MoMA reveals final plans for $400m expansion

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MoMA reveals final plans for $400m expansion | New York’s Museum of Modern Art has unveiled the final designs for a $400m expansion project, having completed a preliminary phase of renovations earlier this week. According to director Glenn D. Lowry, the expansion – which will increase the gallery space by some 30 per cent – is an opportunity to diversify the museum’s collection displays. MoMA’s galleries have traditionally been organised by discipline, whereas many of the new spaces will be arranged chronologically or thematically. ‘It’s a rethinking of how we were originally conceived,’ Lowry told the New York Times. ‘We had created a narrative for ourselves that didn’t allow for a more expansive reading of our own collection, to include generously artists from very different backgrounds’. MoMA will remain open during the construction works, although the main lobby area will be closed as of this Sunday.

LGBTQ group steals work from Documenta 14 | An LGBTQ refugee rights group has stolen a sculpture from Documenta 14 in Athens in protest at the exhibition’s perceived exploitation of migrants. Spanish artist Roger Bernat’s Replica of Oath Stone was due to travel to Kassel for the second part of the exhibition. The activists took the work after agreeing to participate in a performance in which the sculpture – a facsimile of a limestone block said to have been in place at the trial of Socrates in 399 BC – was carried through Athens in a mock funeral procession. Bernat has since dismissed the group’s action as ineffective.

Sam Durant to burn Scaffold sculpture | Artist Sam Durant has reached an agreement with Dakota people who objected to his work Scaffold when it went on display at Minneapolis’s Walker Art Center. According to the Art Newspaper, the work will be dismantled and burned in a ceremony overseen by Dakota elders. Scaffold prompted protests when it was unveiled, with critics claiming it treated a dark chapter in Dakota history insensitively.

SFMOMA appoints first curator of contemporary art | The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art has appointed Eungie Joo as its first curator of contemporary art. The newly established role will see Joo collaborating with all of the museum’s various departments in order to curate contemporary exhibitions, acquire new works and develop public initiatives. Joo, who recently directed the 5th Anyang Public Art Project in China, takes up the role today.