Art Movements
Ann Temkins steps down at MoMA, Rose B. Simpson wins the Santa Fe Mayor’s award, Roy Lichtenstein x Alex Da Corte, and more in Art Movements.
Art Movements, published every Thursday afternoon, is a roundup of must-know news, appointments, awards, and other happenings in today’s chaotic art world.
Yaddo Names New President
Yaddo, the artist residency program in New York’s Saratoga Springs, has named Cyra Levenson as its next president. Levenson, the current deputy director of Learning and Engagement at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and Foundation, will succeed Elaina Richardson, who led the nonprofit for 26 years.
“For 100 years Yaddo has been dedicated to creative people, to practice and to the magic that happens in community,” Levenson said in a statement. “Artists have a unique ability to see what doesn’t yet exist and to metabolize what is happening in the world in ways that others can digest and gain nourishment from.”
Rose B. Simpson Wins Santa Fe Mayor’s Award
Artist Rose B. Simpson has received the Santa Fe Mayor’s 2026 Award for Excellence in the Arts in recognition of her discipline-spanning practice and her “leadership, mentorship, and service to emerging generations of artists.” Simpson, who lives and works in Santa Clara Pueblo, has long advocated for Indigenous cultural life. In a 2025 opinion piece for Hyperallergic, she decried President Trump’s efforts to defund Santa Fe’s Institute of American Indian Arts, of which she is an alum and trustee. “I believe in the power of offering Indigenous people opportunity and space for investigation — both personal and communal,” Simpson wrote. “I believe in the power of collective strength to lift the voice of our people, to claim our rightful position as leaders of creativity and aesthetic expression.”
Ann Temkin Steps Down at MoMA
The Museum of Modern Art’s (MoMA) longtime chief curator of Painting and Sculpture, Ann Temkin, will step down from the role in January. She will remain at MoMA in a newly created advisory role, the New York Times reported, leading programming for the museum’s 100th anniversary in 2029.
What Else Happened?
- Eva Respini and Sirish Rao have been named co-CEOs of the Vancouver Art Gallery. Respini will also serve as chief curator, and Rao will serve as executive director. The museum’s previous director and CEO, Anthony Kiendl, departed in spring 2025, months after the museum scrapped plans for a new building due to rising costs.
- Diné artist and composer Raven Chacon is now represented by Sikkema Malloy Jenkins.
- The Smithsonian American Art Museum has appointed Colin Fanning as its new curator of Craft. The role will focus on acquisitions and exhibitions of craft and “maker culture” at the museum’s dedicated Renwick Gallery in Washington, DC.
- Laeh Glenn is now represented by Jessica Silverman gallery.
Acquisitions
- The Bronx Museum acquired Zoë Pulley’s “Elegance No. 1” (2026) from Superposition Gallery’s booth at last week’s Armory Show for the fair’s inaugural Bronx Museum Acquisition Prize. Works by Lizania Cruz, Joshua Nazario, and Theresa Weber were selected for the Pérez Art Museum Miami Acquisition Prize.
- The Dia Art Foundation has acquired Mira Schendel‘s “Still Waves of Probability” (1969).
- The Museum of Modern Art has acquired “Effluvia” and “Wake” by artist Joiri Minaya, from her Divergences (2022) series.
Wildcard: Roy Lichtenstein x Alex Da Corte?
A major retrospective of Pop Art icon Roy Lichtenstein opening at the Whitney Museum of American Art next week has an unexpected co-curator: Venezuelan-American artist Alex Da Corte, best known for his cheeky video art and installations examining celebrity and consumer culture. On October 29, Da Corte will present this year’s Walter Annenberg Lecture at the museum to discuss his engagement with Lichtenstein as both artist and curator.
In an interview for the New York Times, Da Corte told critic and Hyperallergic contributor Aruna D’Souza that despite the ubiquity of Lichtenstein’s work, he “had never thought about it in a close way.”
“So, for me, it felt urgent to ask, as an artist, how would I want my work to be considered and reconsidered when everyone thinks they know everything about it?” Da Corte said.
