Horniman Museum appoints Nick Merriman as chief executive

Our daily round-up of news from the art world

Horniman Museum appoints Nick Merriman as chief executive | Horniman Museum and Gardens in London has appointed Nick Merriman, current director of the Manchester Museum and acting interim director at the Whitworth Art Gallery, as its new chief executive, it was announced yesterday. Merriman will assume his new position at the Horniman in May 2018. He succeeds Janet Vitmayer, who has resigned after two decades leading the London institution, which is currently preparing for the opening of its new World Gallery of anthropological objects next summer.

Hito Steyerl tops ArtReview’s 2017 Power 100 | German artist Hito Steyerl has taken the number one spot on this year’s edition of ArtReview’s Power 100 list of the contemporary art world’s most influential figures, it was announced today. Steyerl, who is known for her politically charged videos, installations and performances, is the first woman to have topped the annual list of influential figures in the art world, now in its 16th year. She succeeds Hans Ulrich Obrist, who headed up the 2016 edition and this year can be found in sixth place. Analysing the full list of entries (which is available here) for the Telegraph, Louisa Buck finds that this year’s selection ‘sends a clear message that [it…] is more about ideas than money’.

Ancient coin collection is discovered at National Trust’s Scotney Castle | A collection of 186 coins, spanning from the seventh century BC to the 1800s, has been discovered at Scotney Castle in Kent. The mansion house’s former owners, the Hussey family, left it to the National Trust in 1970, which opened it to the public in 2007. NT volunteers searching through the house came across the coins by chance in a study drawer. The significance of the collection, primarily made up of Roman coins and containing only one 19th-century forgery, has since become apparent. It will soon go on display as part of a public exhibition at the mansion.

ADAA Foundation announces grants for four US museums | The Arts Dealers Association of America Foundation (ADAA) this week announced the four recipients of its newly expanded grants programme for US museums. The $10,000–$15,000 grants, which are intended to fund research and exhibitions at museums with an operating budget below $5million, have been awarded to the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum; the Eskenazi Museum of Art at Indiana University; the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center at Vassar College; and the Michael C. Carlos Museum at Emory University.

Recommended reading | At Artnews, 16 artists, writers, and curators have contributed their remembrances of feminist art historian Linda Nochlin, who died on Sunday aged 86. In the words of artist Howardena Pindell: ‘I remember Linda being a very stable influence on the women’s movement because she was so articulate and so intelligent in her observations. I considered her to be an anchor in the feminist movement.’ In the Paris Review, meanwhile, Kyle Chayka has written a piece on Walter de Maria’s The New York Earth Room, which has been installed in a building on Wooster Street in New York since 1977.