The Art World This Week, 4 July 2025
Save to My OculaDealer Tim Blum to step away from galleries after 30 years, Khaled Sabsabi will realise Australian Pavilion after all, Tate considers selling naming rights to Turbine Hall, and more. Here’s Ocula’s briefing on the art world news you might have missed.
Institutions
Artist Khaled Sabsabi Reinstated for Australian Pavilion
On Wednesday, artist Khaled Sabsabi and curator Michael Dagostino announced they are back representing Australia at next year’s Venice Biennale. Pavilion commissioner Creative Australia apologised for the ‘hurt and pain’ caused to the pair by the decision. Read more.
Tate Launches Endowment Fund, Ponders Sale of Turbine Hall Rights
After Tate announced a new endowment fund last week that will seek to raise £150 million by 2030 to support its activities in perpetuity, Tate’s trustee chair Roland Rudd told The Telegraph naming rights to its Turbine Hall could be up for sale for ‘a minimum of £50 million’.
M+ Façade Commission Goes to Photographer Greg Girard
Hong Kong museum M+ has selected Canadian photographer Greg Girard for its annual façade commission. Shot between the 1970s to 1990s, Girard’s vignettes of old Hong Kong will be visible from across the Victoria riverbank on evenings from 4 July until 28 September 2025.
Medina Triennial Will Bring Art Fairs to Small Town New York State
A town of around 6,000 people in Western New York is set to welcome a contemporary art triennial next year. From 2026, the Medina Triennial will invite artists to contribute around 50 site-specific commissions installed at indoors and outdoors sites along the Erie Canal.
Art Fairs and Market
Paris Photo Announces 2025 Exhibitors
The 28th Paris Photo will host 224 galleries and publishing houses at the Grand Palais from 13 to 16 November 2025, including 59 first-time participants. Exhibitors include Vienna’s Eva Presenhuber, London’s Richard Saltoun, Dubai’s Ayyam Gallery, and New Delhi’s Vadehra Art Gallery.
Galleries
Dealer Tim Blum to Shutter Galleries, Citing Exhaustion
After 30 years in the business, dealer Tim Blum will close his locations in Los Angeles and Tokyo once their summer exhibitions conclude. He cited the unsustainable demand of art fairs, openings, and expansion, calling the gallery model ‘arduous’ and ‘aggravating’. Read more.
Gallery Representations
Firenze Lai Is Now Represented by White Cube
Hong Kong-born, London-based artist Firenze Lai is now represented by White Cube and Creative Vitamin Space. The gallery will host the painter’s inaugural U.K. exhibition at their Mason’s Yard location in London next summer.
Antonio Ballester Moreno Joins Gomide&Co
Spanish artist Antonio Ballester Moreno, who is best known for hard-edge abstractions of symbols and shapes on raw jute surfaces, has joined Gomide&Co. The São Paulo gallery will represent the artist with Tanya Leighton and Galerie Urs Meile.
Sophia Loeb Joins Fortes D’Aloia & Gabriel
Brazilian artist Sophia Loeb has entered the roster of Fortes D’Aloia & Gabriel, who will represent the painter with Pippy Houldsworth Gallery. Her first exhibition with the São Paulo gallery is showing at their Rio de Janeiro venue through to 2 August.
Awards
Sophia Al-Maria Named Recipient of 2025 Frieze Artist Award
Qatari American artist Sophia Al-Maria has received the Frieze Artist Award for early and mid-career artists to realise a commission at Frieze London. Al-Maria will be performing a stand-up comedy show under Frieze’s white tent daily from 15 to 19 October 2025.
Obituaries
Peter Phillips, Pioneer of British Pop Art, Dies at 86
English painter Peter Phillips died last Monday in Australia. Phillips trained at the Royal College of Art with contemporaries like David Hockney and Allen Jones, and stood at the vanguard of British Pop art in the 1950s and ‘60s. His family said that even as his health gradually declined, the artist ‘faced each chapter with dignity, wit, and a creative spirit that never dimmed’. —[O]
Main image: Greg Girard, HK:PM (2025) (video still, detail). Commissioned by M+, Hong Kong. Courtesy © Greg Girard.
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