17 newcomers at Art Basel
Art Basel has revealed the 291 international exhibitors who will participate in the fair’s 48th edition, which runs from June 15 to 18, 2017. Among this year’s participants are 17 newcomers, including New York galleries Canada, Di Donna, Chapter NY, Salon 94 and Leila Heller; the Box and Parrasch Heijnen from Los Angeles; Kalfayan Galleries, Athens; P420, Bologna; Magician Space, Shanghai; Gypsum Gallery, Cairo; Campoli Presti, Paris; Pilar Corrias and Luxembourg & Dayan from London; and dépendance, Brussels. See the full gallery list here.
Chapman Brothers bid farewell to White Cube
YBA generation duo Jake and Dinos Chapman have left London’s White Cube gallery after nearly 20 years to join international gallery Blain|Southern.
The decision to leave was apparently made mutually by the Chapman brothers and White Cube. Blain|Southern said in a statement: “With their sharp wit and playful intelligence, Jake and Dinos Chapman never shy away from deflating the pieties of our age. This is yet another exciting development in the gallery’s programme.” The artists’ first exhibition with the gallery is expected to take place in its London space within the year. More via The Art Newspaper.
Jake and Dinos Chapman at with taxidermied animals at their Sackler Gallery show. Photo via The Evening Standar
Widespread layoffs at Paddle8
Auction house Paddle8 has announced that it will make dozens of employees redundant across its three offices in New York, London, and Los Angeles.
Some departments are now down to a single staffer, with the heavy cutbacks taking a particular toll on cataloguing, design, and tech. The news follows Paddle8’s recent separation from German art startup Auctionata, which occurred a mere nine months after their much-publicized merger. The merger sparked an initial round of layoffs and departures at Paddle8. In the latest high-profile departure, it has been revealed that CEO Aditya Julka will be leaving the company, but will continue to work as an advisor. ARTnews has the full story.
Trump enlists art historian
Donald Trump has appointed art historian Victoria Coates as senior director for strategic assessments on the National Security Council — one of the most important national security jobs in the US.
Coates received her Ph.D. in Art History from the University of Pennsylvania in 1998, and was a consulting curator at the Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA) from 2010 to 2013. She became involved in the defense sector in the mid-2000s whilst blogging about national security for the conservative website RedState. More recently, she worked as a national security advisor to Texas senator Ted Cruz, helping him develop his defense policy during his attempts to win the Republican presidential nomination last year. Coates has voiced strong opposition to the nuclear deal with Iran, has been fiercely critical of the Obama administration’s position on Israel, so her appointment is likely to trigger big changes in US defense policy. Artsy has further details.
Coates at a talk by they Action Institute at The Bloomsbury Hotel, London. Photo via Action Institute
Zona Maco
There were some significant sales at Zona Maco art fair in Mexico last weekend.
London’s Lisson Gallery sold Ai Weiwei’s nearly 10-foot-tall sculpture, Forever (Stainless Steel Bicycles in Gilding) 3 Pairs 8 Layers, (2013), for €550,000 to a public collection in Mexico City as part of the ARTZ Pedregal Public Space Acquisition Award. Works by Mexican artist Jose Dávila were sold by Sean Kelly gallery and Galeria OMR. Marlborough gallery raked in over half a million dollars with their sale of Cuban artist Tomás Sánchez’s Inner Lagoon…Thought Catalog (2016) ($550,000). See the full list of sales via Art Market Monitor.
