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Louis Vuitton Foundation to stage major Calder retrospective

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Louis Vuitton Foundation to stage major Calder retrospective


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December 16, 2025

The Fondation Louis Vuitton will stage a novel Alexander Calder centennial retrospective in 2026, the latest in a series by the Paris art institute focused on leading artists of 20th and 21st centuries.

The striking silhouette of the Fondation Louis Vuitton in France – Fondation Louis Vuitton – Facebook

 
Previous monographic exhibitions at the Fondation Louis Vuitton have included Jean-Michel Basquiat, Joan Mitchell, Charlotte Perriand, Mark Rothko, David Hockney, and Gerhard Richter, its current show.
 
For Calder, a legendary artist known for his giant mobiles, sprawling mechanical kinetic sculptures moved by power and wind, the foundation will dedicate the entirety of its show space. And also, for the first time, the adjacent lawn, in a dialogue between Calder’s volumes, planes, and movements and those of the foundation’s famous sailboat silhouette.

The announcement by the Fondation Louis Vuitton on Tuesday, comes 11 days after the death of Frank Gehry, the master architect who designed its building. The art show will celebrate the centenary of Alexander Calder’s arrival in France in 1926 and the 50th anniversary of his death with a retrospective covering all aspects of his work. The son and grandson of two sculptors, Calder was born in Philadelphia in 1898 and died in New York in 1976.
 
Entitled ‘Calder: Rêver en équilibre,’ or ‘Calder: Dreaming in Balance,’ the exhibition covers half a century of creation, from the late 1920s and the first performances of the Calder Circus that captivated the Parisian avant-garde, to his monumental sculptures that redefined the idea of public art in the 1960s and 1970s.
 
The exhibition, one of the most important to date devoted to Calder, was conceived in close collaboration with the Calder Foundation, which is the main lender. It will also benefit from loans from international institutions and leading private collectors, bringing together nearly 300 works: mobiles and stabiles- to borrow Calder’s terminology for kinetic and static abstractions- as well as wire portraits, wooden sculptures, paintings, drawings, and even jewellery.
 
Works by his friends Jean Arp, Barbara Hepworth, Jean Hélion, and Piet Mondrian, as well as Paul Klee and Pablo Picasso, help to situate Calder’s radical inventiveness within the avant-garde movement. Thirty-four photographs taken by some of the most important photographers of the 20th century (Henri Cartier-Bresson, André Kertész, Gordon Parks, Man Ray, Irving Penn, and Agnès Varda) show an artist walking the tightrope between art and life.
 
After studying at the Art Students League in New York, Calder moved to Paris in 1926. In the Montparnasse district, the artist quickly became part of what was then the world’s leading artistic centre. There he presented unique forms, figurative and refined wire sculptures that attracted critical acclaim, and a miniature circus. Thanks to an exceptional loan from the Whitney Museum of American Art, the first in 15 years, Calder’s Circus is returning to Paris, the city where it was created. At the centre of this new kind of show, Calder manipulates acrobats, clowns, and miniature horsemen. Fernand Léger, Jean Hélion, Le Corbusier, Jean Arp, Joan Miró, and Piet Mondrian are among his spectators.
 
Calder’s visit to Mondrian’s studio in 1930 marked the abstract turning point in his work, first in painting, then in sculpture. Marcel Duchamp proposed the name “Mobiles” for the abstract and kinetic compositions that the artist presented in 1932 at the Galerie Vignon in Paris. Initially driven mechanically, then moved by slight breezes, these mobiles borrowed “their life from the vague life of the atmosphere,” as Jean-Paul Sartre wrote in 1946.
 
Calder returned to France after WW2 and set up a studio in the hamlet of Saché, in the Loire Valley in 1953. One of his sculptures still stands in the village’s square.
 
Like his swaying interconnected mobile art, the exhibition is a joint curation that includes input from Suzanne Pagé, artistic director of the Fondation Louis Vuitton; guest curators Dieter Buchhart and Anna Karina Hofbauer, assisted by Valentin Neuroth and Claire Deuticke; and Olivier Michelon, associate curator, assisted by Léna Lévy.
 

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Australia’s Myer posts strong H1 FY26 sales growth, up 24.5% YoY

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Australia’s Myer posts strong H1 FY26 sales growth, up 24.5% YoY



Australian department store chain Myer Holdings Limited has reported a solid financial performance for the first half (H1) of fiscal 2026 (FY26) ended January 24, 2026, with the company posting total sales of $2,279.5 million, marking a 24.5 per cent increase year-on-year (YoY). On a comparable basis, sales rose 2.1 per cent, driven by growth in womenswear, home, concessions, and Just Jeans.

