multimedia artist raymond saunders dies at 90

Raymond Saunders, a multimedia artist known for his enigmatic, sociopolitical paintings and assemblage style, has died at age 90. His passing was announced jointly by his representing galleries—Casemore, Andrew Kreps, and David Zwirner—on Instagram. Saunders's work often explored the Black American experience through extensive use of black paint and complex narratives, as articulated in his influential 1967 essay "Black Is a Color." His first career-spanning retrospective, "Flowers from a Black Garden," recently closed at the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh, his hometown. Saunders had a long teaching career in the Bay Area and received numerous honors, including a Rome Prize Fellowship and a Guggenheim Fellowship.

Mary Lovelace O’Neal, Painter Who Defied the Bounds of Abstraction, Dies at 84

Mary Lovelace O’Neal, the American painter known for her large-scale abstract works that defied easy categorization, died in Mérida, Mexico, on May 10 at age 84. Her death was confirmed by her galleries, Jenkins Johnson and Marianne Boesky, on May 13. Active in the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, O’Neal developed a distinctive practice that blended Minimalism, Abstract Expressionism, and figurative elements, most notably through her Lampblack series and later the "Whales Fucking" series. Her work gained renewed attention in the 21st century, with exhibitions at Mnuchin Gallery and the Museum of the African Diaspora, and her painting *Blue Whale a.k.a. #12* (1983) was selected for the 2024 Whitney Biennial.

melvin edwards sculptor dead

Melvin Edwards, the pioneering sculptor known for his powerful steel assemblages and "Lynch Fragments" series, has died at the age of 88 in Baltimore. Edwards was a trailblazer who reframed Minimalism by infusing it with political and cultural weight, becoming the first Black sculptor to have a solo exhibition at the Whitney Museum in 1970. His work utilized industrial materials like chains and barbed wire to address histories of enslavement, anti-Black violence, and global conflict while maintaining a sophisticated abstract language.

thaddeus mosley sculptor dead

Thaddeus Mosley, the acclaimed American sculptor known for his monumental wood abstractions, has died at the age of 99 in Pittsburgh. Throughout a career spanning seven decades, Mosley transformed salvaged walnut, sycamore, and cherry wood into curvaceous, gravity-defying forms that balanced immense weight with a sense of lightness. Though he was a long-standing pillar of the Pittsburgh creative community, he achieved widespread national recognition and major museum representation only in his 90s.

mel leipzig painter dead

Mel Leipzig, a painter known for his intensely detailed, realistic portraits of everyday people and places, died on November 1 at age 90. Over a career spanning more than five decades, the Brooklyn-born artist taught at Mercer County Community College from 1968 to 2013, founded the Trenton Artist Workshop Association (TAWA) in 1979, and never painted from photographs, instead practicing what he called 'designing with reality.' His work is held by major institutions including the Whitney Museum, the National Academy Museum, and the New Jersey State Museum.

Nicholas Pope, sculptor whose career came in two acts, 1949–2026

Nicholas Pope, a British sculptor known for his organic, post-minimalist works, has died at age 76. His career unfolded in two distinct acts: an early phase in the 1970s producing roughly-hewn wooden columns like *Oak Tree Column* (1973) and *Drooping Column* (1975), which earned him a spot in the British Pavilion at the 1980 Venice Biennale, followed by a decades-long hiatus after contracting viral encephalitis in Tanzania. He later returned to sculpture with brighter, brasher works in ceramic, glass, and felt, including *The Apostles Speaking in Tongues Lit By Their Own Lamps* (1993–96) and collaborations like *The Conundrum of the Chalices of the Seven Deadly Sins and Seven Virtues* (2015) with James Maskrey.

art calvin tompkins new yorker dies

Calvin Tomkins, the longtime New Yorker writer known for his intimate profiles of modern and contemporary artists, has died at age 100 in his home in Middletown, Rhode Island. Over more than six decades, Tomkins profiled giants of the art world including Marcel Duchamp, Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, John Cage, Georgia O'Keeffe, Kerry James Marshall, and Rashid Johnson, beginning with a 1959 assignment on Duchamp that launched his career. He continued writing sweeping profiles as recently as 2024.

Mary Lovelace O’Neal, Painter and Civil Rights Luminary, Dies at 84

Mary Lovelace O’Neal, a painter, educator, and Civil Rights activist, died on May 10 at age 84 in Mérida, Mexico. Known for her monumental canvases and inventive “lampblack” works, she moved fluidly between abstraction and figuration, using layers of black pigment to assert Blackness and presence. Her career included studies at Howard University and Columbia University, activism with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, and connections to the Black Arts Movement.

Sculptor Thaddeus Mosley dies at 99.

Sculptor Thaddeus Mosley dies at 99.

