Art Basel/UBS Report’s Surprising Findings and More Art News

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The Headlines

BIG SPENDERS SPEAK. The fifth edition of the annual Art Basel & UBS Survey of Global Collecting is out, and ARTnews reports several unexpected findings. For one, despite fears that younger generations of collectors are not as active as older generations, the survey of 3,100 high-net-worth collectors, authored by economist Clare McAndrew, found that Gen Z spent the most on average in 2025 and 2026. In fact, they accounted for more than twice the amount of older generations surveyed, or $347,460 in 2025, a 19 percent increase from the previous year. That trend has continued in 2026, and across almost every segment of collectibles. However, 39 percent of the same group said they’d rather keep access to their collections private, nearly twice as many as other generations. In other surprises, collectors of all ages are increasingly relying on artificial intelligence for advice, recommendations, and provenance checks, jumping from four percent in 2024 to 22 percent this year.

TANG TROUBLES. Several artists are accusing Tang Contemporary gallery of not paying them and withholding artworks, joining similar claims by their landlord and other providers, reports The Art Newspaper. While the gallery’s space in the Wong Chuck Hang neighborhood announced in late August that it shuttered on July 21, its other locations in Bangkok, Beijing, Seoul, Singapore, and central Hong Kong remain open. In August, a legal notice was attached to the door of the closed gallery, but its director, Vivian Har, denied that any artists had filed lawsuits against it. That’s not what a lawyer representing an anonymous artist said in a statement specifying they filed a legal complaint on August 14 in Thailand, alleging that the gallery owes their client about $450,000. Several other artists also told TAN they are owed money. Meanwhile, the landlord of the closed Hong Kong gallery is demanding about $201,000 in unpaid rent for this year, plus other fees, and had reportedly previously filed a legal complaint.

The Digest

A nearly 8-foot-tall, naked, gold statue titled “Orange Plague,” by the Danish artist Jens Galschiot, depicting a bloated President Donald Trump sitting on the shoulders of a smaller man, has been temporarily installed in Strasbourg’s European Parliament building. [The Straits Times]

Five people were arrested in connection with the September 8 theft of two paintings by Auguste Renoir from a museum in southern France. [Le Figaro]

Following threats of criminal charges, the Volksbühne theater in Berlin covered up the genitalia on a giant sculpture of a nude female figure installed on its roof by Florentina Holzinger, which had been inspired by Gustave Courbet’s The Origin of the World. [Berliner Zeitung]

Ukraine is rebuilding a Russian-bombed museum dedicated to Roman Shukhevych, accused of being a Nazi collaborator. [The Art Newspaper]

After a decade, the Para Site nonprofit art space is departing its location in the Quarry Bay district of Hong Kong, and will launch a nomadic program. [Artforum]

The Kicker

FEMALE FACTOR. A new AI tool clocks the gender balance—or more often, imbalance—of gallery artist rosters in a matter of clicks, reports Ocula. Designed by art historian Hall W Rockefeller, who also founded the arts network Less Than Half, hopes that the app will encourage more recognition and support for women artists, while also boosting “a global movement of matronage.” In other words: the mobilization of more women art collectors. Specifically, the AI tool determines what percentage of a gallery’s roster is female or identifies as non-binary. Those that pass a 50 percent quota get a digital sticker they can also display. “I want people to notice the very apparent discrepancies and inequalities between men and women artists and the systematic ways in which women artists are kept from succeeding,” Rockefeller said.