Art News Daily

Plus: American Alliance of Museums announces new museum leadership diversity initiative | UK government pledges £20m culture fund for five English regions | Haifa removes McJesus sculpture after continuing protests | and recommended reading

Plus: MOCA Los Angeles to close Pacific Design Center | and Warhol Foundation announces latest grants

Plus: Global fund Aliph announces its first cultural heritage projects in Iraq and Mali | 'Michelangelo' painting stolen from Belgian church | Bloomberg awards $1m to Tulsa, Oklahoma | and winners of Creative Capital Awards 2019 announced

Plus: Installation featuring Saudi Arabian flag to be relocated away from Ground Zero | Doyle auction house appoints new CEO and president | and Montreal contemporary art foundation announces rebrand

Plus: Prix Marcel Duchamp 2019 shortlist announced | and Sean O’Harrow to direct Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art

Plus: El Museo del Barrio cancels plans to honour German princess | New Museum workers start process of unionising | and recommended reading

Plus: Robert Kret steps down as director of Georgia O’Keeffe Museum | Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro disbands ministry of culture | French state rejects option to buy work attributed to Caravaggio | and VIA Art Fund announces 2018 grant recipients

Plus: Art dealer Mary Boone cites early-life trauma as reason for tax fraud | US Supreme Court refuses Hungarian restitution case filed by Jewish heirs | and five arts organisations shortlisted for Ampersand Foundation Award

Plus: Nazi-looted painting in Gurlitt collection returned to Jewish heirs | Stedelijk Museum confirms Beatrix Ruf will not return as director | and Artadia and Marciano Art Foundation establish new award for LA artists

Plus: Gaurav Bhatia resigns permanently as managing director of Sotheby’s India | and Ruth Estévez to be senior curator-at-large of Rose Art Museum

Plus: Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum closes in federal shutdown | Warren MacKenzie (1924–2018) | Lauren Wittels named partner of Luhring Augustine Gallery | and recommended reading

Plus: Artworks seized from residence of former president of Argentina | Nicola L. (1937–2018)

Plus: Smithsonian sites in Washington, D.C. close due to government shutdown | Venice to introduce new tourist entry fee | Invisible ink drawings discovered on Basquiat work | Sister Wendy Beckett (1930–2018) | and recommended reading

Plus: Ivory Coast requests restitution of 148 artefacts from France | and bill on ivory ban receives Royal Assent to become UK law

Plus: Hashim Sarkis to curate Venice Architecture Biennale 2020 | Amale Andraos to design Beirut Museum of Art | and Shortlist for Margaret Tait Award announced

Plus: Gemeentemuseum Den Haag to be renamed | Loic Gouzer to leave Christie’s New York | and Vanessa German wins $200,000 Don Tyson Prize

Plus: Dalí lobster telephone acquired by National Galleries of Scotland | Troels Wörsel (1950–2018) | and recommended reading

Plus: Strasbourg Biennale postponed after Christmas market shooting | Subodh Gupta steps down as curator of Goa arts festival over sexual misconduct claims | and recommended reading

Plus: Mario Merz Prize 2019 finalists announced | and Joan Mitchell Foundation announces 2018 grants

Plus: Julie Finch to direct Compton Verney Art Gallery | Leonor Antunes wins Zurich Art Prize 2019 | Anonymous Was a Woman 2018 grants awarded to 10 female artists

Plus: Robin Nicholson named director of Telfair Museums | Update on recovery of objects from National Museum of Brazil | and Tania Bruguera cancels appearance at Kochi-Muziris Biennale

Plus: DRC to seek restitution of objects in Africa Museum in Belgium | and Carol Rhodes (1959–2018)

Plus: ICA LA director Elsa Longhauser to step down | Tania Bruguera and other artists released in Cuba | and recommended reading

Plus: European Court of Human Rights rules that Russian government must pay compensation to Pussy Riot | Pieter Bruegel the Elder may have engraved earliest known Scottish landscape