Art Industry News is a daily digest of the most consequential developments coming out of the art world and art market. Here’s what you need to know on this Friday, May 21.
NEED-TO-READ
UCCA Opens Shanghai Outpost – Beijing’s UCCA Center for Contemporary Art is launching its new branch in Shanghai, called UCCA Edge, tomorrow. The inaugural show revisits the 2000 Shanghai Biennale, which the museum posits is the “moment at which the Chinese art world began to understand itself as global.” The 5,500-square-meter venue, designed by SO – IL architects, is spread across three floors of a new office tower on the north shore of Suzhou Creek. (The Art Newspaper)
Akron Art Museum Searches for a Way Forward – The Akron Art Museum was among the art institutions most upended by whistleblower claims of workplace mistreatment last year. Now, it is publicizing its efforts to rebuild trust with staff and visitors. The museum’s interim director Jon Fiume, hired to stabilize the institution, has proposed a transformation plan including staff and board training on DEAI and implicit bias. (Akron Business Journal)
JR Installs a Canyon at the Eiffel Tower – Just when you think to yourself, “Wow, it’s been a while since I’ve heard about what JR is up to,” there he is again! The inexhaustible French street artist has just completed a massive trompe l’oeil installation at the Eiffel Tower in Paris. The black-and-white photocollage work creates the appearance of a vast canyon beneath the monument, and will remain in place for one month. We’ll bet you $200 it shows up in the next season of “Emily in Paris.” (Le Monde)
German Architecture Biennial Curators Call for Housing Debate – The curators of the German pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale, which presents a vision of the year 2038, have called on the German government and public to think about and debate proactively what can be done today to create a more sustainable architecture, and to improve human and animal coexistence with plants. (Monopol)
ART MARKET
Phillips Will Offer “Bitchcoin” – Phillips will sell conceptual artist Sarah Meyohas’s early digital currency, Bitchcoin, which she created in February 2015, five months before Ethereum launched. Five bundles of 480 Bitchcoins will be offered online between May 25 and 28, each tied to a digital rose petal artwork from her 2017 exhibition “Cloud of Petals.” (Artfix Daily)
Independent Releases Exhibitor List – Some 40 galleries will take part in New York’s Independent art fair this year, which is setting up shop in a new home at Cipriani South Street from September 9 through 12. Slightly smaller than the fair’s usual lineup of 50 to 60 participants, exhibitors include Maureen Paley, Peres Projects, and Various Small Fires. (ARTnews)
COMINGS & GOINGS
Little Island Opens in New York…
Read More: Art Industry News: World’s Busiest Artist JR Just Created a Vast Canyon