The Dallas Museum of Art jointly acquired All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins in 2017 with the Rachofsky Collection, which is also based in Dallas. Like other entries in the series, viewers are invited to step inside a small mirrored room filled with Kusama’s whimsical, often polka-dotted sculptures, in this case, her signature yellow and black pumpkins. The effect is a kaleidoscopic sea of sculptures stretching into oblivion—very selfie-friendly. 

All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins is “key to understanding [Kusama’s] practice,” Gavin Delahunty, a contemporary-art curator at the museum, said in a statement in 2017.

Due to its popularity, the installation comes with a recommendation of one to four visitors at a time, though that didn’t prevent property damage during its stint at the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, D.C. In a headline-grabbing 2017 incident, a visitor tripped on one of the hand-painted acrylic gourds, shattering it in the process, while trying to take a photo. The Washington Post reported at the time that the museum instructed for no security to be in the narrow room with visitors, who are allowed 30 seconds inside of viewing. 

A Hirshhorn spokesperson told the Post that the cost of replacing a pumpkin was “negligible,” and the site-specific nature of the installation allows for seemingly endless reconfigurations, all of which are executed in consultation with Kusama.

The 95-year-old Japanese artist is one of the most profitable contemporary artists of today. She grossed $80.9 million at auction last year, beating out David Hockney for the spot of top-selling contemporary artist of 2023 (her most expensive piece sold was the painting A Flower (2014), which fetched nearly $10 million at Christie’s Hong Kong). 

Museums are similarly shelling out to add a Kusama to their collection. In June, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art announced that it had acquired the “Infinity Room” Dreaming of Earth’s Sphericity, I Would Offer My Love (2023). The installation, consisting of large transparent acrylic dots suspended like a constellation, will remain on view through January of 2025.

As of this June, SFMOMA reported that its Kusama show, “Infinite Love,” had been seen by 170,000 people.

From October 3 through 6, the inaugural Atlanta Art Fair will host international galleries and local enterprises at the historic event space Pullman Yards. The new fair is helmed by AMP director Kelly Freeman, with Nato Thompson tapped as artistic director. 

The full exhibitor list will be shared closer to October, but organizers have said the spread will offer “a unique microcosm of the American South”, with strong representation by regional outfits, as well as public programming and large-scale projects organized by Thompson.

Some 60 exhibitors showcasing artworks by over 100 artists are slated to appear so far. Among the Atlanta exhibitors are Alan Avery Art Company, Day & Night Projects, Dunwoody Gallery, Fay Gold Gallery, Gallery Anderson Smith, Hawkins Headquarters, Jackson Fine Art, Johnson Lowe Gallery, Marcia Wood Gallery, Maune Contemporary, The Object Space, Poem 88, Sandler Hudson Gallery, Spalding Nix Fine Art, and Whitespace. 

Participants from elsewhere in the American South include House of Friends (Savannah, Georgia), Scott Miller Projects (Birmingham, Alabama); Fotovat Atelier (Fort Lauderdale, Florida); Lucky Fish Gallery (Greensboro, North Carolina ); Urevbu Contemporary (Memphis, Tennessee); and Mitochondria Gallery (Houston, Texas). Also set to appear are Luis De Jesus and Residency Art Gallery from Los Angeles, Aspen’s Casterline|Goodman Gallery, New York’s M. David & Co. and Spanierman Modern, as well as international galleries Gallery Tableau (Seoul, South Korea); Galeria Baobab (Bogotá, Colombia); Makasiini Contemporary (Turku, Finland); Spence Gallery (Ontario, Canada); and Stoney Road Press (Dublin, Ireland). 

Atlanta Art Fair—the first of its stature in the city—is the latest endeavor of Art Market Productions (AMP) and Intersect Art and Design, the latter of which was involved in an advisory role. AMP currently organizes three art fairs: the Seattle Art Fair, the San Francisco Art Fair, Art on Paper in New York (The company is also a division of a21, a marketing agency). Intersect Art and Design currently organizes two art fairs: Intersect Aspen (formerly Art Aspen) and Intersect Palm Springs (formerly Art Palm Springs).

“There is so much happening in Atlanta from a cultural perspective,” Freeman said in a statement. “We have been watching as Atlanta’s art scene has grown from strength to strength and recognize the need for the city’s art market to have a centralized meeting point. Our priority is to engage the local community and really listen to what it needs to help support its expansion.”

On August 12, Judge William H. Orrick, of the United States District Court of California, granted several appeals from Stability AI, Midjourney, DeviantArt, and a newly added defendant, Runway AI. This decision dismisses accusations that their technology variably violated the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which intends to protect internet users from online theft; profited unfairly from the artists’ work (so-called “unjust enrichment”); and, in the case of DeviantArt, violated assumptions that parties will act in good faith towards contracts (the “covenant of good faith and fair dealing”). 

