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The Headlines
COVERING UP DIVERSITY. In response to President Trump scrapping diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies, one national museum followed the executive order with unusual zeal. Earlier this month, the National Cryptologic Museum covered a display in the museum’s Hall of Honor with brown paper, which featured plaques of “Trailblazers in US Cryptologic History,” with an emphasis on women and people of color who had served the National Security Agency. Images of the display covered with brown paper quickly sparked outrage online last week, particularly from former NSA workers, reported NPR. Following the backlash, however, the museum said it had made a mistake. NSA Executive Director Sheila Thomas told NPR that “there was absolutely never an intention to cover up parts of our history … As soon as we became aware [of it], we said, ‘Oh, that was not what was intended.’” Thomas reasoned that the museum hadn’t guided its staff properly in how to implement Trump’s executive order, and assured reporters the exhibit had been uncovered since. Yet many remain concerned. Larry Pfeiffer, a former NSA worker, who runs the Michael V. Hayden Center for Intelligence, Policy and International Security at George Mason University said he suspects federal workers are afraid of what might happen to them if they don’t respond quickly to the onslaught of new executive orders. “We have appointees to this administration who have said that they intend to traumatize the federal employee workforce,” Pfeiffer said.
LOST & FOUND. A trove of artworks rescued from a San Francisco park bench where they had been dumped are heading to the permanent collection of the Museum of Jewish Art and History in Paris, reports KQED. The 48 found artworks are mostly signed and made by painter Ary Arcadie Lochakov, who was part of the School of Paris. He moved to the French capital from present-day Moldova in 1920, and died there in 1941 during the Nazi occupation. How the artworks got to the public bench, where they were discovered by city employees, remains a mystery, but several key steps on their winding provenance history have been pieced together, including having been in the possession of the artist’s distant relatives, one of whom died about a year before the artworks surfaced. The Paris museum said it is planning an exhibition around the artworks, following a first display at the Ferry Building in San Francisco in August, 2024. Meanwhile, at least one other Lochakov painting has surfaced at a San Francisco Goodwill auction, sparking hope of more to come.
The Digest
Artist Ai Weiwei was barred from entering Switzerland on Monday because he didn’t have a visa, so he spent the night on a bench in Zurich’s airport, an experience he documented and shared on Instagram. “’This is Switzerland, not Portugal’ they told me. I’m sleeping on a bench with a blanket tonight, waiting to be deported at 6:50 am the next morning,” he wrote online. Swiss police clarified to the media that the Chinese artist was not arrested, though his entry into the country from London was denied. [Swiss Info]
Following a “just and fair solution,” Germany’s Kunstmuseen Krefeld will be able to keep a painting by Heinrich Campendonk, titled Wirtshaus [Tavern] (1917). The German city and the legal heirs of the painting, which once belonged to the Jewish shoe manufacturer Alfred Hess, were able to come to an amicable solution for the restitution and then repurchase of the Expressionist painting, which is one of the museum’s most precious holdings. [Art Daily]
Sidney’s Artspace has appointed Victor Wang as its new director. He succeeds Alexie Glass-Kantor and departs a previous position as artistic director and chief curator at Beijing’s M WOODS Museum. “Artspace is one of the most exciting institutions in the Asia Pacific, and I am deeply honored to be leading it at this pivotal moment,” Wang said in a statement. [ArtAsiaPacific]
An original rare first edition of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (1997) was rescued from the trash in Brixham and sold for over £21,000. [BBC]
The Kicker
WHO IS THIS REMOTE GSTAAD EXHIBIT FOR? The Luma Foundation has big ambitions for its budding, “biennial of the Alps,” currently in the form of the Elevation 1049 exhibition, and in its sixth edition in the Alpine town of Gstaad, Switzlerand until March 16. But as The Art Newspaper’s Alexander Morrison points out, the exhibit’s thematic focus on the environment and climate change doesn’t quite jive with some of the event’s exclusive “billionaire’s playground” surroundings, like an airport for private jets, doubling as a venue for one of the event’s main artworks. While the art itself is celebrated, Morrison asks, “but who is it for?” In one glaring example, artist Theaster Gates – himself sensitive to the contradictions apparent in the luxurious setting — performed at Gstaad Saanen airport, which the reporter notes is “reserved for private aircraft.” The performance with Gates’ band the Black Monks was “mesmerizing, one of the most compelling examples of art as energy you could hope to witness.” However, it took place “in front of an intimate crowd filled with VIPs … and with landing helicopters and jets visible through the monumental glass shutters behind the musicians.”
