Art Industry News: Look Out, Instagram Influencers—Street Artists and Their Lawyers Are Coming for You + Other Stories

Art Industry News is normally a daily digest of the most
consequential developments coming out of the art world and art
market. Here’s what you need to know this Wednesday, August
7.

NEED-TO-READ

How Artforum’s New Editor Led the Magazine Through
Its #MeToo Crisis – In a deep
dive into the recent history of Artforum, new
editor David Velasco speaks
about taking over from Michelle Kuo amid the magazine’s #MeToo
crisis. He has worked to push the storied institution forward
with contributions such as a 12,000-word article on feminist
archetypes and an entire issue devoted to abuses of power. But some
feel that the magazine should have done more to directly address
the allegations against former publisher
Knight Landesman. A
former staffer says: “It’s not enough to have a veneer of content
that’s progressive, if it isn’t structural or systemic.”
(Columbia Journalism
Review)

African American Leaders
Advocate to Preserve George Washington Murals – In
the latest development in an ongoing saga, a group of prominent
African American figures in San Francisco have voiced further opposition to
the city school board’s recent decision
to cover up a
controversial mural in a public high school that has been
criticized as racist. The 1936 mural depicts George Washington’s
slaves working in a field, as well as pioneers standing over the
dead body of a Native American man. “The mural must not come
down,” San Fransisco Reverend Amos Brown said. “We must never
forget that fact and that reality.” (AP, NBC Bay
Area)

That Street Art Selfie Could Get You Sued – Superstar influencers,
beware! A copyright
lawyer predicts that it’s only a matter of time before professional
influencers begin to be sued by street artists for posting
sponsored messages in front of murals without asking for permission
or paying a licensing fee. “My guess is, you’re going to see a
couple influencers get hit hard,” says lawyer Stephen Doniger. Paid
posts by social media personalities with millions of followers can
command hundreds of thousands of dollars—making them just as much
of a target as corporations. The development would expand a current
wave of lawsuits street artists have brought against businesses
that have used their work in advertisements without permission,
including Mercedes and H&M. (Hollywood Reporter)

Artists Decry Aichi Triennale Censorship
– More than 70 of the 90
artists taking part in the Aichi Triennale
in Nagoya, Japan have criticized organizers’ decision to censor a
sculpture in an
exhibition about censored works of art. Candice Breitz and Tania Bruguera, among many
others, have signed an open letter demanding that the Korean
artists Kim Seo-kyung and Kim Eun-sung’s Statue of a Girl of Peace
return to public view. The
controversial work refers to the thousands of mainly Asian women
forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese military during World
War II. Nagoya’s mayor, Takashi Kawamura, claimed that the
exhibition “tramples on the feelings of Japanese citizens,” while
the triennale’s artistic director said the decision to shut down a
portion of the show was due to safety concerns. (ARTnews)

ART MARKET

Praise for Middle-Market Dealers Taking Risks – Emerging
and mid-career artists need middle-market dealers who are every bit as
daring as they are—but they rarely get the praise they deserve. So
the Observer
gave a shout out to four New York-based
risk-taking art dealers, some of whom operate traditional
storefronts and some of whom have taken an alternate route: Jimi
Dams, Benjamin Tischer,
Allegra LaViola, and Candice Madey. (Observer)

ArtCrush Raises $2.3 Million for the Aspen Art Museum
– The Aspen Museum’s annual start-studded fundraiser
netted $2.3 million. At the charity auction, Eleanore and Domenico
de Sole bought a blue-and-white Anthony Pearson work on canvas,
while Beth Rudin DeWoody snapped up a work by Dario Escobar. The
music executive Troy Carter went home with a trio of works
by Alfred Conteh, Curtis Kulig, and Maynard Monrow. (The Art
Newspaper)

COMINGS & GOINGS

University of Chicago
Gets $1 Million Gift for Art Conservation – The school’s
art history department has received a $1 million gift from
philanthropist Suzanne Deal Booth to support its art conservation
program. The money will be put toward an endowment to support the
university’s five-year conservation initiative, which offers
specialized sources, internships, and an endowed professorship in
the field. (Artforum)

Istanbul Biennial Forced
to Move Venues – This year’s fast-approaching
Istanbul Biennial, which opens on September 14, will no longer be
held in the city’s historic shipyards due to construction delays
and the discovery of asbestos. The exhibition will proceed as
planned at its second venue, the Pera Museum. Nicolas
Bourriaud, the director of the Montpellier
Contemporain in France, is curating this year’s edition,
which is titled “The Seventh Continent.” (Press
release)

Palestinian Artist Kamal
Boullata Has Died – The artist, historian, and writer
has died in Berlin at age 77. Boullata was known for
his geometric, abstract paintings represented in the collections of
the British Museum, the the Institut du Monde Arabe, and others as
well as his research on the history of Palestinian
art. (Artforum)

FOR ART’S SAKE

Paris Downplays Notre
Dame Lead-Poisoning Dangers – Paris authorities say that
tests carried out around Notre Dame show there is no further danger
of lead poisoning following the April 15 fire. The assurances come
after the city closed two schools on July 25 amid evidence that
lead from the melted roof and steeple had settled on various sites
around central Paris. Authorities now say surrounding schools will
be “rigorously cleaned” before the school year
begins. (AFP)

In Reversal, DC Metro
Will Accept Ads for Migrant Crisis Art Show –
Washington’s metro transit authority
has belatedly agreed to run advertisements for the Phillips
Collection’s summer exhibition, “The Warmth of Other Suns: Stories
of Global Displacement.” The agency initially rejected the ads
earlier this spring, citing a policy against promotional material
“intended to influence public policy.” DC Metro did not state the
reason for the reversal, but it came after the museum’s chairman
wrote an op-ed decrying the decision in the Washington
Post. (Washington Post)

An Artistic Protest
Against a Gun Show Returns – The second edition of
the protest art exhibition Art the Arms Fair will return to London
from September 3 through 13. The event runs alongside—and as
counter-programming for—the Defence and Security Equipment
International (DSEI), the world’s largest arms fair, also held in
London. This year, the Guerrilla Girls are among the participating
artists. (The Art Newspaper)

The post Art Industry News: Look Out, Instagram
Influencers—Street Artists and Their Lawyers Are Coming for You +
Other Stories appeared first on artnet News.