Arts

Arts

For instance, I didn't expect to be writing this very piece just days after PG&E shit the bed (again) and sent most of our fair city into a days-long blackout. I didn't expect said blackout a mere two weeks after a PG&E gasline caused another residential explosion in the East Bay. And I certainly didn't expect to write that the aforementioned blackout made notoriously-homocidal robo-taxis cause the very sort of gridlock everyone was expecting to happen from closing The Great Highway.

I've always wanted to bring it back home,

Experts are using artificial intelligence (AI) to help reassemble a priceless fresco by the early Renaissance artist Cimabue that was reduced to tens of thousands of fragments when earthquakes devastated a 13th-century basilica in central Italy nearly 30 years ago. The project has revived hopes for the full recovery of a masterpiece hailed by Italy's prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, as a symbol of national pride.

The name Ana Fedina may not ring a bell, but if you've played games like "Diablo IV," you've seen her work. For more than seven years, Fedina has been working as a professional artist and has contributed illustrations to games like "Raid: Shadow Legends" as well. Most recently, she was the illustrator for "The Armory of Heroes," a full-art compendium of weapons and character art released by the gaming and media company Critical Role in July.

Perhaps a more uncontroversial and profound Turing test is the mystery of the absolute arbitrariness of what makes us happy. Looking over this year's list, patterns emerge-trips, new friends-but much more here inheres in the mundane, lowercase, sense-activating thinginess of life: walking through clouds of butterflies, eating candy alone, homemade stew, wearing pink glitter, cold clementines in a hot bath. Joy is not second-hand. Its unpredictability identifies us as precisely as our fingerprints.

Art duo Cooking Sections bring their immersive, environmental practice to Centro Botín in Santander with a stirring audio-visual exploration of lost waves. Daniel Fernández Pascual and Alon Schwabe are known for deeply researched projects that sometimes lead to tangible change. In 2020, they prompted Tate to remove farmed salmon from its menu, while their Ministry of Sewers at the 2025 Folkestone Triennial invited the public to submit official complaints about sea pollution.

A late Picasso painting on cardboard, Paysage (1965), carries an estimate of $2m to $3m. The work depicts the French Riviera landscape around the village of Mougins where the artist spent his later years with his last wife Jacqueline Roque. Anish Kapoor's concave mirror sculpture, Untitled (2005), also goes under the hammer (est. $600,000-$800,000) along with Andy Warhol's Disquieting Muses (After de Chirico), 1982 (est. $800,000-$1.2m) and his complete set of four screenprints of Muhammad Ali he made in 1978 (est. $300,000-$500,000).

Lam's impact lies in his refusal of singular origin. Born in 1902 in Sagua La Grande, Cuba, to a Chinese immigrant father and an Afro-Cuban mother, he inherited a plural visual and spiritual vocabulary from the start. From his father came an understanding of objects as vessels, of line as philosophy, of restraint as power. From Afro-Cuban cosmology came ritual, invocation, and the inseparability of body and spirit.

Hyperallergic 's tarotscope series is a combination of tarot with astrology, a reading for the collective readership combined with cards for the major astrological signs, grouped by their elemental associations. These are developed by AX Mina, a Hyperallergic contributor and producer for Five and Nine, a podcast about magic, work, and economic justice. These tarotscopes have a special focus on the arts and creative practice, for each solstice and equinox, to mark the turning of the seasons.

For the last month or so, every time I've left my apartment in Astoria I've cut through an aisle of Christmas trees, some festooned with bright red bows, some bare. Around me are those cutting wreaths down to size, taking selfies, begging their parents for a bigger tree, and lugging them away. Despite the cold, the uncertainty, the relentlessness of the news cycle, it makes me feel grounded, in community - which is what the holiday season is about.

That arresting image was made from a tiny portrait of the artist's brother, expanded to monumental public proportions, that announced the Met's "Witnessing Humanity" exhibit, a Wilson retrospective that continues through February 8. In the picture, the brother's brow is steadfast, his gaze grave and alert, mouth and chin resolutely composed; perhaps no Black face has ever so effectively stared down the self-regard of Manhattan's Museum Mile.

Since the 1990s, has been a constant presence in the creative pulse of San Francisco. His imagery, populated by hybrid figures, spiritual bonds between humans and animals, and emotionally charged atmospheres, was shaped within the same ecosystem that gave rise to much of the city's underground culture. From Upper Playground to global collaborations with brands like Nike and Adidas, his path has always been defined by a deeply personal drive for exploration.

9:30 am Free Legion of Honor Museum Day for Bay Area Residents (Every Saturday) FREE* *Free general admission to Bay Area residents. Valid ID or proof of residency required. This offer applies only to the permanent collection galleries. Timed advanced tickets required 9:30 am Free de Young Museum Day for Bay Area Residents (Every Saturday) FREE* *Free general admission to Bay Area residents. Valid ID or proof of residency required. This offer applies only to the permanent collection galleries. Advanced timed tickets required.

In a new letter, the Trump White House has reignited its threat to pull funding from the Smithsonian Institution amid a probe of the federally funded organization's programming, budgets, and forthcoming commemorations for the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States. Dated December 18, the letter addressed to Smithsonian Secretary Lonnie G. Bunch III underscored that the institution has yet to provide the majority of the documents requested in August, including "current exhibition descriptions, draft plans for upcoming shows, upcoming programming materials, and internal guidelines used in exhibition development."

In fact, the Chilean artist even believed she would die in obscurity, although she told EL PAIS that the lack of external recognition never deterred her from dedicating her life to art. I remember reading a children's biography of Mozart, a genius who reached the point of despair out of going hungry, and the idea stuck with me that sublime art wasn't related to recognition, value, or money, she confessed.

Outside an abandoned building in New Zealand's second-biggest city, a sign reads slightly haunted but manageable. In the middle of a busy shopping strip, pedestrians are warned to keep to a 2.83km/h walking speed. In another part of the Christchurch, one piece of signage declares simply don't. The baffling boards are not an overzealous new council initiative, but a piece of art designed to play with the way we take authority and signage so seriously.

His exhibitions were titled 'Normal Life' and his paintings were titled 'Untitled'. There were a few exceptions with small subtitles, but the pattern was mostly consistent. This may seem simple at rst glance, but it comes from his intention to step back and keep a certain distance from his work. This attitude also appears in the way he paints gures without tying them to specic people, allowing anyone to see themselves in them.

I Can Do That! Performing Arts Center begins 2026 with the high-energy show Newsies, the Musical, Jan. 16-25 at Walnut Creek's Del Valle Theatre on 1963 Tice Valley Blvd. Inspired by the real-life newsboys' strike of 1899, Newsies features music by Alan Menken, lyrics by Jack Feldman and book by Harvey Fierstein. Set in turn-of-the-century New York City, the show follows Jack Kelly and a band of young newspaper sellers who rally together to stand up against powerful publishers and fight for what's right.