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- Claire Tabouret’s designs for the Notre-Dame de Paris stained-glass windows goes on public display tomorrow.
- A Swedish court said climate activists never intended to damage a Monet painting they covered in red paint, and has acquitted all six defendants.
- Pantone has issued a statement in response to controversy over its selection of a shade of white as the Color of the Year.
The Headlines
NOTRE DAME’S NEW COLORS. Despite heated controversy over a proposal to replace six stained-glass windows in the Notre-Dame de Paris, which were undamaged by a major 2019 fire, designs for the windows by figurative painter Claire Tabouret are going on display tomorrow at the Grand Palais in Paris, reports the Art Newspaper . Tabouret’s paintings for the window designs were selected to replace 19th-century monochrome windows commissioned by architects Eugène Viollet-le-Duc and Jean-Baptiste Lassus. However, conservationists argue the cathedral must be preserved in its original form, as it was before the 2019 fire that destroyed its spire. Now, the public will have a chance to decide what they think of Tabouret’s colorful, full-scale maquettes for the new windows. “Every time there is a new artistic intervention in a historic part of Paris, there is a controversy, and it’s interesting to be part of that history,” the artist said.
FREE TO GO. A Stockholm court acquitted six environmental activists yesterday for smearing red paint on a Claude Monet painting in June 2023, report AFP and Le Figaro. The court ruled the defendants did not intend to damage the painting when two women lathered red paint on its protective glass covering, as it was on display in Sweden’s Nationalmuseum, and on loan from the Musée d’Orsay. “The climate situation is urgent,” and “our health is at risk,” the climate group Återställ Våtmarker [Restore Wetlands] had posted online after the act of protest. Later, experts confirmed the painting le Jardin de l’artiste à Giverny [The artist’s garden in Giverny] had suffered no harm.
The Digest
Pantone has responded to controversy over its choice of a shade of white as the 2026 Color of the Year. “The global team at the Pantone Color Institute selected this color for its emotional and creative resonance, not as a statement on politics, ideology, or race. Pantone does not assign political narratives to color; to select or avoid a hue on that basis would give such narratives a significance they do not hold in this process,” read a lengthy statement by the company about the color, dubbed “Cloud Dancer.” [WWD]
Brussels is closing its Centrale for Contemporary Art in February due to budget cuts, the city unexpectedly announced last week. The art center was slated to celebrate its 20-year anniversary with a packed exhibition program following a six-month renovation. “It is a collective catastrophe for artists, the public, and Brussels’ entire artistic ecosystem,” said Centrale artistic director Tania Nasielki. [ Le Journal des Arts]
On Monday, the San Francisco Asian Art Museum returned four sculptures that had been looted from Thailand in the mid-1960s from a temple in the country’s northeastern region. They were then sold to a private collector and museums by a London dealer. The museum was gifted the religious statues, but at the time, curators “expressed doubt whether they were legally removed,” and ignored those misgivings, said Natasha Reichle, the museum’s associate curator of Southeast Asian Art. [ ABC 7 News]
Acclaimed curator Pi Li will be stepping down as leader of Hong Kong’s Tai Kwun art institution in February and will reportedly help found a new art museum in Shenzhen, China. Pi joined Tai Kwun in 2023, after serving as the Sigg senior curator and then head of curatorial affairs at Hong Kong’s M+ museum. [South China Morning Post]
Cosmin Costinaș and Inti Guerrero have been named artistic directors of the 9thYokohama Triennale, planned for April to September 2027. The duo also organized the 2024 Biennale of Sydney. [ArtReview]
The Kicker
NO SHAME IN THAT. Marilyn Minter, 77, dished all in a recent talk with the New Yorker about her realistic portraits on view at Regen Projects in Hollywood (through December 20). The show also coincides with a new documentary about her work, called Pretty Dirty, directed by Jennifer Ash Rudick and Amanda Benchley. “All my work has been about getting rid of shame,” Minter told the New Yorker. Particularly, the shame women who are in the public realm are made to feel. Subjects include Pamela Anderson, Miley Cyrus, and Monica Lewinsky . “She was slut-shamed so bad. She’s my hero because she lived,” the artist said of the latter. There is also Minter’s exoneration of pubic hair, which she says has barely made it into art history. “So I decided to make pubic-hair paintings that are gorgeous. They’re so beautiful you can put them over your living-room couch,” she added.
See you here at the same time tomorrow!
