artforum

Absurd yet seductive, absorbing yet repellent—a vintage-kitsch Las Vegas boudoir appears on the May 2026 cover of Artforum. It comes from the Ho Château, home to Carlotta Champagne, Vegas’s self-styled “Queen of Kitsch.”

A new residency for Indigenous artists working with neon is launching as the result of a collaboration between the Walker Youngbird Foundation, a Native-led nonprofit, and Lite Brite Neon Studio, a neon fabrication workshop based in Kingston, New York. artforum.com/news/sarah-row…

Unionized staffers at the Wexner Center for the Arts in Columbus, Ohio, have demanded that the institution remove top funder Les Wexner’s name from its moniker following the discovery of his close ties to the late convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. artforum.com/news/workers-a…

Manuel Segade, director of Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, has been threatened with removal if the museum doesn't complete a full inventory of its collection by December 31. Spain’s Court of Auditors has long criticized its cataloguing methods; officials now want a physical accounting of 25,000+ works and full valuations. artforum.com/news/spanish-g…

Krakow's mayor has fired Adam Budak as director of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Krakow (MOCAK), citing "improper performance of duties related to work organization and team management." The decision has ignited a strong response among the artistic community. artforum.com/news/krakows-m…

On Tuesday, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs released its finalist shortlist for its planned public monument dedicated to legendary jazz and swing singer Billie Holiday. British sculptor Thomas J. Price and Bahamian conceptual artist Tavares Strachan are both among the top contenders, Artnet reported. artforum.com/news/artists-s…

On Thursday, the luxury fashion house Chanel and Paris’s Centre Pompidou announced a five-year strategic partnership in support of the contemporary art museum’s significant phase of renovations, which is planned to culminate in 2030 with the reopening of the museum. artforum.com/news/chanel-an…

The organizers of Art Basel Qatar have tapped Wassan Al-Khudhairi, a specialist in modern and contemporary Arab art and the onetime founding director of Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, to serve as artistic director of the 2027 edition. artforum.com/news/wassan-al…

The Sainsbury Centre, a popular art museum in Norwich, England, just announced that it has received a donation of £91.2 million from the politician and philanthropist Lord David Sainsbury. The donation represents one of the largest ever made to a museum in the U.K. artforum.com/news/sainsbury…

The May 19 evening sales at Sotheby’s and Phillips pulled in a combined $419.1 million, seeming to signal that the hitherto softening contemporary and modern art market is beginning to firm up again. artforum.com/news/robust-sa…

New York-based arts nonprofit A Blade of Grass has revealed the 3 members of the 2026 In Fellowship cohort. The initiative provides three individuals or groups with $25,000 in support of their respective socially engaged practices, as well as a $25,000 honorarium. artforum.com/news/a-blade-o…

The National Trust for Historic Preservation has released its annual list of the most endangered historic sites in the US. While some locations were included due to threats of redevelopment and environmental decay, others face political challenges from the Trump Administration. artforum.com/news/new-list-…

On Monday morning, the French government announced that an international team of architects combining the efforts of New York’s Selldorf Architects and Studios Architecture Paris, will be responsible for executing the biggest overhaul of the Louvre in 35 years. artforum.com/news/louvre-na…

The National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC, has reinstated mention of Donald Trump’s two impeachments in a new wall text accompanying his portrait in the institution’s gallery of American presidents. artforum.com/news/trump-imp…

Christie's raked in $1.1B across two May 18 sales, headlined by Jackson Pollock's 1948 drip painting Number 7A—an 11-foot-wide canvas that hammered at $181.2M (vs. a $100M guarantee), crushing his previous record of $61.2M set in 2021. Up to six bidders competed in $1M increments for the win. artforum.com/news/christies…

The Dia Art Foundation and the Sam Gilliam Foundation have announced Guatemala-based artist and poet Edgar Calel as the winner of the 2026 Sam Gilliam Award. Calel will receive $75,000 and will be featured in a public program at one of Dia’s locations this fall. artforum.com/news/edgar-cal…

Radical performance artist, filmmaker, and sculptor VALIE EXPORT, arguably the most significant feminist artist of the postwar era, died in Vienna on May 14, just three days shy of her birthday. She was eighty-five. artforum.com/news/valie-exp…

Opened less than five years ago, M+, Hong Kong’s museum of modern and contemporary art, has just announced a multi-year partnership with the Centre Pompidou in Paris, which houses the largest modern art museum in Europe. artforum.com/news/hong-kong…

Sotheby’s New York logged a big win last Thursday with the $85.8 million sale of Mark Rothko’s "Brown and Blacks in Reds," 1957, a sterling example of the painter’s singular style. This is now the second-highest price the artist has ever fetched at auction. artforum.com/news/rothko-se…

More than one hundred employees at the Seattle Art Museum have announced their intent to unionize in a letter delivered by organizers to museum director and CEO Scott Stulen. The staffers cited a collective desire to “improve working conditions in alignment with SAM’s mission, vision, and core values.” artforum.com/news/seattle-a…

Activist, educator and artist Mary Lovelace O’Neal, whose monumental, richly hued lampblack paintings expanded abstraction’s possibilities, died on May 10 in Mérida, Mexico. She was eighty-four. artforum.com/news/mary-love…