Sculptor Thaddeus Mosley, a self-taught artist renowned for his monumental abstract wood sculptures, has died at the age of 99. Working for decades in his Pittsburgh basement, Mosley used locally sourced felled trees and traditional hand tools to create dynamic, asymmetrical forms that channeled both modernist principles and African artistic traditions. His prolific career, which began in his 30s, gained significant institutional recognition only in his later decades, culminating in a major 2022 solo exhibition at the Baltimore Museum of Art.

Mary Lovelace O’Neal, Author of Uncategorizable Abstractions, Dies at 84

Mary Lovelace O’Neal, an activist, educator, and artist known for her monumental lampblack paintings that expanded the possibilities of abstraction, died on May 10 in Mérida, Mexico, at age 84. Despite a six-decade career, she was long considered an "artist's artist" before gaining international acclaim in recent years, with major exhibitions at Mnuchin Gallery, Marianne Boesky Gallery, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and inclusion in the 2024 Whitney Biennial and the 2025 group show "Paris Noir" at the Centre Pompidou.

painter mary abbott has died

Abstract Expressionist painter Mary Abbott has died at age 98 due to heart failure, as confirmed by McCormick Gallery in Chicago, which represented her for nearly 20 years. Known for her colorful canvases and sweeping brushstrokes, Abbott was praised by the New York Times in 2008 as one of the last great Abstract Expressionist painters of her generation. Despite her early modeling career on Vogue covers and her immersion in the downtown New York art scene alongside figures like Mark Rothko and Willem de Kooning, her work received little scholarly recognition until the 2016 Denver Art Museum exhibition "Women of Abstract Expressionism," which traveled to the Mint Museum and Palm Springs Art Museum.

Mary Lovelace O’Neal, Abstract Painter Who Refused to Conform, Dies at 84

Mary Lovelace O’Neal, an abstract painter known for her gestural, unruly works that defied categorization, died on Sunday in Mérida, Mexico, at age 84. Her galleries, Jenkins Johnson and Marianne Boesky, announced her passing. O’Neal produced sprawling paintings characterized by tangles of drippy strokes, often using lamp black pigment to create intensely black canvases. She rejected labels like Abstract Expressionist or Minimalist, insisting she was simply a painter. Her series "Whales Fucking" (1979) and a 2020 exhibition at Mnuchin Gallery revived her profile, leading to inclusion in the 2024 Whitney Biennial.

Remembering James Hayward, LA’s Adored Cowboy Painter

Abstract painter James Hayward, known for his monochromatic oil and wax impasto works, died last week at age 82. A legendary figure in the LA art scene, Hayward was equally celebrated for his magnetic personality, ribald humor, and storytelling. He rose to prominence in 1977 when included in the group show "Less is More" at Sidney Janis Gallery in New York, and was admired by art-world giants such as Dave Hickey, Chris Burden, Nancy Rubins, Ed Moses, and Mike Kelley. Hayward also taught at colleges across the country, including a guest seminar at the University of Southern California, and was a longtime supporter of the LA contemporary art magazine Artillery.

Raghu Rai’s masterful images of Indian life – in pictures

Raghu Rai, the celebrated Indian photographer who was recruited to Magnum Photos by Henri Cartier-Bresson in 1977, has died at the age of 83. Over five decades, he produced defining images of Indian life, ranging from intimate portraits of Mother Teresa to stark documentation of the Bhopal disaster. His work captured both the grand and the everyday, from crowds at Mumbai's Churchgate railway station to slums in Dharavi, and he published more than 18 books, receiving multiple awards for his unflinching human gaze.

Calvin Tomkins, Who Profiled Giants of Modern Art, Dies at 100

Calvin Tomkins, the longtime New Yorker staff writer renowned for his profiles of major 20th-century artists, has died at the age of 100. His career spanned more than six decades at the magazine, where he produced intimate and influential portraits of figures like Marcel Duchamp and Robert Rauschenberg, and authored several books including "Living Well Is the Best Revenge."

Remembering Frank Gehry, legendary architect of Guggenheim Museum Bilbao

Frank Gehry, the legendary architect who transformed the global architectural landscape with his deconstructivist style, has died in Santa Monica on 5 December. The article traces his career from his early days remodeling his own Santa Monica home—a controversial project that used corrugated metal, plywood, and chain-link fencing—to his rise as a Pritzker Prize winner and the creator of the iconic Guggenheim Museum Bilbao (1997). Gehry, born Ephraim Goldberg in Toronto in 1929, studied at the University of Southern California and Harvard before founding Frank O. Gehry & Associates in 1962, and spent over six decades championing buildings that embraced emotion and movement over cold minimalism.

A Tribute to Asher Remy-Toledo

Asher Remy-Toledo, a visionary gallerist, curator, and collector, has passed away after a career spanning over three decades. He founded influential initiatives including Remy Toledo Gallery in Chelsea (2004), Hyphen Hub (2013), No Longer Empty (2009), and Yuanfen Gallery in Beijing, the first new media gallery in mainland China. Remy-Toledo was a tireless champion of women artists, supporting figures such as Carolee Schneemann, Judy Chicago, Mary Beth Edelson, and Ana Mendieta, as well as emerging international artists. He also amassed significant private collections, including works by the article's author and Schneemann's Infinity Kisses series.

