Obituaries
News
Remembering Val Kilmer: film star, artist, collector and subverter of the male archetype
The ‘Top Gun’ and ‘Heat’ star was a fixture on the Los Angeles contemporary art scene—and made his own art exploring themes such as his rich heritage
Remembering Jack Vettriano, an immensely popular artist whose market success reflected 'an appetite for the glamorous'
The sale of “The Singing Butler” at Sotheby’s in 2004, for a record price for a painting by a Scottish artist, caused a sensation and turned attention on Vettriano's critical and institutional neglect
Remembering Rosalind Savill, the porcelain expert who transformed the Wallace Collection
During her 19-year tenure as its director, she turned a sedate institution into a vibrant tribute to the culture of 18th-century France
Mel Bochner, conceptual artist known for text paintings and wry humour, has died, aged 84
Bochner was a pioneer of conceptual art, creating works rooted in information systems and decontextualised language
Jimmy Carter, the US president and Renaissance man who believed in art and rock and roll, has died, aged 100
The Southern Baptist peanut farmer from Plains, Georgia, was a dedicated amateur portraitist and made a deep cultural impact when in office
Art and artists
Obituaries of painters, sculptors and digital artists
Mel Bochner, conceptual artist known for text paintings and wry humour, has died, aged 84
Bochner was a pioneer of conceptual art, creating works rooted in information systems and decontextualised language
Remembering Val Kilmer: film star, artist, collector and subverter of the male archetype
The ‘Top Gun’ and ‘Heat’ star was a fixture on the Los Angeles contemporary art scene—and made his own art exploring themes such as his rich heritage
Remembering Jack Vettriano, an immensely popular artist whose market success reflected 'an appetite for the glamorous'
The sale of “The Singing Butler” at Sotheby’s in 2004, for a record price for a painting by a Scottish artist, caused a sensation and turned attention on Vettriano's critical and institutional neglect
Lorraine O’Grady, conceptual artist who dissected language and dualities, has died, aged 90
O’Grady, who devoted herself to art in her early forties, spent the ensuing decades making incisive works that spanned photography, collage, performance and more
Remembering Jean-Claude Saintilus, Haitian artist and member of the Atis Rezistans collective, who has died, aged 64
Artist of memorials to family memory and sprits exhibited at the 2011 Venice Biennale, the Fowler Museum in Los Angeles, Documenta Fifteen (2022) and the Ghetto Biennale, in Port au Prince
Art market
Leading New York gallerist Barbara Gladstone has died, aged 89
The dealer, who died in Paris “after a brief illness”, represented many of the most ambitious contemporary artists of the past half-century
François Duret-Robert, art market journalist, professor and collector, has died aged 92
The former editor of Connaissance des Arts was a leading figure in the French art market
Remembering Virginia Dwan: champion of land artists and the US's first bicoastal gallerist
Hugely influential art dealer whose galleries in Los Angeles and New York launched Minimalism and Land Art in the US
Remembering Michel Strauss, Impressionist supremo at Sotheby’s over four decades
Expert from a French collecting dynasty saw first-hand the fast-changing art world of the 1960s and helped British Rail create its renowned collection
Peregrine Pollen, who revitalised auction industry and laid the ground for the booming art market of the 21st century, has died, age 89
One of the most dynamic figures in the international expansion of Sotheby's in the 1960s and 1970s, descended from generations of collectors and men of action
Museums
Remembering Rosalind Savill, the porcelain expert who transformed the Wallace Collection
During her 19-year tenure as its director, she turned a sedate institution into a vibrant tribute to the culture of 18th-century France
Remembering Elizabeth Esteve-Coll, groundbreaking director of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London
Charismatic leader who steered the museum through a difficult period in the 1980s, and later became a university vice-chancellor
An infinite conversation: Hans Ulrich Obrist's personal memoir of Kasper König, curator, publisher, teacher, museum director, and friend to artists
The artistic director of Serpentine, recalls 35 years of friendship and collaboration with the cultural impresario who was one of the most important curators of the second half of the 20th century
Influential French curator Vincent Honoré, who put on shows at Tate Modern and Palais de Tokyo, has died
Art world figures including Nicolas Bourriaud pay tribute
Alan Bowness, museum director who established the Turner Prize and Tate Liverpool, has died aged 93
Scholar with an international outlook who was director of the Henry Moore Foundation and executor of his mother-in-law, Barbara Hepworth
Philanthropy
Remembering Jacob Rothschild, banker, collector, philanthropist, and a towering figure in the British art world
A scion of the famous banking dynasty, he led the National Gallery, the Heritage Lottery Fund and Waddesdon Manor
Remembering Myriam Ullens, art collector, and philanthropist, who launched the first contemporary art museum in China
Belgian entrepreneur in fashion, food and art, co-founded the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, in Beijing, with her husband, Guy Ullens
John Sainsbury, former supermarket boss and major patron of British museums, has died aged 94
