A View From the Easel: Gerardo Rosales

“My past sculptures [and] tools act as levers that pry ideas from my mind.” Welcome to the 359th installment of A View From the Easel, a series in which artists reflect on their workspace. This week, Allan Wexler tinkers, saws, and paints in the woods of Long Island, in a studio he built himself. Want to take part? Check out our submission guidelines and share a bit about your studio with us through this form! All mediums and workspaces are welcome, including your home studio. Allan Wexler, Southold, New YorkHow long have you been working in this space? After living part-time on the North Fork of Long Island for decades, in 2001, we bought four acres of woods in Southold. I was trained as an architect, and so we, like most creative people, had always dreamed of designing and building a unique house and art studio. We completed the studio in 2006. We completed the house in 2009. I also have a small studio in Brooklyn. Describe an average day in your studio. I wake in my house and prepare coffee in my La Pavoni Espresso maker. By 9am, I commute for my one-minute walk on the well-worn path through the woods to my studio.

It’s a provocative and discursive exploration of how artists respond to our late-capitalist epoch, but its focus on “rupture” raises questions. Detail of Wen Liu, "In Light, Where Edges Yield" (2025), prescribed herbal medicine, epoxy clay, resin, acrylic, varnish, stainless steel (photo Rebecca Tisdelle-Macias, courtesy Toronto Biennial of Art; all other photos Neil Price/Hyperallergic)

The Prix Marcel Duchamp jury announced Thursday that it has awarded the 2026 prize to artist duo David Brognon and Stéphanie Rollin, known for their multidisciplinary practice that spans installation, sculpture, video, performance, and photography. The Prix Marcel Duchamp is considered France’s most prestigious art prize, with winners recieving €35,000, or just over $40,000. For the award, a jury typically selects four nominees, who show together at the Centre Pompidou in October. This year, however, five nominees were chosen—Malagasy artist Joël Andrianomearisoa, Josèfa Ntjam, a participant in last year’s Bienal de São Paulo, artist and filmmaker Laura Henno, and Brognon and Rollin—and the annual exhibition was held at Musée d’Arte Moderne de Paris due to the Pompidou’s extended closure.

Paul Stankard, a visionary glass blower who memorialized flora and fauna in hardened and translucent form, died at the age of 83, according to a New York Times obituary that celebrates how his “decades-long obsession with replicating the natural world in glass transformed the American paperweight from tchotchke to fine art.” The cause of his death was cancer, according to his daughter. As the Times described Stankard’s fateful turn to the the mode of working he made his own, “In 1972, with three young children and a newborn at home, Mr. Stankard skipped out on a steady job blowing glass for chemical laboratories. He was in love—with paperweights.”

LEGO brings daft punk’s alive stage into brick formThe illuminated pyramid at the center of Daft Punk’s 2007 Alive tour is on its way to becoming an official LEGO set. Announced on October 22nd, the collaboration between the Danish toymaker and the French electronic duo begins with a fan-designed concert model, bringing one of electronic music’s most recognizable stage designs down to tabletop scale. The pyramid became a defining image of the Alive shows, placing the helmeted musicians within a glowing geometric structure. In the LEGO Ideas concept, a miniature version of the triangular stage sits between two wide, gridded structures, with colorful lighting recreated across its faceted surfaces. The model shows an early look at the proposed set, while the final product design is still in development.images courtesy LEGO Groupa father-and-son LEGO project becomes an official setThe design began during lockdown, when Luxembourg-based LEGO enthusiast Patrick Harboun and his son started building their own version of the famous concert stage. Their proposal won the LEGO Ideas Music to Our Ears challenge in 2020 and later gathered 10,000 supporters on the platform.

Museum closures are expected to take place across Paris on Saturday, in anticipation of planned protests, reports Le Figaro. The Louvre, Musée d’Orsay, Musée de l’Orangerie, Picasso Museum, and the Grand Palais’s exhibition spaces will all close their doors on Saturday. The news follows the cancelation of Art Basel Paris over the weekend, which is held at the Grand Palais. In a statement on Friday, the French Ministry of Culture said that all establishments must ensure “the safety of visitors, the protection of agents and the preservation of works.” All national and public museums are being urged to shut their doors; meanwhile, many shops have started boarding up their windows in case of a second round of looting, following last weekend’s civil unrest in the wake of mostly peaceful protests held across France, in response to social and economic inequality amid a rising cost of living.