On June 7, the museum issued a statement about the exhibition Ngura Pulka – Epic Country officially being postponed. Scheduled to open this month, the show featured the work of Aboriginal artists from the APY Art Center Collective (APY ACC) and was billed as one of the largest community-driven art projects to be displayed at the NGA.

“All parts of Ngura Pulka are being entirely conceived, created, directed, and determined by Aṉangu people,” said a statement on the gallery’s website. “Home to 2,500 people, the APY Lands, in remote South Australia, support a network of Aṉangu communities, including seven key art centres.”

However, in April, the museum announced it was reviewing the exhibition’s artworks after a report from The Australian alleged that white studio staff had been painting on the works attributed to residents of Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY), sparsely populated lands in remote South Australia that are home to more than 20 Aboriginal communities. The Australian also published video that it said appeared to show a non-Indigenous art assistant making creative decisions and painting on a depiction of the Tjukurpa — the creation period of ancestral beings that also formed the religion, law, and moral systems that govern Anangu society.

The NGA said the decision to postpone the opening Ngura Pulka – Epic Country had been made due to an independent panel review needing more time to “fully complete their work” to check if the works were consistent with the museum’s provenance policy, as well as the Australian government also announcing it would undertake a joint investigation.

“The National Gallery will work with the artists and Aṉangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) community leaders in relation to the exhibition and will await the outcome of both reviews,” the museum statement said. “The National Gallery is committed to continuing to work with APY Lands artists and supporting their ground-breaking work.”

The NGA originally said it expected to receive findings from the independent review by May 31.

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, the APY ACC issued a statement supporting the gallery’s decision to postpone the exhibition. “Light is always the best defense to darkness,” it said.

“Given recent accusations that we believe are without merit, we welcome the most rigorous and robust reviews of the work. Knowing the truth and authenticity of the works and having an abundance of pride in this project and every facet of our important program and the business we’ve built, we are content to wait for the independent panel to make their findings.”

The federal, South Australian, and Northern Territory governments are behind the inquiry into authenticity of works by the APY Art Center Collective (APYACC), which have become increasingly valuable and collected by major museums across the country. The National Gallery of Australia (NGA) in Canberra was set to show 28 paintings from the APYACC in early June, but has postponed the exhibition Ngura Pulka – Epic Country following an independent review announced on April 10.

The government joint investigation and the museum’s review was prompted by a report from The Australian in early April alleging that white studio staff had been painting on the works attributed to residents of Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY), sparsely populated lands in remote South Australia home to more than 20 Aboriginal communities. The newspaper’s findings were the result of interviews with former gallery staff and Aboriginal artists about whether the work of white art assistants interfered with the artistic process.

South Australia arts minister Andrea Michaels confirmed to ARTnews in a written statement that she had met with federal arts minister Tony Burke and Northern Territory arts minister Chanston Paech on May 15 in response to the allegations published by The Australian.

“We determined there will be a review into the organisation led by the South Australian Government, jointly funded by the Commonwealth, with the support of the Northern Territory Government. We will work closely with the Anangu people including those working in the Adelaide Studio as the review gets underway,” she said.

“All three governments are determined to protect the integrity of First Nations art. We are committed to supporting First Nations artists to share their art with the world, and ensuring respect for their culture and stories is incredibly important.”

The newspaper investigation, independent review, and government inquiry have all brought additional attention to notions of authenticity and attribution in the art industry. Employing junior assistants in the production of artworks usually attributed to a single author is not uncommon among famous names like Jeff Koons, Tom Sachs, Kent Monkman, Kehinde Wiley, and Damien Hirst.

The issue is whether the APYACC’s white art assistants influenced or took over creative control of Aboriginal artworks attributed to APY artists in the Ngura Pulka exhibition that also had religious or cultural significance.

On Friday, Minister Burke further emphasized that concern regarding authenticity and artistic integrity was not about the APYACC’s mere utilization of non-Indigenous assistants.

“I won’t be telling First Nations artists whether or not they are allowed to be assisted,” he told the Sydney Morning Herald. “I won’t be doing that, and I won’t be telling any creators what they can and can’t create. That’s certainly not my job, that’s certainly not my style.

“What matters is to make sure that people have creative control,” he added. “And to the extent that there are allegations that there was no creative control, then that’s important for us to be able to work through the facts on that.

“But I certainly have no intention of implying a standard set of rules around First Nations artists that are not applied to any other artists in the world or throughout history.”

