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The Headlines
BEARING WITNESS. Today, the acclaimed French-Lebanese artist Ali Cherri, together with the International Federation for Human Rights, filed a complaint with the French War Crimes Unit against “unknown perpetrators,” and denouncing the Israeli army’s bombing of civilian homes in Lebanon, according to a press release. On November 26, 2024, hours before a ceasefire, Cherri’s parents, Mahmoud Naim Cherri and Nadira Hayek, were killed when the Israeli military bombed their apartment in Beirut. The attack killed a total of seven people. Targeting a civilian home “could constitute a war crime under French criminal law and international humanitarian law,” reads the statement. “My sisters and I decided to legally pursue this case a year ago. It was an important but deeply difficult decision,” wrote Ali Cherri on Instagram.
THE PRICE IS RIGHT. India’s art market is being bullish right now, as shown by a Raja Ravi Varma painting that sold on Wednesday for $17.9 million with fees, setting a new auction record for a South Asian painting, reports the Art Newspaper. Pharmaceuticals billionaire Cyrus Poonawalla bought the painting titled Yashoda and Krishna (1890s), topping its $12.9 million high estimate. The sale dethrones an MF Husain painting that sold for $13.7 million with fees at Christie’s New York last year. Calling the painting a national treasure, Poonawalla said in a statement that he plans to ensure the public will be able to view it “periodically.”
The Digest
A new open letter signed by 70 artists and curators participating in this year’s Venice Biennale calls for banning the US, Russia, and Israel from the global event. [Artnet News]
São Paulo has “regained one of the world’s great public spaces,” with a new extension project of the city’s Museum of Art (MASP), designed by Lina Bo Bardi. [Apollo Magazine]
The White House has immediately appealed a judge’s decision to stop the construction on President Trump’s ballroom project, while polling shows any Congressional review of the architectural plans is expected to spark heated debate. [The Washington Post]
La Biennale de Québec, featuring work by 60 international artists until April 19, looks at ice as a metaphor and medium with its theme “Briser la glace/Splitting Ice.” [Observer]
The Kicker
SEARLE AN IMPOSTER? As ARTnews reported earlier this year, the Guardian’s chief art critic Adrian Searle is stepping down from his role, held since 1996. As an end note, he shared his insights and confessions in response to what proved to be a tricky question from his editor about what he learned over the course of 30 years on the job. Rather, Searle wrote about what he has seen, despite things converging into a “watery blur.” With time, it becomes hard to know what was “imagined or real,” he says. “The work came to me first as a story and has never left me.” This, from a seasoned critic who admits to a feeling of imposter syndrome that he’s “always had and never really goes away.”
