold vigorous paintings, which mixed abstraction with figuration at a time when both methods were strictly separated from one another, were finally receiving an abundance of critical and commercial attention. …

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10 Key Works in “The First Homosexuals: The Birth of a New Identity, 1869-1939”

Photo Collage by Daniela Hritcu. For much of human history, queerness wasn’t thought of as something one was, but rather as something one did. “The First Homosexuals,” an ambitious exhibition at Wrightwood 659, a three-story gallery occupying a former Chicago apartment building, tracks the shift from that fluid definition to a more concrete identity. Most …

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Cabaret Performer Justin Vivian Bond Dishes on the Current Cultural Climate

Justin Vivian Bond before showtime at Joe’s Pub, May 2025 Photo: Christopher Garcia Valle Editor’s Note: This story is part of Newsmakers, a series where we interview the movers and shakers who are making change in the art world. Justin Vivian Bond is a star of the stage and a powerful singer and interpreter of songs. They are …

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Museum Launches Public Appeal to Raise $5 M. to Keep Rare Barbara Hepworth Sculpture on British Soil

‘Rare and exceptional’: The Hepworth Wakefield does not own any finished works by Hepworth from the 1940s… yet. Betty Saunders A public campaign was launched on Thursday to raise £3.8 million ($5 million) to buy a rare Barbara Hepworth sculpture and keep it on British soil.   A private collector bought the wooden work, which …

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Collectors Igor and Mojca Lah to Open New Contemporary Art Museum in Foothills of Slovenian Mountains

Picturesque: The new museum will be a stone’s throw from Lake Bled. David Chipperfield A new contemporary art museum is slated to open next year in Slovenia in the foothills of the Julian Alps. Named after its founders, Slovenian philanthropists Igor and Mojca Lah, Muzej Lah will house the Fundacija Lah art collection. On its …

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Artists Accuse Dealer Reco Sturgis of Issuing Death Threats and Withholding Payments and Artworks

Reco Sturgis, the founder of Hugo Galerie. Courtesy of Beth Carter A number of artists have accused art dealer Reco Sturgis—the founder of Hugo Galerie in New York, which closed in 2023—of withholding artworks, failing to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in owed funds, and making violent threats via email and text message. In …

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Klaus Biesenbach Says American Art Scene Is Too Focused on ‘Political Correctness’: ‘It Became Unbearable’

Klaus Biesenbach. Photo Hannes P Albert/dpa/picture alliance via Getty Images In a lengthy interview published this week by the German publication Der Spiegel, curator Klaus Biesenbach addressed his decision to leave the American art scene for the one in Germany, where he now serves as director of the Neue Nationalgalerie in Berlin. He appeared to …

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Smithsonian Institution Subtly Announces It Will Challenge Trump’s ‘Firing’ of National Portrait Gallery Director

Lonnie G. Bunch III. Getty Images On Monday evening, the Smithsonian Institution released its first statement since President Donald Trump said he fired National Portrait Gallery director Kim Sajet. In its statement, the institution affirmed that it is an “independent entity.” While the statement did not name Sajet nor call out Trump directly, it stated, …

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