The South Australian government is the principal funder of the APYACC. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, the government inquiry hasn’t set a timeframe for its joint investigation. The NGA said it expects to receive results from its independent review by the end of May.

The NGA’s review was prompted by a report from The Australian in early April alleging that white studio staff had been painting on the works attributed to residents of Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY), sparsely populated lands in remote South Australia home to more than 20 Aboriginal communities. The newspaper’s findings were the result of interviews with former gallery staff and Aboriginal artists about whether the work of white art assistants interfered with the artistic process.

“The aim of the Independent Review is to clarify whether the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) artists attributed as the creators of the paintings to be included in the Gallery’s upcoming Ngura Pulka exhibition exercised effective creative control over the creation of the paintings, and so can properly be described as the artists responsible for those works consistent with the National Gallery’s provenance policy,” museum director Dr Nick Mitzevich said in a statement Wednesday. 

The exhibition Ngura Pulka – Epic Country is described by the NGA as “one of the largest and most significant First Nations community-driven art projects to have ever been developed.”

“All parts of Ngura Pulka are being entirely conceived, created, directed, and determined by Aṉangu people,” the gallery said on its website. “Home to 2,500 people, the APY Lands, in remote South Australia, support a network of Aṉangu communities, including seven key art centres.”

The NGA’s independent review panel consists of lawyers Colin Golvan and Shane Simpson, as well as First Nations advisors Yhonnie Scarce and Maree Meredith. Golvan is an expert in copyright protection for Indigenous arts. Simpson is an expert in property and copyright laws in the areas of arts, entertainment and culture. Scarce is a Kokatha and Nukunu glass artist. Meredith is a Bidjara woman and vice-chancellor of Indigenous leadership at the University of Canberra.

The Australian‘s investigative report has also brought up serious questions around the ethics of the production and integrity of Aboriginal art in the country, especially since the APY includes the famous Ken Sisters, winners of the $50,000 Wynne Prize for landscape painting in 2016. Aboriginal artist Paul Andy told The Australian through a translator that Skye O’Meara, the general manager of the APY Art Centre Collective would contribute her ideas and painting to his works. O’Meara has consistently denied these claims.

Artworks by APY artists are also increasingly popular at auction, with some selling for thousands of dollars. The National Gallery of Victoria, Art Gallery of New South Wales, and the Art Gallery of South Australia also have “significant collections of work from the Anunga people of the APY Lands”, according to the Sydney Morning Herald.

The APY Art Centre Collective, which represents 500 artists and seven arts centres, issued its own statement strenuously denying “the over-arching narrative” from the reports about its artworks being compromised as reported in The Australian, calling the reports “disingenuous.”

The organization said it “does not hide the fact that art assistants assist in the underpainting process,” describing it as when “heavily diluted paint is poured, sprayed, or slopped onto the canvas, often with large painting brushes. Multiple layers are then applied by the artist only.”

The APYACC also called the allegations published by The Australian “infected by a paternalistic view of how indigenous art should be made, devoid of contemporary, professional practices which are not hidden from anyone wishing to observe them.”

The APYACC’s statement concluded by calling the newspaper’s allegations of non-Indigenous assistants completing unfinished artworks “false and seriously defamatory” and that it was taking legal advice on the issue.

The NGA said it expects to receive the findings of the independent review by May 31.

Images and video of the protest posted to social media show the two activists also trying to glue their hands to the famous print series titled Campbell’s Soup I, which is framed and under glass.

A press release from Stop Fossil Fuels Subsidies, which is part of A22 Network, a coalition of civil resistance organizations, said the protest was aimed at ending the Australian government’s financial support of industries like natural gas and coal. Australia is the world’s largest exporter of coal and 71% of its electricity in 2021 came from fossil fuels.

One of the activists at the Canberra protest was identified in a press release as a mother of three named Bonnie Cassen. She said Andy Warhol depicted consumerism gone mad in his iconic print series.

“Families are having to choose between medicine and food for their children while fossil fuel companies return record profits. And yet our government gives $22,000 a minute in subsidies to the fossil fuel industry,” she said while applying glue to her palm.

