August 19 | The Museums Association defends Tate and BP

The MA carried out a two month investigation and concluded that such a deal between a museum and a corporate sponsor was “standard practice.” Art Not Oil have nonetheless expressed their disappointment in the results of the investigation. The full letter can be found here. 

Harvard has launched an online database of 32,000 Bauhaus artworks. The project has been organised with the Harvard University Art Museums in honor of the upcoming 100 year anniversary since the inauguration of the German art and design school in 1919. Featured artists include Mies van der Rohe, Bertrand Goldberg, Marcel Breuer, and Bauhaus founder Walter Gropius. More via The Art Newspaper.

Zai Kuning has been selected to represent Singapore at the 2017 Venice Biennale. Born in Singapore in 1964 Kuning has exhibited the world over from Paris’ Palais de Tokyo to Japan’s Museum of Contemporary Art. His presentation will present the culmination of 20 years of research into Malay culture, an oft-overlooked people in the history books. The pavilion will be curated by June Yap. Art Forum has more.

A new affordable art sales platform — Collectionair — has managed to get backing from important curators including Jean-Hubert Martin, the former director of the Centre Pompidou, who will make up part of their advisory board. The website, which sells artworks for less than $10,000, was co-founded by Olivier Varenne, international curator of the Museum of Old and New Art, and entrepreneur Valerie Konde. The platform focuses on “under-represented art scenes”, enabling buyers to browse more than 20 virtual exhibitions featuring artists from countries such as Iran, Oman and Mozambique.  Other advisory board members include Philippa Adams, Senior Director of the Saatchi Gallery in London, and Adelina von Fürstenberg, curator of the Armenian pavilion at the 2015 Venice Biennale. More via The Art Newspaper.

Point72 Asset Management, the hedge fund belonging to Steve Cohen, now only holds 1m shares of Sotheby’s stock. The previous filings showed Cohen to be in possession of over 3m shares, equal to 5.5% of the company. The news comes following Taikang Life Insurance’s purchase of a 13.5% stake in the auction house. More via Art Market Monitor.

Yale University Press and the Richard Diebenkorn Foundation are to issue a catalogue raisonné of Diebenkorn’s work this fall. The publication comes following an ongoing scandal concerning fakes of the artist’s work through the now fallen Knoedler & Co galleryin New York. The project was initiated by Diebenkorn’s wife Phyllis before her death in 2015 around the time that authenticity questions were being raised. According to the editor of the catalogue raisonné, Jane Livingston, most of Diebenkorn’s works never even left his studio. Read more on Art News.