Arts & Culture

NEW YORK — New York's November auction season starts in two weeks. On November 16, Sotheby's opens its sales week with an evening auction of the Theodore and Ruth Baum collection of postwar and contemporary art. The house expects the collection to exceed $100 million. More than 20 works go on the block that night, including pieces by Rothko, Joan Mitchell, Ruscha, Burri, Warhol and Fontana, many unseen at auction for decades. A day sale follows on November 17, and more Baum works are slated for 2027. Phillips lists its evening sale of modern and contemporary art for November 18. It is led by Modigliani's 1911–12 sculpture Tete, estimated at $28 million to $35 million, with a Hockney double portrait at $10 million to $15 million. Phillips' May sale made $115.2 million with fees, more than double the prior year's equivalent, which sets a higher bar this time.

LONDON — The National Gallery in London opens Van Eyck: The Portraits on November 21. It runs through April 11, 2027, with an admission charge. For the first time, all nine of Jan van Eyck's painted portraits will hang together, gathered from across Europe. The Arnolfini Portrait of 1434 sits beside the newly conserved Portrait of a Man (Self Portrait?) from 1433, shown next to the 1439 likeness of the artist's wife, Margaret. The gallery calls Margaret's portrait the first known portrait of a non-aristocratic woman. Loans come from Berlin, Vienna, Bruges and the British Museum, and the gallery says Dresden's silverpoint drawing of an elderly man is also on loan. The accompanying catalogue is billed as the first monograph on van Eyck's portraits. It draws on new research into his technique, original frames and inscriptions.

NEW YORK — The National Book Foundation will announce winners in fiction, nonfiction, poetry, translated literature and young people's literature on Wednesday, November 18, at the 77th National Book Awards in New York. The ceremony is livestreamed at 8 p.m. Eastern. The 25 finalists were named on October 6. Fiction finalists are Hannah Lillith Assadi's Paradiso 17 (Knopf), Edwidge Danticat's Dèy (Knopf), Julián Delgado Lopera's Pretend You're Dead and I Carry You (Liveright), Valeria Luiselli's Beginning Middle End (Knopf) and Morgan Thomas's Mad Eden (MCD). Translated-literature finalists include Mohamed Mbougar Sarr's Pure Men and Samar Yazbek's Your Presence Is a Danger to Your Life, both from Other Press. Salman Rushdie will receive the foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, presented by Kiran Desai. Kyle MacLachlan hosts, with Michelle Zauner as musical guest.

Tuesday, November 3, brings new titles from several bestselling authors. Cassandra Clare's The Last King of Faerie is one of the month's most anticipated releases. Freida McFadden's The Gift, a holiday short story inspired by O. Henry's The Gift of the Magi, comes from Poisoned Pen Press. William Boyd returns with the spy novel Cold Sunset, a Gabriel Dax book, and John Scalzi's Monsters of Ohio is also due. A bookshop listing for Daisy Johnson's Long Wave quotes The Guardian calling it her strongest work yet. Later in the month, David Baldacci's thriller All In arrives from Hachette on November 10, according to Time Out. One bookseller listing gives November 5. On November 17, Nora Roberts begins a new trilogy with Birth of the Witch (Macmillan). New Directions publishes the fifth volume of Solvej Balle's On the Calculation of Volume, and Rebecca Yarros's Peculiar Stars comes from Montlake.

LOS ANGELES — Director Taika Waititi has called critics "sad lost souls" over negative notices for 'Klara and the Sun,' according to The Hollywood Reporter. The film adapts Kazuo Ishiguro's 2021 novel about a robot companion and stars Jenna Ortega and Amy Adams. THR's chief film critic, David Rooney, called it a "wretched mess." The box office has been weak. Boxoffice Pro's Sunday estimates show about $145,000 from 880 theaters in its second weekend, for a running total near $1.17 million. Deadline reported that Sony stopped releasing second-weekend figures. Audience exit polling it cited gave the film two stars and a 40 percent definite-recommend score, with the audience mostly women and 18-to-24-year-olds a notable share. Waititi's comments came as the film's poor run became clear.

NEW YORK — The Gotham Film & Media Institute announced nominations for its 36th awards last week. 'All of a Sudden,' 'Clarissa,' 'La Gradiva,' 'The Invite' and 'Tender Loving Care' lead with four each. A24 collected 15 nominations and Neon 14. The Gotham Audience Award returns after a six-year gap, with eight nominees: 'Backrooms,' 'La Bola Negra,' 'The Drama,' 'The Invite,' 'Michael,' 'Obsession,' 'Project Hail Mary' and 'You Can See Everything.' Winners will be announced Nov. 30 in New York. Lee Chang-dong's 'Possible Love' has three nominations. It won the Silver Lion at Venice and reaches Netflix on Nov. 6, which The Hollywood Reporter calls the streamer's best 2027 Oscar prospect.

LONDON — Pavel Kolesnikov's complete Chopin Nocturnes (Harmonia Mundi, two CDs, 115 minutes) is Gramophone's Recording of the Month for November 2026, according to Presto Music's listing. Reviewer Aleksander Laskowski said the Yamaha CFX concert grand sounds round and mellow under Kolesnikov's hands, as if painted in watercolour, with a quality close to a period instrument. He credited the pianist rather than the instrument, citing a very fine touch and brilliant but sometimes idiosyncratic pedalling. As an example he pointed to a passage in the Nocturne Op. 48 No. 1 where the harmonies blur into haze. Gramophone's November Editor's Choices also include Bertrand Chamayou's Mendelssohn Songs Without Words and the Kopatchinskaja-Say duo album 'Patkop & Say'. The Autumn issue of International Piano put Kolesnikov on its cover.

MEMPHIS — The Memphis Youth Symphony Program is marking 60 years with two anniversary concerts, held Sunday, Nov. 1, at Rhodes College's McNeill Concert Hall. Six of its orchestras and ensembles performed works by Smetana, Dvořák and contemporary composers, WKNO reported. Executive director Jenny Davis also introduced the program's new string orchestra conductor, Yonitte Ryger. A 60th Anniversary Gala is set for Nov. 14, 7 to 10 p.m., at the Children's Museum of Memphis. The Memphis Symphony Orchestra's Tunes & Tales storytime concerts visit Shelby County schools on Nov. 4 and 5. The orchestra then plays John Williams's score live to 'Home Alone' at the Orpheum on Nov. 28, at 1 and 6:30 p.m. Robert Moody conducts the Magic of Memphis holiday show at the Cannon Center on Dec. 5.

PALERMO — Several losses have hit classical music in the past week, according to Slipped Disc. Italian conductor Gabriele Ferro died in Palermo, aged 88, the site reported on October 29. Judith Blegen, the American-born soprano and longtime Metropolitan Opera favourite, died, with the news posted October 24. Slipped Disc also reported on October 29 that a composer was among those missing after Wednesday's train disaster in Spain. The pianist and composer Stephen Kovacevich also died this week. The site gave no details on the cause of Ferro's or Blegen's deaths. Slipped Disc is a single-editor industry site, and these reports have not been checked against other outlets here.