Artnet editorial staff slashed after Artsy consolidation

At least six members of Artnet’s dwindling newsroom were laid off Thursday, a day after the corporate owners of Artnet and Artsy said both companies had been brought under the same leadership. Beowolff Capital purchased Artnet for $65 million last year.

Multiple sources who spoke with Urgent Matter said the layoffs included Berlin-based senior editor Kate Brown, senior market editor Eileen Kinsella, China director of content Cathy Fan, senior writer Sarah Cascone, London correspondent Vivienne Chow and William Van Meter, the editorial director of Artnet Studio.

In total, dozens of layoffs have been reported across divisions at the two companies.

Separately, Naomi Rea is also said to be out as editor-in-chief, a role that was long held by Andrew Goldstein—who left the role in September 2023. His replacement, Sarah P. Hanson, left just weeks after assuming the title, prompting Rea's promotion to top editor. Rea’s departure was said to be unrelated to the layoffs.

Andrew Russeth will now step up to serve as interim editor, according to ARTnews. He currently serves as the editor of Artnet News Pro, the paywalled section of the site.

Before the layoffs, Artnet’s website listed 17 editorial staff members, making the six reductions a 35% decrease in the publication’s workforce. The layoffs leave only two reporters still at Artnet—senior reporter Katya Kazakina and European news reporter Jo Lawson-Tancred—and national art critic Ben Davis.

Everyone else remaining has an editor-level title. They are news editor Margaret Carrigan, culture editor Min Chen, managing editor Caroline Goldstein, galleries editor Annikka Olsen, editor Katie White, executive producer Sonia Manalili, and Russeth.

This marks the third recent layoff amid ongoing financial woes at Artnet and its news division, which was founded in 2012. In 2024, at least three members of the editorial staff were laid off: reporter Taylor Dafoe and editors Lee Carter and Guelda Voien.

Adam Schrader, the author of this article and founder of Urgent Matter, was laid off in 2025.

Brian Boucher, who had contributed to Artnet’s coverage as a long-term freelancer, left in November for a senior market writer position at ARTnews. Wet Paint columnist Annie Armstrong left her role in December. In February, Artnet posted a job opening on LinkedIn seeking to replace Armstrong.

And the Observer reported that Beowolff Capital appeared to be moving toward consolidating Artnet and Artsy into a single platform, though they remain separate entities. Beowolff Capital founder Andrew Wolff told the Observer that the company would also lean into artificial intelligence.

In his remarks, Wolff reportedly detailed an A.I. agent that could scrape a gallery’s documents in PDF format and structure the data to upload directly to its online marketplaces. It was not immediately clear whether this may include PDFs of press releases and how the company intends to use A.I. to automate news coverage.

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