However, “the Copyright Act claims survive against Midjourney and the other defendants,” Orrick wrote, as do the claims regarding the Lanham Act, which protects the owners of trademarks. “Plaintiffs have plausible allegations showing why they believe their works were included in the [datasets]. And plaintiffs plausibly allege that the Midjourney product produces images—when their own names are used as prompts—that are similar to plaintiffs’ artistic works.”

In October of last year, Orrick dismissed a handful of allegations brought by the artists—Sarah Andersen, Kelly McKernan, and Karla Ortiz—against Midjourney and DeviantArt, but allowed the artists to file an amended complaint against the two companies, whose system utilizes Stability’s Stable Diffusion text-to-image software.

“Even Stability recognizes that determination of the truth of these allegations—whether copying in violation of the Copyright Act occurred in the context of training Stable Diffusion or occurs when Stable Diffusion is run—cannot be resolved at this juncture,” Orrick wrote in his October judgement.

In January 2023, Andersen, McKernan, and Ortiz filed a complaint that accused Stability of “scraping” 5 billion online images, including theirs, to train the dataset (known as LAION) in Stability Diffusion to generate its own images. Because their work was used to train the models, the complaint argued, the models are producing derivative works.

Midjourney claimed that “the evidence of their registration of newly identified copyrighted works is insufficient,” according to one filing. Instead, the works were “identified as being both copyrighted and included in the LAION datasets used to train the AI products are compilations.” Midjourney further contended that copyrighted protection only covers new material in compilations and alleged that the artists failed to identify which works within the AI-generated compilations are new. 

Assadollah Hashemi, 66, was charged with second-degree arson and first-degree attempted malicious burning. According to charging documents, surveillance video captured the car model and license plate of the vehicle used to flee the scene after the fire was set, both of which were linked to Hashemi. Baltimore police added that Hashemi has a history of fire-related crimes. 

A federal investigation was launched after scorch marks were discovered by a member of the museum’s renovation team outside the front entrance of the museum. 

The museum is located between two historic synagogues on Baltimore’s Lloyd Street. The Lloyd Street Synagogue is Maryland’s oldest synagogue, having welcomed its first congregants in 1845. The museum has been closed for the past year due to renovations and has not reported any prior threats to its property or staff. Police have not confirmed whether the incident is being investigated as a hate crime, however the location of the target drew scrutiny and condemnation from the local Jewish community.

“It’s hard to believe someone would randomly light a small fire outside an institution that’s clearly labeled as Jewish between two historic synagogues that there’s not some antisemitic or anti-Israel intent,” Howard Libit, the Executive Director of the Baltimore Jewish Council, said.

The site, an ancient city founded by Greeks in the 5th century BCE on the northern shores of the Black Sea, was added to UNESCO’s World Heritage List in 2013. The following year, Russia illegally annexed the Crimean Peninsula. Ukraine and its allies do not recognize Russian sovereignty over Crimea, a key entryway into the Eastern Mediterranean, and have campaigned for its recovery since its occupation began.

The new complex, named “New Chersonese,” features a Russian Orthodox monastery and several institutions, including a Museum of Christianity and the Museum of Crimea and Novorossiya. (Novorossiya is the term Russia uses for the annexed territories in Crimea.) The complex was built by Russia’s ministry of defense with funds from Transneft, a state-controlled corporation, and is managed by a cleric appointed by Russian President Vladimir Putin. It officially opened on July 28.

On July 24, Dmytro Lubinets, the Ukrainian parliament commissioner for human rights, appealed to the UN to protect the site, and described its redevelopment as part of Russia’s plan to destroy Ukrainian heritage.

Russia has “completely destroyed the authentic monument of world significance, Tauric Chersonese,” Lubinets said in a statement posted on his Telegram channel. “They have started illegal construction work on its ruins, actually building a new city, the so-called historical and archaeological park.”

In a new report, Evelina Kravchenko, from the Institute of Archaeology of Ukrainian National Academy of Sciences, said Tauric Chersonese had been “disturbed.” Moreover, Kravchenko said, “tens of thousands of finds” were destroyed. “Some of them were picked up from these dumps by local people both for personal storage and for sale on the black market. Thus, soon we will be able to see things from Chersonesos on online auctions.” 

The annexation has created legal and ethical quandaries for Ukraine and the International cultural sector. In November, the Allard Pierson Museum, a historical museum in Amsterdam, inspired some controversy when it returned 400 artifacts, including prized Sythian gold, to a Kyiv museum. The collection was loaned to Amsterdam from four museums in Crimea prior to the annexation, and following the incident, both Ukraine and Crimea demanded the artifacts be returned.

