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The Headlines
ARTFUL DODGERS. The Louvre has had a tough season because the brazen daylight theft of France’s crown jewels from its gilded halls final October. Now, French police have arrested 9 individuals in reference to an intensive community of fraudsters who offered pretend tickets through guided teams to the Louvre and the Chateau de Versailles, studies Le Parisien. Two Louvre staff, together with unbiased guides, have been arrested for his or her suspected position within the “large-scale” scheme, which is estimated to have value the Louvre some 10 million euros ($11.9 million). Louvre President Laurence des Vehicles has been combating to carry onto her job because the October theft revealed main gaps within the museum’s safety, and she or he has vowed to implement emergency measures to fill them, at the same time as museum staff proceed to strike over associated claims of operational dysfunction. The Louvre alerted police of suspicious exercise in December 2024, because of the museum’s inner “antifraud coverage and continued interactions between museum groups and police,” finally resulting in this week’s arrests, acknowledged a Louvre spokesperson. The museum additionally stated it’s implementing a brand new “structured anti-fraud plan,” as a result of it’s going through “an increase and diversification in ticketing fraud.” So how did the scheme work? Suspects reportedly posed as legit, unbiased museum guides, and based on Le Parisien, charged prospects for tickets that the fraudsters reused for a number of entries.
NATIONAL GALLERY JOB CUTS. The Nationwide Gallery in London is reducing workers and launching a “voluntary exit scheme” in a bid to beat again a looming £8.2 million ($11.17 million) deficit anticipated by the 12 months 2026-27, studies The Artwork Newspaper. Burdened by growing working prices, a stagnant earnings, inflation, and fewer guests opting to pay for momentary exhibitions, layoffs are reportedly anticipated, with repercussions anticipated in programming. The establishment will “be stopping a number of of our actions the place, for a lot of causes past our management, we will not justify their prices,” stated a gallery spokesperson. In the meantime, if voluntary departures don’t minimize it, staff can be pressured out. The information comes as a shock, because it follows the September announcement of two record-breaking £150 million donations in the direction of the funding of a significant new extension, known as Venture Domani.
The Digest
In Might, Christie’s is about to public sale a trio of the late collector Agnes Gund’s trophy artworks she stored in her condo: a Mark Rothko, a Cy Twombly, and a Surrealist field by Joseph Cornell, estimated to value a complete of $145 million. [The New York Times]
French writer Gallimard has suspended the publication of a brand new ebook by former French tradition minister Jack Lang, about former French president Francois Mitterrand, because of the revelation of Lang’s ties with Jeffrey Epstein. [Le Figaro]
Sotheby’s will provide 4 main works from the Lewis Assortment subsequent month, spearheaded by a 1972 self-portrait by Francis Bacon, in what the public sale home described as a markedly stronger market than a 12 months in the past. [ARTnews]
A short lived 48-foot-tall steel sculpture of a nude girl in San Francisco’s Embarcadero Plaza could stay standing for one more six months, till October, 2026, if advocates for the extension have their means. The yoga-posing sculpture by Marco Cochrane titled R-Evolution, has divided public opinion, and metropolis businesses will now determine on its future. [KQED]
The Kicker
WOMEN’S WORK. Can solely ladies paint “nice” feminine nudes? That could be a query writer Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett explores in her new novel on the subject, which argues ladies have distinctive views in relation to depicting their very own our bodies, certain by political and historic context. “What does it imply for a feminine artist to be each the artist and the life mannequin?” or “each picture and image-maker?” puzzled efficiency artist Carolee Schnueemann, based on Cosslett. In a chunk for the Guardian, the writer says these are questions that haven’t been given their due.
