Good morning!
- The UK government is exploring the option of charging foreign tourists for entry to national museums.
- The Azrieli Foundation maintains it did not end funding for the Toronto Arts Foundation over Gaza-related protests.
- Art Basel Hong Kong day-one sales are in.
The Headlines
NO MORE FREE LUNCH? Today, the UK’s culture secretary, Lisa Nandy, introduced a proposal to consider charging foreign tourists an entry fee to national museums in a bid to address lackluster funding for the arts, the Financial Times reports. In addition to revenue from museum ticket sales, lawmakers will also consider a hotel levy, both of which were recommended in a review of Arts Council England by former Labour MP Baroness Margaret Hodge. Nandy told the FT that the government is exploring “the potential opportunities that charging international visitors at museums could bring.” National museums have been free to all since 2001, as part of a policy credited with boosting tourism, and opinions remain divided on the question. For now, at least, UK visitors can rest assured: any changes to the existing system are contingent on a new, universal ID scheme needed to differentiate foreign visitors from British citizens. Until then, enjoy your free ticket.
FUNDING FEUD. Following a sustained protest campaign by Canadian artists and art workers, led by the group Artists Against Artwashing (AAA), the Canada-based Azrieli Foundation is ending its support for the Toronto Arts Foundation (TAF), the Art Newspaper reports. Protesters allege that the Azrieli Foundation is funded by “genocide and land theft.” However, both the foundation and TAF said the termination of the funding agreement was not connected to the protests. AAA sees it differently. “This victory comes after two years of organizing and protest,” the group said earlier this week. The Azrieli Foundation, a charitable organization tied to Israel’s largest real estate company, called AAA’s accusations “baseless” and said it “condemns the false, hateful, and willfully misleading mischaracterizations of our work and our organizations.” It added that it is “committed to finding new ways to collaborate in the future” with TAF.
The Digest
The first-day sales report is in for Art Basel Hong Kong, with plenty of cash flowing—especially in blue-chip gallery booths—but confidence trickling through the aisles more slowly. [ARTnews]
Could a skeleton recently found beneath the nave of a 13th-century church in Maastricht be the remains of the Count d’Artagnan, who famously inspired the hero of The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas? [L1 nieuws]
A 77-year-old Jewish woman from Laatzen, Germany, is seeking damages for what she describes as an “antisemitic insult” following the exhibition of an artwork by the Indonesian collective Taring Padi at Documenta 2022, which was later removed after its imagery was deemed antisemitic. [dpa]
The outsider artist Henri Rousseau (1844–1910), also known as Le Douanier (“the customs officer”), was not the “naïve” Sunday painter he has often been portrayed as, according to a new reading of his practice at the Musée de l’Orangerie in Paris. [ Le Monde]
The Artizon Museum in Tokyo has unveiled a new outdoor commission by Australian artist of Chinese heritage Lindy Lee, as part of its Sculpture Project. [ArtAsiaPacific]
The Kicker
DIVE IN, THE WATER’S WARM. Free studio space for 30 artists for a year—and plenty of water for inspiration—is what a new San Francisco Bay project called Art + Water is offering, starting this fall, the New York Times reports. More than 100,000 square feet of empty, century-old warehouse space on San Francisco’s Embarcadero waterfront is being converted into a new exhibition space, art school–apprenticeship program, and community events venue by local writer Dave Eggers and artist and educator JD Beltran. The initiative will match 10 established artist-mentors with 20 San Francisco–based artists who want to learn from them—all for free. Artists can apply until April 6 . Eggers, who trained as a painter as a student, said the project was a response to “a problem that everybody talks about endlessly here—the mass exodus of artists from San Francisco over the last 20 years.” He added that Art + Water is designed to be “economically accessible, demystifying, and welcoming—like, ‘Here, this is how we do this. You can do it, too.’”
