Designs revealed for Studio Museum redevelopment

Our daily round-up of news from the art world

Designs revealed for new home of Harlem’s Studio Museum | The Studio Museum in Harlem has released images of Adjaye Associates’ designs for its new building, located on the site of its present home. The design will grant the museum a 115 per cent increase in exhibition space, with groundbreaking taking place in the autumn of 2018. Work had been due to start on the site this year, but Adjaye has since altered the design. The city of New York has pledged $53.8m towards the costs of the redevelopment, estimated at $175m; according to ArtNet, the museum has already raised some 70 per cent of the total.

Thomas Sokolowski named director of Zimmerli Art Museum | Former Andy Warhol Museum director Thomas Sokolowski has been appointed to lead Rutgers University–New Brunswick’s Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum, it was announced today. Sokolowski, who headed the Warhol museum from 1996 to 2010, has more than three decades of experience in the sector, having previously held leading posts at the Chrysler Museum in Norfolk, VA, and Grey Art Gallery at New York University.

Gus Casely-Hayford named director of the National Museum of African Art | The Smithsonian has appointed Augustus Casely-Hayford to lead its National Museum of African Art in Washington, D.C. Casely-Hayford, currently a research associate at London’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), is also known for his television work, having written series including Sky Arts’ Tate Britain: Great British Walks. When he takes up the job in February 2018, he will replace Johnnetta Cole, who stepped down in March.

Pompeii to build contemporary art collection | The authorities responsible for the ruins of Pompeii have invited contemporary artists to create sculptures responding to, and incorporating fragments of material from, the ancient site, reports the Art Newspaper. The initiative will launch with an exhibition at the Museo d’Arte Contemporanea Donnaregina (Madre) in Naples: participating artists include Laure Prouvost, Adrián Villar Rojas and Jimmie Durham. Pompeii’s director-general Massimo Osanna, who hopes to build a permanent collection of contemporary works at the site, hopes the project will show how Pompeii remains ‘a place of the contemporary’.

Kathy Halbreich named executive director of Rauschenberg Foundation | MoMA’s Kathy Halbreich is to move to the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, where she will take up the post of executive director. Halbreich has worked at MoMA as associate director for nine years, and before that served as the director of the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. She will continue supervising work on MoMA’s forthcoming Bruce Nauman retrospective after taking up her new role in November.