Briefing

Dame Julia Peyton-Jones – the long-time director of London's Serpentine Galleries – will join Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac as their Senior Global Director. Peyton-Jones will take up her new role from 1 September 2017, and will be based in London. ‘Julia Peyton-Jones is one of the most respected and admired figures in the art world with an unparalleled level of experience,’ the gallery said in a statement. ‘It will be an honour and a joy to work together and develop exciting new projects.' Peyton-Jones was director of the Serpentine from 1991 to 2016, and was responsible for initiating its pavilion programme, commissioning artists and architects to design a structure next to the galleries each summer.

Berlin’s Silberkuppe Gallery is closing. The gallery opened in 2008, and had been recently participating in several international art fairs, including the Liste fair in Basel just a fortnight ago. Silberkuppe originally opened in Kreuzberg, and then later moved to Schöneberg – its final show was Win McCarthy’s ‘Mister’ which closed on 24 June.

Buffalo’s Albright-Knox Gallery has released plans for its USD$155 million expansion. The building work will more than double the gallery space to 4,645 square metres. The project is led by Shohei Shigematsu of the Rotterdam-based Office for Metropolitan Architecture, and will see the Albright-Knox's current parking lot transformed into an underground gallery. It’s the first expansion for the museum in over 50 years. Construction will begin in April 2019, with an opening expected in October 2021.

The Centro Botín opened in Santander last Friday, two decades after the Guggenheim landed in neighbouring Bilbao. The private museum’s arrival – funded by the philanthropic Botín Foundation – contributes to the unceasing expansion of contemporary art institutions across the Spanish Atlantic coast. The art centre, designed by Renzo Piano, was originally intended to open three years ago, but was beset by delays. The opening of the Centro Botín has prompted comparisons to the ‘Bilbao effect’ – you can read more about the debate in our latest Postcard from Northern Spain.

Julia Joern is leaving David Zwirner Gallery. Joern has been a partner at Zwirner since 2014, and worked at the gallery for over a decade. She has resigned for health reasons. ‘Julia has been a relentless innovator and pioneer, and in the process has created the very blueprint for all the marketing efforts that are now necessary to effectively run and grow a large-scale, international art gallery’, David Zwirner wrote in an email to staff.

French billionaire and luxury brands owner François Pinault has revealed his plans for a new Paris art museum, which will transform a historic stockmarket building, the 19th century Bourse de commerce. Architect Tadao Ando will oversee the building project, with an opening expected in early 2019. The museum will house Pinault’s personal collection of modern and contemporary art, which includes pieces by Mark Rothko and Damien Hirst. The Guardian has the story.