George Nelson

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Big brother is watching: museum visitors are being monitored by AI-powered cameras

Sophisticated technology is helping institutions count people but it also has the capability of tracking demographic data, ensuring people are well behaved and even detecting if visitors are enjoying themselves

World is ‘blindly failing’ persecuted Afghan artists, human rights organisation says

As a new report is released, the US-based Artistic Freedom Initiative demands refugee status for artists and cultural workers under threat from Taliban rule

Inaugural New York fair for Ukrainian artists wants to show that the country is ‘a solution, not a problem’

The event, called I Am U Are, is demonstrating that Ukraine’s creative industries are alive and kicking despite Russia’s invasion

Crime news

Ukrainian art dealer found guilty of stealing £1.3m Paul Signac from French museum

Vadym Huzhva handed a five-year sentence for 2018 theft and for stealing four other paintings in France, including a Renoir

Crime news

Russian arms dealer and artist Viktor Bout returns to Moscow via prisoner swap with US basketball player Brittney Griner

The man known as The Merchant of Death was exchanged for the American athlete, who was arrested for possessing cannabis oil at a Moscow airport in February

Art fairsanalysis

Tbilisi Art Fair attempts to distance itself from Moscow politics

Amid the ongoing war in Ukraine, exhibitors at the third edition of Georgia's premier commercial art event hoped to dispel the idea that the nation "exists on the periphery of Russia”

The 17th Istanbul Biennial finds novel ways to have difficult conversations

Against the constraints imposed by Covid-19 and Turkey’s repressive social climate, the influential biennial obliquely takes up thorny topics and engages with the city’s alternative spaces

Russian artist Dmitry Vrubel, who created famous Brezhnev-Honecker kiss mural on Berlin Wall, has died aged 62

The dissident painter suffered heart failure while being treated for Covid-19 in Germany

Ilya Repin's chilling painting of Ivan the Terrible—vandalised in 2018 by a drunk man with a metal pole—goes back on show at Moscow's Tretyakov Gallery

The work was temporarily rehung for press, but the public will have to wait until a bulletproof "protective capsule" can be installed

'We will not forget about Viktor': incarcerated Russian arms dealer's art goes on show in Moscow

Viktor Bout was handed a 25-year sentence in the US in 2010 for conspiring to sell weapons to FARC, Colombia's largest rebel group

Ukrainian art scholar reportedly tortured and imprisoned by Russian forces on ‘absurd’ espionage charges

International Council of Museums committees in Ukraine and Poland appeal for help to secure Olena Pekh's release

Warnews

Azerbaijan refuses to hand over 1,500 artworks after seizing 'cultural capital' in Nagorno-Karabakh

Artsakhi ministers have asked Russia to intervene in their bid to recoup paintings, sculptures, and precious stones after relinquishing culturally significant city of Shusha

Hundreds of artists’ studios in Moscow to be bulldozed amid government’s huge renovation plan

Evicted artists say authorities are leaving them out in the cold by failing to provide alternative workshops

'A crisis is always a good time to unite': Russian art galleries form new alliance to boost industry

The Association of Galleries aims to simplify the country's customs procedures and secure government funding

Art marketanalysis

A Covid success story: how the London Original Print Fair helped its 68 dealers keep selling

London’s longest-running art fair survives virus by going fully online and diversifying

Prizesgallery

Prozac nation: Russian photographer’s images of depression win 2020 Wellcome Photo Prize

Arseniy Neskhodimov’s photographs raise awareness of mental health in the age of coronavirus

'I have a 1% chance of being acquitted': Russian activist faces six years in prison for posting vagina drawings online

Police say the body-positive images, accompanied by captions like ‘Real women have body fat and it’s normal,’ violate pornography laws

Moscow Biennale opening marred by 2017 controversy

Event’s president Julia Muzikantskaya accused of allegedly threatening artists and withholding payments

Uzbekistan’s troubled Nukus Museum embroiled in new row

Museum seeks fourth director in as many years amid claims its renowned avant-garde collection is being “mistreated”

Uzbekistan opens new art centre to boost 'undeveloped' local scene

Moscow's Garage Museum of Contemporary Art is offering curatorial expertise as part of growing network of partnerships with post-Soviet countries

State Hermitage Museum to curate Venice Biennale pavilion

Russia’s entry for 2019 show influenced by Gospel of Luke and includes installation by famous film director Alexander Sokurov

Ivan the Terrible returns to Ukraine

19th-century oil painting, stolen during the Second World War, was found in the US

Moscow's Tretyakov Gallery develops blockchain app to bring Russian art to the world

Digital initiative will invite users to explore and sponsor more than 190,000 works in the collection

Russianews

Russian police seize drawings by high school pupils under 'gay propaganda' law

Students’ parents complain and psychologists sent to school after art contest for International Day of Tolerance draws fire from authorities

Selfie-takers accidentally damage Goya and Dali works in Russia’s Yekaterinburg

A group of women send partition crashing to the ground, as one punter only just escapes being crushed

Young pop-up The Auction Collective claims bidding on art is as easy as buying a book on Amazon

No buyer's premium and bidding paddles on your phone, but founder still believes holding physical auctions is key

‘Genuine’ Leonardo ‘sold’ for €72m on classified ads site Avito

The seller says that the painting, titled A Young Girl in Furs, was authenticated by the Stockholm art valuation firm Atelje Catellani

Russianews

Tretyakov clamps down on ‘illegal’ tours by banning visitors from discussing works of art

Ordinary groups are being targeted by the gallery’s guards for "exchanging views" about paintings in fight against bogus guides

Moscow erases legal graffiti to allow for World Cup advertising

Authorised works have been targeted alongside illegal ones