Operating gross profit surged 35.1 per cent to $886.0 million, while underlying earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) rose 10.5 per cent to $112.8 million. Underlying net profit after tax (NPAT) increased 21.7 per cent to $51.7 million, with statutory net profit after tax (NPAT) up 32.8 per cent to $40.3 million.

Myer has reported strong H1 FY26 results, with total sales rising 24.5 per cent to $2,279.5 million and NPAT up 21.7 per cent to $51.7 million.
Growth was supported by Apparel Brands integration and strategic investments.
Loyalty members reached 5.1 million.
Early H2 FY26 sales rose 1.7 per cent, though the company remains cautious amid macroeconomic pressures and weak discretionary demand.

The company maintained strong financial discipline, with cost of doing business at 27.9 per cent of total sales, within its FY26 target of around 29 per cent. Myer also reported a robust net cash position of $287 million, reflecting strong cash conversion and balance sheet flexibility, Myer said in a press release.

Myer’s ongoing transformation strategy continued to gain traction during the period, particularly through its customer engagement and brand expansion initiatives. The relaunched Myer one loyalty programme reached a record 5.1 million active members, supported by enhanced personalisation driven by AI-led data modelling.

The company also strengthened its product portfolio, introducing new exclusive brands and securing partnerships with global names such as Fenty Beauty, La Mer, Gap, and Topshop.

“Our H1 result reflects momentum across our business as we continue to implement the Myer Group Growth Strategy. Sales growth was achieved both in store and online, and our disciplined cost management allowed us to make targeted investments including in e-commerce, marketing, product, merchandise and supply chain to deliver on our plan,” said Olivia Wirth, executive chair at Myer.

“We achieved our biggest Black Friday on record for Myer Retail, and total sales for the group through the important trading months of December and January were in line with last year—a good outcome that demonstrates the resilience of the business,” added Wirth.

The integration of Myer Apparel Brands progressed steadily, with the company targeting at least $30 million in annualised synergies, alongside an additional $10 million from integrating sass & bide, Marcs, and David Lawrence.

Operationally, Myer continued to optimise its store network, closing 22 stores and opening 12 during the period, while advancing its omni-channel capabilities. The company is set to launch an expanded Myer Marketplace platform in May 2026.

Supply chain efficiency also improved, with 32 per cent of online orders fulfilled through third-party logistics and distribution centres, compared to 13 per cent a year earlier.

In the first seven weeks of the second half (H2), total sales grew 1.7 per cent YoY, with Myer Retail sales up 2.2 per cent, driven by strong performance in home and kids categories.

Despite the positive momentum, the company remains cautious amid macroeconomic uncertainty and pressure on discretionary spending.

“Given the current volatility in the wider macroeconomic environment and the ongoing pressures on discretionary spending, we are more focused than ever on delivering value for our customers,” added Wirth.

Fibre2Fashion News Desk (SG)



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Export demand lifts North India cotton yarn; local demand slow

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WTO launches 3rd phase of Enhanced Integrated Framework

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WTO launches 3rd phase of Enhanced Integrated Framework



World Trade Organisation (WTO) director general Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala called for strong partnerships to meet the objectives of the third phase of the Enhanced Integrated Framework (EIF) launched yesterday.

EIF is a mechanism aimed at leveraging and coordinating support for trade and investment priorities in least-developed countries (LDCs).

WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala called for stronger partnerships to achieve the objectives of the Enhanced Integrated Framework’s (EIF) third phase, launched yesterday in Yaounde.
It aims to coordinate support for trade and investment priorities in LDCs.
The latest six-year phase has also secured fresh contribution pledges from Germany, Liechtenstein, Norway, Switzerland and the UK.

The new phase was launched at a side event to the 14th WTO Ministerial Conference (MC14) in Yaounde, Cameroon, co-organised by Cambodia, the United Arab Emirates and the EIF executive secretariat.

The third phase of the EIF introduces a shift from stand-alone projects to multi-year country programming. It is designed to help LDCs better integrate into the global trading system while addressing structural vulnerabilities and seizing new opportunities in areas such as digital trade, services, green value chains and regional integration.

The latest six-year phase also received new contribution pledges from Germany ($1.964 million), Liechtenstein (~$63,139), Norway ($4.15 million), Switzerland ($3.16 million) and the United Kingdom ($6.67 million).

“This third phase of the EIF comes at a defining moment for the LDCs and recently graduated countries. Familiar structural vulnerabilities are being compounded by a disrupted global trading system, power politics, debt pressures, climate change, and global economic uncertainty. At the same time, the current global context offers some important opportunities for LDCs to use trade to drive growth, development, and job creation,” Okonjo-Iweala said in a release issued by the WTO.

The DG also emphasised the need to scale up support and partnerships to match the ambition of the new phase.

Fibre2Fashion News Desk (DS)



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