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Toxic Lead Levels in Paris’s Palais Garnier Opera Delay Renovation

The discovery of lead during renovation work at Paris’s historic Palais Garnier—opened in 1875 and summoned as inspiration for Gaston Leroux’s 1910 novel The Phantom of the Opera (and even more famously for Andrew Lloyd Weber’s musical adaptation)—has “throw[n] a tight schedule of venue closures and the projected budget into disarray,” according to a report in Le Figaro . Planned restoration work that was supposed to take two years is now projected for five, with evaluation for the best method to extract the lead to be undertaken this summer. “Depending on the method chosen, the duration of the Palais Garnier stage’s closure will be determined this fall,” Le Figaro reports. “Barring any unpleasant surprises, management can already announce that the work will extend from at least 2027 to 2032, leading the Paris Opera to offer an off-site program during this period.” Alexander Neef, the Paris Opera’s artistic director, told Le Figaro in the spring that h...
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Artist Calls on Manifesta 16 to Remove Installation, Alleging Plagarism

An artist has demanded the organizers of Manifesta 16 remove an installation from the exhibition in Essen, Germany, alleging that a piece in the show plagiarizes one of her earlier works.  The piece, titled Elevation and made by the Turkish sculptor Nasan Tur, consists of reclaimed church pews installed on their side inside St. Gertud Church and engraved with anonymous musings submitted by the public. Bochum-based artist Dorothee Bielfeld told the German outlet Waz that the Elevation ’s central visual motif—meter-high upright pews, transformed by their reorientation into oblique towers—closely resembles her 2010 work Aufrichten (Raising Up), created for Ruhr.2010, a cultural campaign in Germany’s Ruhr region. Elevation invites visitors to carve wishes, worries, and hopes into the church pews. Bielfeld’s Aufrichten also employs a participatory conceit: Visitors to Christ-König-Kirche could deposit slips of paper bearing their thoughts into ...
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Collector and Patron Flavia Nespatti to Open Commercial Art Space in London

The Brazilian-born, London-based art collector and patron Flavia Nespatti will open a commercial gallery in London this October, reports the Art Newspaper . Located in a mid-century industrial building in the central London neighborhood of Fitzrovia, Antesala will focus on art and artists from Latin America. The gallery will organize selling exhibitions of both primary and secondary market works in collaboration with galleries, artists, estates, collections, publications, and nonprofits, together with talks, screenings, and other public programming. As envisioned by Nespatti, the space will be a hub for exhibiting, discussing, and collecting contemporary art. Antesala will not represent artists, but neither will it be a rental space, Nespatti told the Art Newspaper , though collaborators will be charged a combination of a flat fee and a commission on sales. Rather, she and her team will be “highly involved” in the decisions behind each show. In add...
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Bae Young-hwan, Artist Who Represented Korea at Venice Biennale, Dies at 57

Bae Young-hwan, a beloved artist who represented his home country of Korea at the 2005 edition of the Venice Biennale, died on June 19 at 57. His Seoul representative, Gallery BB&M, did not state a cause in its announcement of his passing on June 20, which described Bae’s death as “sudden.” He was most widely known for his artworks that appropriated lyrics from Korean pop songs. Remaking those lyrics from pain medications, disinfectant, and cotton used to soothe wounds, Bae critiqued the optimism of these songs, suggesting that the hope offered by those words was only a temporary patch in the quest to fix a perennial sense of sadness afflicting Korean society. Born in 1969, Bae attended Hongik University in Seoul, where he received an eduction in traditional Asian painting styles. He would go on to eschew that education and take up conceptual art, showing it in vaunted Korean art institutions such as Alternative Space Pool, Art Sonje...
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Matchday Scoring Highlights: Paremata-Plimmerton (19) v Wainuiomata (12)

Visitors Paremata-Plimmerton beat Wainuiomata 19-12 in a tough fixture at William Jones Park on Saturday in their Smith & Wilson Cup match in the last round of the 2026 Swindale Shield. It was always tight and it came down to who could take their chances. Paremata-Plimmerton did just that, while also coming up with three...
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National Museum Cardiff in Wales May Close for Repairs to Address ‘Deteriorating Condition’               

The National Museum Cardiff in Wales may close for much-needed repair work, according to a workers’ union claim that it is in early discussions about a temporary closure in the wake of work last year to address what the institution’s director general described as the building’s “deteriorating condition.” As reported by the BBC, “The Public and Commercial Services union (PCS) said it understands that Amgueddfa Cymru, which runs the site, is ‘considering the possibility’ of temporary closure but that ‘no final decisions have been made.’” The union told the BBC that the talks related to “the impact on staff, the protection of collections and the future operation of the museum” after rumors on social media led to questions about the museum’s future. In a statement, Amgueddfa Cymru chief executive Jane Richardson described maintenance on the building as “an ongoing challenge.” A press release issued by the group said a design team has been appointed...
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As the California African American Museum Celebrates 50 Years, Its Leader Looks Ahead

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This week, the United States marks its 250th birthday, arguably no closer to agreeing on how that story should be told—or who gets to tell it. Under the second Trump administration, museums have become one of the clearest arenas for that struggle. These are places where America’s myth of exceptionalism collides with its lived reality: a contested memory of race, class, and political ambition. As the unfolding case of the Smithsonian attests, museum leaders occupy a pivotal position in American public life, balancing obligations to historical truth, institutional stakeholders, and the communities whose record they are entrusted to keep.   Against this backdrop, the California African American Museum (CAAM) celebrates its 50th anniversary, offering a blueprint for how museums can hold fast to their mission, regardless of what gathers at their periphery. Chartered by the State of California in 1977, CAAM is widely considered the nation’s first state-sup...
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