Benefactors of his gifts include London's National Gallery, Tate Britain, Dulwich Picture Gallery, the British Museum, the Ashmolean Museum and the Royal Opera House
Evelyn de Rothschild—banker, collector, art patron and philanthropist—has died, aged 91
He inherited his family's Ascott House collection of English furniture, Chinese porcelain, British paintings and Old Masters, and built a new collection of Modern and contemporary works with his third wife, Lynn Forester
Tribute to Marella Agnelli—doyenne of high society
The art collector and museum founder who married into the Agnelli dynasty was a woman of charm and intelligence
Politics and society
Obituaries of politicians, heads of state and social leaders connected to art and the art world
Jimmy Carter, the US president and Renaissance man who believed in art and rock and roll, has died, aged 100
The Southern Baptist peanut farmer from Plains, Georgia, was a dedicated amateur portraitist and made a deep cultural impact when in office
Remembering Henry Kissinger, master of art politics, whose Cold War diplomacy still had resonance in 2023
Kissinger, one of the most photographed men of his time, with an instantly recognisable pair of spectacles, was a powerful graphic gift to artists including Philip Guston
Remembering Queen Elizabeth II, the British sovereign who perfected the fine art of monarchy
Over seven decades, the monarch used ceremonial, media and heritage to project soft power around the globe
Pope Benedict XVI, for eight years proprietor in trust of the Vatican's library and art collection, has died aged 95
The German-born conservative pontiff, a noted theological scholar, tried to accommodate contemporary art but became a subject of satire
Harry Belafonte, singer, actor and civil rights champion inspired by artists' involvement in social causes, has died, aged 96
Belafonte cited Pablo Picasso and his artist friend Charles White among the visual and performing artists whose support of social justice movements inspired his activism
Art criticism
Remembering Peter Schjeldahl: indispensable critic, poet, and lyrical observer of the embodied experience of art
His direct and personal style made him a well-respected chronicler of the US art scene for over 50 years
Considering Greg Tate’s transformative impact on cultural criticism
The writer, musician and professor, who died earlier this month, wrote some of the most influential and creative art criticism of the past half-century
Dave Hickey, influential critic who saw art as inseparable from everyday life, has died aged 82
He prized accessible writing and paired discussions of sports and food with his artistic analyses in widely read books like ‘The Invisible Dragon’ and ‘Air Guitar’
Art history and scholarship
Remembering David Anfam, curator, writer and Abstract Expressionism connoisseur
The artist Erin Lawlor recalls her time spent with the art historian, who wrote defining texts on artists such as Mark Rothko and offered critical support for the next generation
Remembering Kavita Singh, acclaimed historian of Indian art and museology, who has died, aged 58
An expert on Mughal, Rajput and Deccan painting traditions, she was unafraid to address rising nationalism in state-led cultural institutions
Remembering Richard Verdi, art historian and long-time director of the Barber Institute, who has died, aged 81
An inspirational teacher, charismatic museum director, Poussin scholar and curator, he was working to the end
John Harris—an architectural historian and eagle-eyed connoisseur—has died, aged 90
A scholar of Inigo Jones and William Chambers, Harris mounted landmark exhibitions based on the RIBA drawings collection that he so radically transformed
'Unafraid of upsetting the applecart': leading Rembrandt scholar Ernst van de Wetering has died, aged 83
The Dutch art historian, who worked on the Rembrandt Research Project for 47 years, made radical changes to the study of the Old Master painter
Architecture
Remembering Joseph Rykwert, influential writer and teacher on the theory of architecture
Warsaw-born RIBA gold medal winner, who became the professor of architecture at the University of Pennsylvania, changed architectural understanding
Remembering Richard Rogers, Centre Pompidou architect who waded into the culture wars with his unique, hi-tech style
Anglo-Italian architect was responsible for numerous landmark buildings around the world including the Lloyd's insurance building in London
Rafael Viñoly—museum 'starchitect' who believed in experience over aesthetics—has died, aged 78
Uruguayan-born architect had an acute understanding of the visual arts and produced prize-winning buildings
Remembering Balkrishna Doshi, artist, teacher and father of modernist Indian architecture, who has died, aged 95
Innovative architect was at heart of rebuilding independent India, a protégé of Le Corbusier and Louis Kahn, and winner of the Pritzker Prize and the RIBA Royal Gold Medal
Remembering Owen Luder, architect whose gifts ran far wider than the Brutalist landmarks he is known for
Two of his most famous buildings, the Tricorn Centre in Portsmouth and the Trinity Car Park and Shopping Centre in Gateshead, were demolished earlier this century
Collecting
Hamburg art collector and patron Harald Falckenberg dies aged 80
Falckenberg, one of Germany’s most important private art collectors, once said he was drawn to “outsiders and freaks"
Remembering Barry Humphries, art lover, artist and creator of Dame Edna Everage, who has died, aged 89
Australian comedian and actor was a passionate champion of museums, libraries and the visual arts, and a collector of late 19th-century artists and authors
