This week, we look at contemporary public art, as debate has raged about various works in recent weeks. Who is public art for and why does it continue to provoke such strong reactions? Host Ben Luke talks to Louisa Buck, The Art Newspaper’s contemporary art correspondent, and James Lingwood from the visionary producers of public works, Artangel, about art by Christoph Büchel, Jeremy Deller, Maggi Hambling, Rachel Whiteread, Marc Quinn and Mark Wallinger; the artist Olaf Breuning tells us about a public work he has made for a hospital in Miami; and for this episode’s Work of the Week, the artist Tom Sachs talks about Mondrian's Broadway Boogie-Woogie in the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week we look at museums and Africa: we explore the future of museums and African institutions’ central role in it and we look at the 19th-century looting of the Benin Bronzes and what it tells us about museums and colonialism, then and now. We talk to Sonia Lawson, the founding director of the Palais de Lomé in Togo, and András Szántó, the writer of the new book The Future of the Museum: 28 Dialogues. We also speak to Dan Hicks, professor of contemporary archaeology at the University of Oxford and curator at the Pitt Rivers Museum there, about his book The Brutish Museums, focusing on the Benin Bronzes. And for our Work of the Week, Christopher Riopelle of the National Gallery in London talks about a painting of Copernicus by the Polish artist Jan Matejko, which is coming to the National for an exhibition next year. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It’s Thanksgiving on 26 November, so this week, we look at the myths behind this American holiday, and particularly the story of the Mayflower, the ship that landed in Plymouth Bay, Massachusetts, 400 years ago. We talk to Jo Loosemore, the curator of the exhibition Mayflower 400: Legend and Legacy at The Box in Plymouth, about the voyage, the settlement and decolonising the story. And then we get the in-depth perspective of Steven Peters, the co-founder of the creative agency Smoke Sygnals and a member of the Wompanoag nation, the native inhabitants of the region around Plymouth Colony, who along with other tribes, had lived there for 10,000 years before the Europeans arrived. Steven curated the exhibition Our Story: The Early Days of the Wampanoag Tribe and the Pilgrims Who Followed at the Provincetown Museum in Massachusetts. For this episode’s Work of the Week, the painter Chantal Joffe explores Paula Modersohn-Becker’s Self-Portrait, Age 30, 6th Wedding Day. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week: we speak to our China correspondent Lisa Movius in Shanghai about the fairs and other events opening in the city this week. And we look at a rare museum event opening in Europe: Tate Britain’s Winter Commission, which—because it’s on the facade of the building—opens to the public this week; Louisa Buck meets the latest artist to take on the commission, Chila Kumari Singh Burman. And for this week’s Work of the Week, we focus on Art is… by Lorraine O’Grady, a performance made in 1983 that inspired the video made for the triumphant candidates in the US election, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As the ramifications of the US election are set to continue for weeks, where do we stand in the art world? We look at the economics and the response of artists and art communities over the last four years and into the future. We talk to Felix Salmon, the chief financial correspondent at Axios, about the economic situation and its potential effects; Carolina Miranda of the Los Angeles Times reflects on individualism and collective action in the cultural sphere; and the Mexican artist Pedro Reyes talks about his project in New York City, Mañanaland, timed to coincide with the election. For this week’s Work of the Week, Martin Rowson, a cartoonist for the Guardian and the Daily Mirror, among others, talks about William Hogarth’s Gin Lane (1751), drawing President Trump, and the power of satire to address moments of crisis. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week: like the rest of the art world, the market has been upended by the pandemic. But has the turmoil forced it to be any more transparent? Do we know any more about the actual price of art? Ben Luke is joined by Georgina Adam, an editor-at-large at The Art Newspaper and art market specialist, to discuss transparency and the market. Also this week, we talk to David Blayney Brown, the curator of Turner’s Modern World, a new show at Tate Britain in London. And in this episode’s Work of the Week, the artist John Stezaker talks about a grisaille painting, Christ and the Woman Taken in Adultery, by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, in the Courtauld collection but currently on display at the National Gallery in London. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Following a historic relaxation of deaccessioning laws in the US, we probe the moral quandaries faced by museums forced to sell-off parts of their collections to stay afloat. We speak to Christopher Bedford, the director of the Baltimore Museum of Art in Maryland, which has announced it is to sell three works; to Georgina Adam about what this all means for the art market, and to James H. Duff, a former director of the Brandywine River Museum and chair of the Professional Issues Committee of the Association of Art Museum Directors, for an overview of the history of deaccessioning. Plus, in our latest work of the week, artist Jennifer Packer discusses a Buddhist mural in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, we talk to the critics and curators Barry Schwabsky and Aindrea Emelife about the four-year delay to the show Philip Guston Now at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, the museums of fine arts in Houston and Boston and Tate Modern in London. What does the postponement of a big show of the American artist’s work tell us about museums’ response to art and race in the wake of Black Lives Matter? Also, Louisa Buck meets Maggi Hambling as a new show of her work opens at Marlborough Gallery in London. And in our Work of the Week, the artist Martha Tuttle talks about a medieval Visitation in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It’s Frieze Week in London, yet there’s no big art fair at its heart. Can galleries create the usual excitement—and is anyone still buying?There’s no Frieze London or Frieze Masters but there are plenty of exhibitions and events being staged across the city, the now customary online viewing rooms and digital sales platforms and a big New York auction. We talk to The Art Newspaper's contemporary art correspondent Louisa Buck about the art around town and to our editor-at-large and FT columnist Melanie Gerlis about how the market is faring without the fairs. And Linda Yablonsky talks to Theaster Gates about his shows at Gagosian in New York and White Cube in London. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, we look at two great women artists: at last, we visit the postponed Artemisia exhibition at the National Gallery in London, taking a tour with its curator Letizia Treves, and picking out some of the extraordinary highlights of the show. And we also explore a new biography of Frida Kahlo with its author, Hettie Judah. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.