The Guggenheim has debuted its own biennial award for visual artists.
The Guggenheim has launched a new biennial prize, the Jack Galef Visual Arts Award, marking the museum’s first in-house honor of this kind for visual artists. The inaugural recipient is Catherine Telford Keogh, a New York–based sculptor and installation artist, who receives an unrestricted $50,000 grant. The award aims to support either emerging artists with strong momentum or established figures whose work has not received sufficient recognition, with winners chosen by a Guggenheim curatorial jury. Funded through a gift from the Jack Galef Estate, the prize joins the museum’s broader slate of artist awards following the end of the Hugo Boss Prize.
Russia’s Ministry of Justice has classified Pussy Riot as an “extremist organization.”
Russia’s Ministry of Justice has formally designated Pussy Riot an “extremist organization,” a move that outlaws the collective’s activities nationwide following a Moscow court ruling on December 15, 2025. The decision reframes the art-activist group as a national security threat and exposes supporters to criminal penalties for actions as minor as sharing music, images, or social media posts linked to the group. Founder Nadya Tolokonnikova, speaking from exile, rejected the ruling as a criminalization of dissent and truth-telling. The designation extends a years-long campaign against Pussy Riot, including recent prison sentences issued in absentia to several members for criticizing Russia’s military.
Theaster Gates has been commissioned to paint a monumental frieze for the Obama Foundation.
The Obama Foundation has commissioned Theaster Gates to create a 175-foot painted frieze for the Hadiya Pendleton Atrium at the Obama Presidential Center, set to open in Chicago in 2026. Drawing from photographs in the Johnson Publishing Company archive and the personal collection of photographer Howard Simmons, the work will translate images associated with Ebony and Jet into a monumental aluminum installation. The frieze centers crowds and Black women, foregrounding collective labor, resilience, and everyday life on Chicago’s South Side. It joins a growing roster of site-specific artworks anchoring the Center’s civic and cultural mission.
The New York City Parks Department will restore I.M. Pei’s public plaza in Brooklyn.
The New York City Parks Department plans to reconstruct a public plaza in Crown Heights designed in 1969 by I.M. Pei and landscape architect M. Paul Friedberg, following approval from the Landmarks Preservation Commission. The project will replace fencing, walls, and paving while addressing long-standing safety issues, including cars driving through the mid-block space, and aims to better integrate the plaza into the surrounding streetscape. Preservation advocates support the need for upgrades but have urged the city to restore key elements of the original Brutalist design rather than rely on standard-issue park furnishings. The $2.8 million renovation builds on a site with deep ties to 1960s urban renewal efforts in Bedford-Stuyvesant and Crown Heights.
In just four days, David Zwirner’s benefit exhibition for the Ali Forney Center raised nearly $1 million.
David Zwirner’s four-day benefit exhibition, “Toward the Light: Artists for the Ali Forney Center,” brought in $950,000 for the nonprofit, nearly tripling its original target. Curated by art adviser Stephen Truax, the show marked a shift from prior Sotheby’s-led editions to a gallery model that expanded participation to 37 artists, including Marlene Dumas, Julie Mehretu, and Wolfgang Tillmans. Most artists donated works outright, while some received partial proceeds, resulting in $250,000 paid to artists and the remainder directed to the Ali Forney Center, with Zwirner forgoing commission. The approach allowed tighter control over sales while significantly increasing funds for the organization’s housing and support programs for queer youth.
Today’s attractive distractions:
Devon Turnbull recast Cooper Hewitt’s Carnegie Library as a listening room.
TikTok has renamed hockey rinks as “boy aquariums.”
The Winter Olympics keep giving: Mariah Carey will perform at the opening ceremony.
Hundreds of Labubus are at the center of this touring exhibition.
