Last November, the Met agreed to give back the artifacts after an internal museum investigation determined it had no right to the antiquities — mostly non-museum quality pieces, ranging from small fragments to a tiny bronze dog — in the first place. On Tuesday, the museum said it had shipped the objects to Egypt.

The East Harlem museum announced on Tuesday that Margarita Aguilar would be its next director. Aguilar, who was born in Cuba, takes the place of Julian Zugazagoitia, who left the museum last September.

Most kids can't stand the thought of summer school. But what if your teachers are James Franco, Gus Van Sant and Ryan Trecartin? All three are scheduled to lecture on making art, films, and the written word at MoMA PS 1's free Summer School next month.

On September 1, ticket prices for adults will go from $20 to $25. The cost of senior tickets will be raised from $16 to $18 and student tickets will go from $12 to $14. The increase marks the first time since 2004 the museum has raised its prices.

The late British fashion designer Alexander McQueen, who committed suicide in 2010, left £50,000, or $81,500 in his will for the continual care of his three dogs Minter, Juice, and Callum.

The museum announced on Wednesday that it would keep its "Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty" exhibition open until midnight on Aug. 6 and 7, the last two days the show will be open. The late-night hours mark the first time in the museum's history that it has had its doors open until midnight.

On Tuesday, the New Jersey State Council on the Arts doled out $15.8 million in Fiscal Year 2011-12 funding to arts groups. The three groups that got the most funding are all based in Newark.

The report, "Arts and the GDP: Value Added by Selected Cultural Industries," drew on data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis and looked at the performing arts, museum, sports, motion picture, sound recording and publishing industries.

The Metropolitan Museum announced on Thursday that it had broken records: 5.68 million people visited its Fifth Ave. location, its Cloisters museum and its gardens in the past fiscal year. The number marked the most visitors the Met has had in 40 years.

The board's Seaport/Civic Center Committee resolution came after City Councilmember Michael Nelson, who runs the council's Waterfront Committee, expressed interest in a hearing to save the museum.

Queens college recently announced it would take ownership of an online Islamic art online museum, thanks to donations from the London-based shopping mall magnate Nasser Khalili and the Shelley & Donald Rubin Foundation.

If there's one thing I've learned since completing my 21-day detox program a week ago, it's that one's mind can become as bloated and overweight and sluggish as one's body.  And so I took my mind (and the body it's attached to) to the Metropolitan Museum of Art this morning.

At a press conference on Thursday, Mayor Bloomberg and Seth Pinsky, the president of the New York City Economic Development Corporation, said that the South Street Seaport Museum should work on getting private sector, as well as public sector, funding to keep its museum afloat.

Ai's Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads will be taken down from the fountain in front of the Plaza Hotel on Friday, according to the artist's gallery because it's the end of the exhibit's run in the city. The New York stop was part of a world tour for the Zodiac Heads, which will be installed in Los Angeles next month.

Governor Christie's budget stipulates that three arts organizations — the Old Barracks, the Battleship New Jersey and the Newark Museum — will have to apply for grants from the State Arts Council and the New Jersey Historical commission.

This week, insect lovers can learn to live like wasps at the American Museum of Natural History. A nearly 15-foot tall replica of a yellow jacket nest is being constructed of cardboard, wood and aluminum on the museum's Arthur Ross Terrace. It will be completed by Friday.

The Dedalus Foundation is suing the New York City art dealer Julian Weissman for selling a forgery of the Robert Motherwell work 'Spanish Elegy.'

Cy Twombly, the artist and painter whose sketchy, scribbly style innovated and challenged the art world has died at age 83 in Rome.

An exhibit at the LMAKprojects gallery by Brooklyn-based artist Kenseth Armstead turns the story of a slave-turned-spy who lived during the American Revolution into a graphic novel. 

An exhibition of 227 black-and-white documentary photos taken by the controversial Chinese artist Ai Weiwei in New York from 1983 to 1993 opened at the Asia Society on Wednesday. The show marks the first such exhibit presented outside China. Click here to see a slideshow.