Raghu Rai, pioneering Indian photographer, 1942–2026

Raghu Rai, the pioneering Indian photographer and photojournalist, has died at age 84. Over his career, he produced more than 30 books covering subjects such as Tibetan exile, Mother Teresa, Indira Gandhi, and Sikhs in India. His most famous work documented the 1984 Bhopal chemical disaster, first for India Today and later for Greenpeace, resulting in the book *Exposure: A Corporate Crime* and exhibitions that toured Europe, the US, and Bangladesh. Rai began his career at The Statesman in 1966, joined India Today in 1982, and became a member of Magnum Photos in 1977 under the patronage of Henri Cartier-Bresson. He was awarded the Padma Shri in 1972 for his coverage of the 1971 India-Pakistan War and the plight of Bangladeshi refugees.

isaiah zagar artist philadelphia magic gardens died 86

Isaiah Zagar, the visionary mosaic artist behind the landmark Philadelphia’s Magic Gardens, died on February 19 at age 86 due to complications from heart failure and Parkinson’s Disease. A Pratt Institute graduate and former Peace Corps volunteer, Zagar transformed Philadelphia’s South Street neighborhood over five decades, creating more than 200 public murals and a sprawling, immersive environment of tunnels and grottos made from glass, tile, and found objects.

‘In every drop of paint he slurped, you see the Holocaust’: the genius and torments of Georg Baselitz

Georg Baselitz, the German painter and sculptor known for his provocative confrontations with Nazi history, has died. Born in 1938, he was one of the last living artists with direct childhood memories of the Third Reich. His early works, such as *Die große Nacht im Eimer* (1961) and his upside-down German eagles, deliberately shocked postwar West Germany by depicting obscene, shameful images of a society trying to forget the Holocaust. He famously exhibited a zombie Hitler woodcarving at the 1980 Venice Biennale alongside Anselm Kiefer, insisting on confronting rather than ignoring the Nazi heritage of the German Pavilion.

Remembering Asher Remy-Toledo, Media Art Luminary

Asher Remy-Toledo, a Colombian-born cultural producer and a central figure in New York's media art scene, died on February 22 at age 62 from Hodgkin's lymphoma. He was the founder and director of Hyphen Hub, an international art organization, and previously ran the influential Remy Toledo Gallery in Chelsea, which showcased feminist and post-feminist artists.

Steven Durland, Champion of Performance Art, Dies at 75

Steven Durland, a longtime editor of *High Performance* magazine and a champion of performance art, died on March 11 at age 75 after a brief illness. His life partner, Linda Frye Burnham, confirmed his death in Saxapahaw, North Carolina. Durland was born in Long Beach, California, raised in South Dakota, and trained as a ceramic artist with a BFA from the University of South Dakota and an MFA from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He became deeply involved in performance and mail art, and from 1986 to 1994 served as editor of *High Performance*, a magazine founded by Burnham that featured thousands of artists including Nancy Buchanan, Carolee Schneemann, Paul McCarthy, Suzanne Lacy, and Ulysses Jenkins. Durland also maintained his own artistic practice, creating performances such as "Win Defeat/BID FOR POWER" (1978) and "Death and Taxis" (1982), and produced the micro-newspaper *Tacit*.

Desmond Williams obituary

Architect Desmond Williams, known for designing modern Catholic churches, has died at age 93. His work, which includes four listed churches, was celebrated for its innovative integration of liturgical function, architectural ambition, and artistic collaboration, placing him among the leading figures of postwar British architecture.

Mary Lovelace O’Neal, painter and activist, 1942–2026

Mary Lovelace O’Neal, the American painter, professor, and civil rights activist, has died at age 84. Born in Jackson, Mississippi, she was a co-founder of the Non-Violent Action Group while a student at Howard University, later earning an MFA from Columbia University. Known for monumental abstract works on soot-black surfaces, she developed her signature technique through the Lampblack series (1960s–70s) and continued evolving her practice through series such as Whales Fucking (1970s–80s) and Panthers In My Father’s Palace (1980s–90s). In 1985, she became the first African American woman to receive tenure in the Department of Art Practice at the University of California, Berkeley, where she taught for nearly three decades and served as chair from 1999 until her retirement in 2006.

Adriano Goldschmied, ‘Godfather’ of Modern Denim, Dies at 82

Adriano Goldschmied, the visionary designer and entrepreneur widely regarded as the 'Godfather of Denim,' has died at the age of 82. Over a prolific career spanning several decades, Goldschmied revolutionized the fashion industry by launching more than 50 brands, including Diesel, Replay, and the premium label AG Jeans, as well as revitalizing lines like Gap 1969.