The protest follows similar actions by climate change activists at major galleries and museums in cities across Europe. Activists have thrown liquids or glued their hands on the glass or frames of iconic works such as Johannes Vermeer’s Girl With a Pearl Earring, Van Gogh’s Sunflowers, Claude Monet’s Meules, and Francisco Goya’s paintings The Clothed Maja and The Naked Maja. Videos and statements about those protests have explained that the intention is not to damage the paintings and sculptures, but only to highlight the lack of government action against the causes of worsening climate disasters. The climate protests started in late June, with most actions committed by the UK climate activism group Just Stop Oil.

Earlier this month, the Association of Art Museum Directors, a prominent museum group that includes many of the most important art institutions in the U.S. and Canada, released a statement speaking out against the protests by climate activists in Europe.

“This Association has always been clear that attacks on works of art cannot be justified, whether the motivations are political, religious, or cultural,” the AAMD said in its statement. “Art crosses boundaries of time and place to underscore the creativity that people everywhere have expressed, and they represent our shared humanity.”

The statement continued, “Attacking art for any purpose undermines those common bonds. Such protests are misdirected, and the ends do not justify the means.”

On Monday, a profile of Wolfson published by the New Yorker offered news of his latest work—which, it turns out, has already been acquired by a major museum for a huge sum.

The National Gallery of Australia in Canberra has bought Wolfson’s latest work, which is described as a “body sculpture” with a protagonist called the Cube. It’s set to go on view at the museum in 2021, and according to the article, it was acquired last fall for nearly $5 million—a price that reportedly maxed out the museum’s acquisitions fund for an entire year. (Wolfson’s auction record stands at $125,000, for a painting sold at Sotheby’s New York in 2014. His sculptures, which are often valued more highly than his videos and paintings, have rarely been offered at auction.)

What, exactly, is the Cube? According to Wolfson, it will interact with viewers, and it will be able to perform various activities. These include (but are not limited to) being able to “rape the floor” and “play its own body like an instrument.” It may even ultimately be able to point at viewers’ genitals. Wolfson, who is based in Los Angeles and New York, reportedly wanted to show it at a major American museum, but that wasn’t in the cards.

“Jordan Wolfson is one of the most dynamic and exciting artists of our generation and the acquisition of his most recent work continues the National Gallery of Australia’s focus on collecting art that has the potential to change the course of art history like Jackson Pollock’s Blue Poles and Constantin Brancusi’s Birds in Space,” Nick Mitzevich, the museum’s director, told ARTnews in a statement.

In a statement posted to Twitter, the museum said that it closed “to mitigate any risk to the public, staff, and works of art on display.”

Nick Mitzevich, director of the museum, told the Australian newspaper the Daily Telegraph that reopening is contingent upon air quality conditions, and the institution remained shuttered on Monday. An exhibition of works by Matisse and Picasso is currently mounted at the museum.

“The bushfire is really having an effect and we can’t guarantee the safety of our air quality in the building, with the movements of the doors opening and closing,” Mitzevich told the Daily Telegraph.

The Guardian reports that Canberra currently has the world’s worst air quality, with index readings rising well beyond what are considered “hazardous” conditions.

The National Museum of Australia, also located in Canberra, was open on Monday but alerted visitors to its website that “due to poor air quality our hours may change at short notice.”

The National Portrait Gallery in Canberra closed on Sunday and is now “monitoring the smoke situation in Canberra on a day-to-day basis and will remain open unless conditions reach similar levels to Sunday,” according to a museum representative. If the museum shutters again this week it will aim to update its social media pages with relevant information by 8 a.m. on days with closures. “But because this is an unprecedented situation, we’re just taking each day as it comes,” the rep added.

According to CNN, the fires have already killed more than 20 people across Australia, and an estimated 480 million animals in the southeastern state of New South Wales—including a third of the state’s koala population—have perished as a result of the blazes. More than 1,300 homes in New South Wales have been destroyed, and 136 fires were still burning in the state on Monday. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has announced a $1.39 billion fund for rebuilding efforts.