“This was a special case, in which cultural heritage became a victim of geopolitical developments,” Els van der Plas, director of the Amsterdam museum, said in a statement.

Since the invasion of Ukraine, the Russian military has been repeatedly denounced by the international watchdog groups for its apparent targeting of Ukrainian cultural heritage. In April, the Kherson Art Museum in Ukraine identified 100 paintings that were allegedly looted by Russian troops, as seen in a video filmed in a museum in Crimea. The museum said that the 100 works of art captured on camera likely represent “less than 1 percent” of what has been looted from Ukraine’s museums.

Remnants of a fire were found on Monday at the locked front gate of the museum. According to Howard Libit, the Executive Director of the Baltimore Jewish Council, a security camera system captured the suspect pulling up to the museum at 10:30 p.m. and lighting an object on fire before fleeing the scene. A member of the museum’s renovation team discovered the aftermath—residue of the material and scorch marks—Monday morning. 

“We are in the very early stages of the investigation,” Baltimore police spokesperson Lindsey Eldridge told FOX45 News. “Through the course of the investigation, officers will be able to determine if the incident will be investigated as a hate crime.”

The museum is located between two historic synagogues on Baltimore’s Lloyd Street. The Lloyd Street Synagogue is Maryland’s oldest synagogue, having welcomed its first congregants in 1845. The museum has been closed for the past year due to renovations and has not reported any prior threats to its property or staff.

“It’s hard to believe someone would randomly light a small fire outside an institution that’s clearly labeled as Jewish between two historic synagogues that there’s not some antisemitic or anti-Israel intent,” Libit said.

The museum did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

One person was seriously injured in the strike, and two others were injured in minor ways, Emad Wafa El-Sayegh, chairman of the board of directors of Gaza’s Young Men’s Christian Association told the Art Newspaper. El-Sayegh, along with his family, were reportedly taking shelter in the church.

A post on the church’s Facebook page confirmed El-Sayegh’s account and added that there were no fatalities. The shell collapsed two walls on the upper floors of the church and an adjacent dining room where displaced people had sheltered.

The World Council of Churches (WCC), to which Saint Porphyrius belongs, decried the structure’s targeting in a statement published on July 31. The missile strike came days after a rocket strike on the town of Majdal Shams, in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights, which killed 12 members of its ethnic Druze community. Israel has accused Hezbollah of firing the rocket from Lebanon. Hezbollah has denied involvement, however the deadly incident has exacerbated fears of an imminent regional war. 

“We unequivocally condemn these attacks on civilians,” WCC general secretary Rev. Prof. Dr Jerry Pillay said in a statement. “These actions not only harm innocent people but also exacerbate the already dire situation faced by the people of Gaza and Golan Heights, further fueling the cycle of violence. Governments have the responsibility of protecting and securing the rights of all civilians.”

The first strike on St. Porphyrius was in October 2023, shortly after the Hamas attack on Israel. At least 16 Palestinians sheltering inside the church were killed. 

The foundation of the Church of St. Porphyrius dates to the 5th century, and the current structure was completed in the 12th century. It is named after the former bishop of Gaza, and was located atop the spot he is believed to have died in 420 BCE. 

Like many Crusader-era structures, it was resplendently decorated and built with thickly fortified walls. The church has served as a shelter for Gaza’s Christian minority and Muslim residents through years of bombardment. 

In April, Chicago-based human rights organization Justice For All deemed the initial bombing of the church by Israel a “war crime” in a legal filing submitted to the International Criminal Court (ICC), calling for an international investigation into the incident.

The legal filing by Justice For All detailed how the air strike on the church violated the ICC’s Rome Statute, a 1998 treaty that establishes four core international crimes: genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and crimes of aggression. Per the treaty, those crimes are not subject to any statute of limitations.

The group accused the Israeli military of targeting the church, a non-military structure, which caused the death of civilians and the near-destruction of world heritage—which is a crime, according to the ICC’s Rome Statute.

Shortly after the attack, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) told the Washington Post that the strike was “targeting a Hamas control center.”

“It is important to clarify that the Church was not the target of the strike,” the IDF said.

The two new contracts ensure, that the average hourly wage will increase by more than 9 percent and that employers contribute to the workers’ 403(b) accounts.

In 2023, Storm King joined a number of prominent museums with unions under the umbrella of AFSCME, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Brooklyn Museum. Employees of the sculpture park began organizing in August 2022, following the announcement of a $45 million revamp of its campus set to be completed this year. Their demands echoed those that have underpinned the labor movement in cultural institutions across the United States: job security, and salaries and benefits that accommodate rising inflation and costs of living.

