Marc Desgrandchamps (Né en 1960)

The hammer struck its final blow at €55,900 for a Triptych n° 1266 by Marc Desgrandchamps, offered on June 25 at Millon. This painter of transparency achieved his world record at auction. Two retrospectives were devoted to him in 2006 and 2011 at the Centre Pompidou and the MAM, in Paris.

An auction lit up by the talents of Marc Chagall, Jacques-Émile Ruhlmann and Tamara de Lempicka.

Dusseldorf City Council voted to return the painting to the heirs of Kurt Grawi, a Jewish entrepreneur and banker, persecuted by the Nazis. The painting was sold in New York to fund an escape from Germany. This could establish a precedent for the restitution of art sold outside of Nazi-occupied Europe. (Hyperallergic)

The historian and essayist Marc Fumaroli, a member of the French Academy, died today at the age of 88. Marc Fumaroli had been president of the Société des amis du Louvre from 1996 to 2016 and had notably curated the exhibition "Antiquité rêvée" at the Louvre with Henri Loyrette.

The gallery, which opened in 2015 in the district of Marolles in Brussels, is moving to the Louise Gallery, the shopping center of Ixelles: a sector already occupied by Nathalie Obadia, Templon and Almine Rech. Part of its program will be dedicated to modern surrealist and expressionist art.

Die Füchse (Foxes) will be returned to the heirs of its former owner by the city of Düsseldorf. Its unusual providence – sold at auction in New York in 1940 – means it may set a new precedent on what it means to have sold under duress, even “outside the Nazi sphere of influence.” (Spiegel)

As the Parcours céramique brings together 19 Paris galleries, the dealer discussed ceramics, long considered contemporary art's poor relative.

There are painters who evince little liking for feminine charms—as roundly demonstrated by the fine Rigaud retrospective at the Château de Versailles—and those who beautify their models. And princesses de sang royal (princesses of royal blood) were placed in the top rank of Olympian goddesses by Jean-Marc Nattier.

Noah Horowitz, 43, has just been appointed CEO of Art Basel, succeeding Marc Spiegler, who is leaving the Swiss group MCH in order to "begin a new stage in his career". The newly elected CEO had been Art Basel's director for the "Americas" zone from 2015 to 2021, before a short stint at Sotheby's.

New paperwork was requested and a criminal complaint instigated against the board in Düsseldorf, Germany, who had recommended it be returned. Die Füchse (Foxes) is valued between 18 million and $36 million and was in the process of being returned to Kurt Grawi’s heirs, after being taken by the Nazis in 1935. (ARTnews)