The House of Commons and the House of Lords have been presented with a report outlining the options the restoration of the Palace of Westminster. If MPs and peers leave the building for another temporary home (a ‘full decant’), the works could cost between £10–£15 billion, but if the restoration is gradual, it could cost up to £39.2bn and take as long as 61 years. The report of the Restoration and Renewal Client Board makes it clear that the costs of delay are enormous: £1.5m is spent every week on repairs and maintence; every year of putting off the ‘delivery phase’ will add £70m to the bill and the inflationary impact on construction costs of £250–£350m. While the design and construction of the Gothic Revival building represents ‘the best of Victorian technology’, the report points out that no overall renovation has taken place since 1945–50 and that many of the services are much older than that. It recommends that an initial £3bn be spent on essential work over the next seven years and that a final decision be taken by mid 2030.
The chair of the art practice department at the School of Visual Arts in New York (SVA), David A. Ross, has resigned from his post because of his ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Some 60 emails between Ross and Epstein came to light this week, including an email from July 2009, the day Epstein was released from jail after being convicted on charges including soliciting prostitution from a minor, in which Ross referred to the conviction as ‘an undeserved punishment foisted upon you by jealous creeps’. Ross, who before taking up his role at the SVA in 2009 was director of museums including the Whitney and SFMoMA, said in a statement to the New York Times that he initially befriended Epstein as a patron and collector, and that ‘when the reality of his crimes became clear, I was mortified and remain ashamed that I fell for his lies.’ Meanwhile, Jack Lang, the president of the Institut du monde arabe in Paris, is facing calls to resign on account his friendship with Epstein. On Wednesday, Lang ruled out the possibility of his resignation. A government source told AFP that Lang has been summoned to the foreign ministry on Sunday ‘so he can give an explanation’.
Stephen Friedman Gallery has closed down. Thirty years after Friedman opened his first gallery space in Mayfair, London, the gallery has gone into administration. Best known for representing artists such as Yinka Shonibare, Kehinde Wiley and David Shrigley, the gallery opened a second space in Tribeca, New York in 2023 and a new, bigger, outpost in London’s Cork Street. This expansion lasted only until the end of 2025 when Friedman was forced to close the New York gallery. As Kenny Schacter writes for Artnet, the 2023 accounts showed ‘the company recorded a loss of £1.7 million […] larger than the profit it had made the year before’. The expansion seem to have been a significant contributor to this loss. The last filings for the company made on 28 February 2025 for the year up to 31 December 2023 revealed that ‘the slower than usual sell-through of a major exhibition at the end of 2024 and a slow start to 2025, cash flow is currently tight’. Art Basel Qatar was forced into a last-minute change by the closure as Stephen Friedman had been slated to make a presentation at the fair. Instead, the booth of work by Huguette Caland was presented by the Hugette Caland Estate, staffed by representatives for Lisson Gallery.
The chair of the art practice department at the School of Visual Arts in New York (SVA), David A. Ross, has resigned from his post because of his ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Some 60 emails between Ross and Epstein came to light this week, including an email from July 2009, the day Epstein was released from jail after being convicted on charges including soliciting prostitution from a minor, in which Ross referred to the conviction as ‘an undeserved punishment foisted upon you by jealous creeps’. Ross, who has been the director of museums including the Whitney and SFMOMA, said in a statement to the New York Times that he initially befriended Epstein as a patron and collector, and that ‘when the reality of his crimes became clear, I was mortified and remain ashamed that I fell for his lies.’ Meanwhile, Jack Lang, president of the Institut du monde arabe in Paris, is facing calls to resign on account of his association with Epstein. On Wednesday, Lang ruled out the possibility of his resignation. A government source told AFP that Lang has been summoned to the foreign ministry on Sunday ‘so he can give an explanation’.
The latest release of Epstein files also describes sexual abuse allegations raised by at least three potential victims against Leon Black, the billionaire former chair and current trustee of MoMA. Black’s links to Epstein have been known for some time and there have been repeated calls for him to be removed from the board. Black denies any wrongdoing. Ronald Lauder, collector and donor to museums including the MoMA, the Met and the Getty Trust, has been named more than 900 times in the recent tranche of Epstein files. There is no evidence of direct communication between Lauder and Epstein, but the files show their assistants emailing to discuss arranging meetings and phone calls between the two men.
The Flemish government has dropped its plans to dismantle M HKA, the oldest contemporary art museum in Belgium. In October, it was revealed that the government was planning to cancel the construction of a new building for the museum, strip it of national museum status and move its collection to Ghent. The plans were heavily criticised by the artistic community in Flanders and abroad. This week, the Brussels Times reports, the Flemish culture minister, Caroline Gennez, reached an agreement with a group of Flemish museums that would allow M HKA to keep its status. A statement of intent for the future of the Flemish museum landscape will be drawn up in collaboration with museums in Flanders and will be released in June.
The Philadelphia Museum of Art is reverting to its old name after the unpopular decision, made by previous director and CEO, Sasha Suda, for the institution to call itself the Philadelphia Art Museum. Speaking to the New York Times, her successor, Daniel Weiss, described the change as ‘a misstep’. Last week the Pennsylvania state court ruled that Suda’s case against the museum for wrongful termination should be decided by arbitration rather than in a trial.
