Grafton Architects win Pritzker Prize
Plus: More than 2,000 arts professionals endorse Elizabeth Warren | Google launches VR site for Chauvet caves | Kurdish artist Fatos Irwen released from prison in Turkey | and Louvre reopens after closure over coronavirus
Art Dubai postponed indefinitely due to coronavirus
Plus: Emilia Beatriz wins 2020/21 Margaret Tait Award | Italy rejects arrest warrant for Old Master forger | Proposal to turn Sydney’s Cockatoo Island into art attraction rejected by officials | Peter Dreher (1932–2020) | and MOCA Tucson appoints Laura Copelin its executive director and chief curator
Ulay (1943–2020)
Plus: Louvre closes amid concerns over coronavirus | Cooper-Hewitt donor rescinds $5m bequest over removal of director | and Bonhams appoints Patrick Masson as managing director for UK and Europe
Norwegian government authorises demolition of building bearing murals by Picasso
Plus: Brazilian collector Bernardo Paz cleared of money laundering charges | Italian collector Patrizia Sandretto Re Rebaudengo drops plans for new Madrid space | Eric Crosby announced as director of Carnegie Museum of Art | Brooklyn Public Library and Brooklyn Historical Society to combine | and recommended reading
Grayson Perry wins €150,000 Erasmus Prize
Plus: Sharon Corwin appointed president and CEO of Terra Foundation | François Tajan (1962–2020) | and provenance of Met painting updated to acknowledge ownership by Nazi-persecuted dealer
Major LACMA donor suspends long-term gift programme
Plus: Uffizi scientific committee resigns over loan of Raphael painting | Smithsonian lifts copyright restrictions from 2.8 million images | and New York developers plan to dismantle Isamu Noguchi installation
More than 600 artists endorse Bernie Sanders in open letter
Plus: Oldest known cave paintings threatened by cement mining in Indonesia | Billionaire Rebekah Mercer no longer on American Museum of Natural History’s board, following years of protest | and James Brown (1951–2020)
Spread of coronavirus causes museums across northern Italy to close
Plus: Collector files lawsuit for $1m against Princeton University | Yona Friedman (1923–2020) | Jack Youngerman (1926–2020) | Sotheby’s moves Hong Kong sales to New York | Nazi-looted Andrea della Robbia sculpture restituted to Germany | and recommended reading
New art centre dedicated to Alexander Calder to open in Philadelphia
Plus: Jingart fair in Beijing cancelled due to coronavirus | Monet ‘self-portrait’ reattributed to Charles Giron | and recommended reading
Director of Forensic Architecture barred from travelling to United States
Plus: Staff at UK art schools join nationwide strike | Louvre cancels show of Bulgarian religious art | Ethiopian crown repatriated from the Netherlands | and new £20 note celebrating JMW Turner enters circulation
Leaked Brexit negotiating paper stokes Elgin Marbles dispute
Plus: Egyptian coffin painting discovered at Harvard Semitic Museum | David Adjaye and Cai Guo-Qiang win 2020 Noguchi Award | and Raphael tapestries return to Sistine Chapel
V&A Museum of Childhood to close for £13m renovation
Plus: Six trustees resign from Cooper Hewitt museum | and Arts Council England pushes for greater diversity in arts organisations
Jenny Waldman to direct Art Fund
Plus: India requests restitution of bronze idol from Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum | FBI repatriates over 450 cultural objects to Haiti | and billionaire gaming entrepreneur Mark Pincus pledges $3m to James Turrell’s Roden Crater art project
MoMA appoints Clément Chéroux new chief curator of photography
Plus: Former Sotheby’s attorneys to found new art law firm | Anne Marion (1938-2020) | and recommended reading
Blain Southern closes all three galleries in London, New York and Berlin
Plus: Oliver Dowden named new culture secretary in cabinet reshuffle | House of Representatives votes to establish a Smithsonian museum for women’s history | and Elisabeth Wild (1922-2020)
Sonia Boyce to represent UK at 59th Venice Biennale in 2021
Plus: Court dismisses privacy appeal against Tate Modern viewing platform | Native American burial sites destroyed to construct US-Mexico border wall | Hong Kong Arts Festival cancelled due to coronavirus | and Mat Collishaw parts company with Blain Southern gallery
Bonhams chief executive Matthew Girling steps down
Plus: Trump’s annual budget renews threat against National Endowment for the Arts | Sofie Scheerlinck appointed interim managing director of TEFAF | Caroline Baumann resigns as director of Cooper Hewitt | Lewisham and Croydon named London Boroughs of Culture | and Rembrandt discovered at small Pennsylvania Museum
Climate activists stage three-day protest against BP sponsorship at British Museum
Plus: Ella Fontanals-Cisneros cancels gift of 400 works to Spanish state | Counterspace named as architects of Serpentine Pavilion 2020 | Agnes Gund wins inaugural Ruth Bader Ginsburg leadership award | and Louvre to remain open throughout closing weekend of Leonardo show
Art Basel cancels Hong Kong fair due to coronavirus outbreak
Plus: Uffizi wins court battle against unofficial ticketing websites | New York dealer sues artist Derek Fordjour for $1.45m | and recommended reading
Beverly Pepper (1922–2020)
Plus: Yale art history department defends changes to undergraduate survey courses | and Antony Hudek named director of Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens
Draft executive order could require federal buildings to be classical in style
Plus: Looted temple sculpture confiscated by UK police to return to Afghanistan|Gallery Weekend Beijing postponed due to coronavirus outbreak | Félix Marcilhac (1941–2020) | and College Art Association announces recipients of 2020 awards
Bulgarian billionaire’s antiquities collection seized by authorities
Plus: Ikko Narahara (1931–2020) | and Courtauld appoints Tzo Zen Ang as first managing director
Martine Gosselink appointed general director of the Mauritshuis
Plus: Opening of He Art Museum in China postponed due to coronavirus | Polish government urged to approve reappointment of Jewish history museum director | Gagosian and Steven Tananbaum settle lawsuit| 500-year-old rock art discovered after being damaged by Australian bushfires | and San Francisco tattoo artist sues Disney over alleged copyright infringement
Art Basel tries to reassure exhibitors about Hong Kong fair as WHO declares public health emergency
Plus: Bolsonaro appoints Regina Duarte as Brazil’s culture secretary | Unseen Amsterdam declares bankruptcy | Museum of Chinese in America hopes to salvage collection devastated by fire | Dutch museum sues London dealer after hackers intercept $3.1m deal | and W. M. Keck Foundation donates $50m to $650m Building LACMA campaign
Remembering Christopher Monkhouse (1947–2021), a renowned curator for whom collecting was a way of life