News

The pioneering conceptual artist John Baldessari has died at age 88. [ARTnews]

The National Gallery of Australia in Canberra, where an exhibition of works by Matisse and Picasso is currently on view, closed on Sunday due to smoky air caused by raging brushfires. [The Art Newspaper]

The Market

Later this month, the Chicago-based company Johnson Publishing, which filed for bankruptcy last year, will auction 100 works of art previously displayed in its offices. Among the works set to hit the block are a series of chromogenic prints by Carrie Mae Weems. [Chicago Sun Times]

In a private auction last summer, Johnson Publishing sold its archive of images from Ebony and Jet magazines to a consortium of philanthropic organizations. [ARTnews]

Museums

The Victoria & Albert Museum’s move to new storage facilities in east London involves packing and transporting 250,000 objects, 350,000 books, and over 1,000 archives, making it the museum’s largest relocation of its collections since World War II. [The Guardian]

“There are many, many spreadsheets,” Sarah Cucinella-McDaniel, chief registrar at the Denver Art Museum, said of the logistical details behind the institution’s ongoing exhibition “Claude Monet: The Truth of Nature.” [NPR]

In case you missed it: Phyllis Tuchman wrote last month that the Denver Art Museum’s Monet survey “is telling the story of a long life lived to the fullest.” [ARTnews]

Exhibitions

At San Francisco’s Asian Art Museum, a presentation titled “Lost at Sea: Art Recovered From Shipwrecks” features a “fantastically whimsical flying horse on a fragment of 15th-century Vietnamese pottery” and many more wonders, according to Edward Rothstein. [The Wall Street Journal]

David Pagel writes that artist Alice Tippit, whose paintings are now on view at Grice Bench in Los Angeles, “is a colorist who understands understatement.” [Los Angeles Times]

Photography

Artist Clare Gallagher discusses her photographs of domestic messes: “I want to draw attention to what is not shown about home—the everyday things that are right in front of our eyes, but go almost unnoticed and uncommented on.” [The Guardian]

And finally, behold photographer Michal Chelbin’s vibrant portraits of Ukrainian teenagers at prom. “These pictures should make us think about the possible futures of these young people, and of their country,” Janet Elise Johnson writes of the images. [The New Yorker]

The National Gallery of Australia.

COURTESY NGA

The Australian reported that the National Gallery of Australia has taken down a collection of 13 deity sculptures purchased from Indian-born art dealer Subhash Kapoor estimated to be worth $11 million. As a reminder, Kapoor is accused of orchestrating a $100 million smuggling ring out of his New York gallery, Art of the Past, and is now serving a 14-year sentence in an Indian prison.

The museum is in the process of arranging for the 13 stolen pieces to return to India, though two of them—one called Door Guardians, the other a dancing Sambandar—hang in limbo ownership-wise, as the Indian government has yet to locate their temple of origin from among the thousands that are believed to have been looted.

By way of explanation, NGA director Gerard Vaughan told the newspaper that the enduring display of these artifacts reflected badly upon the entire country. This news marks the latest development in the NGA’s process of ridding itself of Kapoor’s stolen pieces; last year, for example, Australian minister Tony Abbott returned one of the NGA’s dancing Shivas as well as another piece from the Art Gallery of New South Wales during a trip to India. The article additionally noted that German Chancellor Angela Merkel intends to give back a stolen Durga figure acquired from Kapoor by a German museum while visiting India this October.

David Wojnarowicz (1981), by Peter Hujar.

©ESTATE OF PETER HUJAR/MATTHEW MARKS GALLERY

The British Museum’s exhibition on ancient Greek sculpture includes a bronze copy of the lost Greek original Doryphoros (spear-bearer) by Polykleitos, made in 1920 by the German sculptor Georg Römer, and long believed to be destroyed in WWII. [The Art Newspaper]

MoMA film curator Jytte Jensen died on Monday night. [Artforum]

Málaga, Spain has been using its association with Picasso (he was born in Málaga) to become an art hub. It’s been working—the city is receiving museum offshoots of both the Pompidou Center from Paris and the State Russian Museum from Saint Petersburg. [The New York Times]

Günther Förg’s paintings and large-scale architectural photos at Greene Naftali in New York. [Contemporary Art Daily]

Aperture Foundation is releasing a new 20th anniversary edition of David Wojnarowicz’s book Brush Fires in the Social Landscape, which celebrates his friendship with Nan Goldin. [Dazed Digital]

Read this profile of Lonni Sue Johnson, an artist and illustrator who contracted a virus that left her with amnesia. [The New Yorker]

National Gallery of Australia in Canberra is opening its first “naked art tour,” which is exactly what it sounds like. After-hours on April 1-3, three tours of the current exhibition, “James Turrell: A Retrospective,” with 50 guests each, will be welcomed to view the show nude. [CNN]

Battersea Arts Centre in South London will receive £1 million in government aid after a fire destroyed the building’s Grand Hall. [The Stage]