Emily Fisher Landau, contemporary art collector and important Whitney Museum benefactor, has died, aged 102
Landau, whose discerning eye and aesthetic curiosity made her a fixture in the art world from the 1980s onward, began collecting after receiving an insurance settlement for a jewellery heist at her home
Remembering Jayne Wrightsman
A reminiscence of the New York socialite, arts patron and philanthropist by Keith Christiansen, the chairman of the Met's European Paintings Department
Eli Broad, an unexpected—and often unreasonable—arts patron
The self-made billionaire helped shape the Los Angeles art scene, while clashing with most of its prominent museum leaders
Heritage
Richard M. Barancik, the last living Monuments Man, has died, aged 98
He was part of a group that saved thousands of artworks during the Second World War from destruction and seizure by the Nazis
Remembering Desideria Pasolini Dall'Onda, who battled to protect Italy's ecology and cultural heritage
Writer, translator of Virginia Woolf, and historian of gardening and farming she became a champion of conservation by co-founding Italia Nostra
French general in charge of Notre Dame rebuild dies in a hiking accident
The death of Jean-Louis Georgelin might hamper efforts to reopen the cathedral by the end of 2024
Remembering Gianluigi Colalucci, who oversaw the 14-year restoration of Michelangelo's frescoes in the Sistine Chapel
The restorer expertly honoured the "oneness of a work of art" and always balanced its historical and aesthetic qualities
Obituary: Nathalie Brooke, a leading figure in the preservation of Venice
A remarkable cultural ambassador in London's art, political, and musical scene and on return visits to her native Russia. One of the founders of Venice in Peril
Fashion and design
Remembering Vivienne Westwood, godmother of punk and designer to the art tribe, who has died aged 81
The outspoken and original couturier referenced historical costume along with portraiture and campaigned for free access to museums
Issey Miyake, ground-breaking Japanese fashion designer and favourite of museum costume institutes, has died, aged 84
After surviving the atomic bombing of Hiroshima as a child, Miyake turned to clothes as a modern, optimistic form of creativity, and revived the use of pleats to create wearable, free-flowing, unisex clothes
Remembering Kenzo Takada, the designer and artist who created the first global, multicultural, fashion brand
In everything he made—clothes, spectacles inspired by his trademark round lenses, home furnishings, parfumerie—Takada's love of fine art remained close at hand
Remembering Terence Conran: a design maestro who rose alongside groovy London in the Swinging Sixties
From Habitat to the Design Museum, from the Soup Kitchen to Quaglino’s, he transformed Britain’s cultural landscape
Photography
Paul Lowe, conflict photographer and teacher lauded for Sarajevo siege photographs, dies, aged 60
Acclaimed photojournalist's teenage son charged with his murder on a popular hiking trail near Los Angeles
'The Charlie Chaplin of street photography': Elliott Erwitt remembered by those who knew him best
Martin Parr and Magnum colleagues remember the renowned American street photographer, who has died at age 95
Brian Griffin, photographer of rock stars and construction workers, has died aged 75
Best known for his album covers for bands including Depeche Mode, the UK photographer was influenced by the heavy industry of the Black Country where he grew up
Kwame Brathwaite, photographer who encapsulated ‘Black is beautiful’ movement, has died, aged 85
The New York photographer pioneered lighting and developing techniques that helped transformed how Black figures were photographed and seen
Remembering Peter Beard, photographer and artist, champion of East African wildlife, friend and collaborator of Francis Bacon and Andy Warhol
Photographer, diarist, and collagist who highlighted the destruction of the African elephant's habitat and bestrode New York society in the era of Studio 54
Theatre and film
Peter Brook, a giant of international theatre whose stage work moved in sympathy with the visual arts, has died, aged 97
Brook's influential "white-cube" 1970 production of A Midsummer Night's Dream and his epic 1985 realisation of the Sanskrit epic The Mahābhārata find echoes in art history
'A meteor blazing through the world': tributes pour in for the influential film producer Jess Search
The co-founder of The Doc Society and the architect behind numerous films by visual artists was diagnosed with a brain tumour in July
Kenneth Anger, creator of visionary and transgressive films, has died, aged 96
The film-maker and moving image artist was best known for his boundary-pushing (and, according to some, blasphemous) 1963 film “Scorpio Rising”
Literature
Remembering Paul Auster, the ground-breaking novelist who fused art and literature
The New Yorker's collaboration with the artist Sophie Calle was just one way in which art was interlaced with his life and work
Remembering Raymond Briggs: pioneering illustrator and creator of beloved book The Snowman
Briggs used his charming, low-tech visual style to devastating emotional effect in his adult, anti-war books as much as in his beloved children's tales and their film adaptations
‘As if he has just left the room’: a farewell tour of the studio of Raymond Briggs, creator of The Snowman
The Sussex house-cum-studio where the graphic novelist worked for six decades proves to be as colourful, characterful, and packed with verve as his classic visual narratives