Storm King leadership did not immediately recognize the union and hired a New York law firm whose specialties include “union avoidance.” In March 2023, the union launched an Action Network campaign calling for supporters to email the institution’s board of trustees and demand they meet with union negotiators. 

“We see this first contract as a foundation we can build upon now that we have our union and the voice on the job that comes with it,” Maureen Spaulding, a negotiating committee member from CSEA, told Midhudson News. “Right away, we’re all benefiting from an immediate wage increase following our contract vote. Having that contract gives us a written guarantee for our wage increases, health insurance costs, and other benefits for the next several years. Before we organized our union, there were no guarantees year to year.”

A Storm King representative did not immediately respond to ARTnews’s request for comment.

The collection of 1,400 African artifacts of unclear provenance is owned by real estate agent Sam Njunuri. The auctions were planned to settle debts that Njunuri owed Darlene Jarrett and Sylvia Jones, former tenants who allege that Njunuri changed the locks and removed their belongings while they were vacationing in 2015. The couple sued Njunuri in 2021, with a jury ruling in their favor. Njunuri was ordered to pay Jarrett and Jones $990,000 in damages. Njunuri intended to pay them back with the profits made from an auction of his art collection, but a bankruptcy filing in April put an indefinite stop to those plans. 

Meanwhile, investigators have attempted to uncover the origins of Njunuri’s prodigious collection, the existence of which was only publicly broadcast in 2020. That year, KPRC 2, a Houston media outlet, discovered via a tip a discreet shed decorated with high-end security cameras and surrounded by an electronic gate. Inside were hundreds of African artifacts, of varying origin. A subsequent investigation found the shed had been converted with taxpayer money into an art storage facility to the price tag of $326,000. The facility was later revealed to be owned by Harris County and is located in Harris County Commissioner Rodney Ellis’ precinct.

“A lot of money got spent on a building, clearly to make it so that it could be used to store this art collection,” Former Harris County Judge and KPRC 2 Analyst Ed Emmett said in a statement. “The art collection doesn’t belong to the county. The art collection wasn’t even on loan to the county.”

In 2021, local reporters linked the shed to Njunuri, the owner of African Art Global. A connection was also established between the company and the sister-in-law of Ellis. Two criminal investigations were launched by Harris County District Attorney’s public integrity investigators, during which a Harris County grand jury declined to indict Ellis for his involvement. Njunuri has admitted to owning some of the artworks and has testified under oath that a portion of the collection may have been stolen.

The FBI has determined that a federal crime was not committed, however as of April, investigators are pursuing paperwork to authenticate the collection’s ownership.

Taylor Pelton, 28, has reportedly been charged with criminal mischief as a hate crime. Pasternak’s Brooklyn Heights residence was splashed with red paint in an apparent protest of the museum’s ties to Zionist organizations. The residences of several Brooklyn Museum board trustees were also targeted. Five suspects are still sought by police in connection to the crime. 

At Pasternak’s home, vandals unfurled a banner that read: “Anne Pasternak / Brooklyn Museum / White Supremacist Zionist.” Beneath that statement, in a smaller, red font, were the words “Funds Genocide.”

The incident was decried on X by New York City Mayor Eric Adams, who vowed to “bring the criminals responsible here to justice.

The Association of Art Museum Directors, an industry group for institutional leaders that counts some 240 members, including Pasternak, wrote in a statement that it “unequivocally and forcefully” condemned what it described as an “antisemitic act.”

The Brooklyn Museum has repeatedly faced calls from artists, activists, and cultural workers to sever financial ties to Israel and for museum leadership to publicly term Israel’s military actions in Gaza a genocide. On May 31, a massive pro-Palestine march ended at the Brooklyn Museum, where some 30 activists occupied the lobby for a demonstration in which they demanded that the institution disclose its financial ties to Israel and divest from them. Outside the museum, approximately 1,000 protestors echoed their calls, with some climbing onto the ceiling of the museum’s glass pavilion after being denied entry to the lobby. 

The action resulted in dozens of arrests by the NYPD, and museum leadership subsequently received criticism from activists over what they described as an excessive use of force against unarmed protestors. In a statement to Hyperallergic, a spokesperson for the Brooklyn Museum said that “the police brutality that took place [on May 31] is devastating.” As the museum is city property situated on city-owned land, the NYPD does not need permission to enter the premises.

Protests at the Brooklyn Museum in December focused on the institution’s corporate partnership with Bank of New York Mellon, which has investments in Israeli weapons manufacturer Elbit Systems and which has supported the Friends of Israel Defense Force Donor Advised Fund. (The Bank told the Financial Times in April that it invests in Elbit “as a result of requirements by its passive index investment strategies.”)

According to Palestinian health authorities, more than 39,000 people have been killed in Gaza since the October 7 Hamas attack as a result of Israel’s air and ground campaign.