John Sainsbury, the chairman of the Sainsbury’s supermarket chain and a philanthropist whose patronage transformed London’s museums, died in January at 94.

Craig Ruddy, an Australian artist known for his portraits of Aboriginal people, died at 53 on January 5 from complications related to Covid-19.

American art historian and preeminent Diego Velázquez scholar Jonathan Brown died in January at 82.

Hossein Valamanesh, an Iranian-born, Australia-based artist whose poetic works commented on the struggles of immigrants, died in January at 72.

Kohei Yoshiyuki, whose snapshots of Tokyo’s hedonistic after-hours culture emblematized a certain sensibility in postwar Japan, died on January 22 at 76.

Grenville Davey, whose minimalistic sculptures made him the surprise winner of the 1992 Turner Prize, died on February 28 at 60.

Lourdes Castro, a prominent Portuguese artist known for her semi-abstractions making use of silhouettes, died on January 8 at age 91.

Stephane Ackermann, an art historian who curated widely and led a number of arts organizations, died on January 18. He was 53.

The pioneering, larger-than-life fashion designer Thierry Mugler died on January 23 at the age of 73.

The pioneering Austrian light artist Brigitte Kowanz, who repped her homeland with Erwin Wurm at the 2017 Venice Biennale, died on January 28 at 64.

John Wesley, a painter whose bizarre, beguiling figurations were shot through with eros and anxiety, died in February at 93.

Art collector and philanthropist Jerome “Jerry” Chazen, whose last name adorns the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s art museum, died on February 6 at 94.

Peter Earnest, a longtime CIA officer who served as the founding director of the International Spy Museum in Washington, D.C., died in February at 88.

Brenda Richardson, who as deputy director and chief curator of the Baltimore Museum of Art made that institution a destination for modern and contemporary art, died in February at 79.

The Argentinian painter, sculptor, and illustrator Antonio Seguí, who won renown for his wry depictions of busy-looking men in hats, died on February 26 at 88.

Dan Graham, an artist whose sculptures, performances, and conceptual pieces played on viewers’ perception of themselves, the people around them, and their environments, died on February 19 at 79.

Julie Saul, a New York art dealer and curator who championed avant-garde photography, died in February at 67.

Mona Saudi, a Jordanian artist whose modern sandstone sculptures were seen worldwide, died on February 16 at 76.

De Wain Valentine, a sculptor affiliated with the Light and Space movement who is commonly considered to be among the first to enlist plastic as an artistic material, died on February 20.

Charles Csuri, whose experiments with computers during the 1960s made him an essential figure in the history of digital art, died on February 27 at 99.

Kim Byung-Ki, a first-generation abstract artist in South Korea and a leading art theorist, died on March 1 at 105.

Actor and dealer Conrad Janis (at right), with Robin Williams and Pam Dawber. Janis died on March 1 at 94.

Hiram Maristany, the official photographer for the Young Lords, a storied Puerto Rican activist group that was active in the United States in the 1960s and ’70s, died on March 10 at 76.

Daniel Weinberg, a dealer who ran an influential gallery with spaces in Los Angeles and San Francisco, died in March at 88.

Shirley Hughes, the veteran illustrator and author behind more than 200 children’s books, including the 1977 classic Dogger, died in March at 94. 

Toby Devan Lewis (at right), a collector and philanthropist who donated millions of dollars to New York’s New Museum, died on April 29 at 87.

Hudson and Janet Cooling, ca. 1970s. Cooling, who imagined a style of figurative painting built on lesbian and feminist symbologies, died on February 25 at 70.

Budiardjo “Budi” Tek, a collector who founded two private art museums in Asia while helping to create space for contemporary Asian art on the global stage, died on March 18 at 65.

Photojournalist Dirck Halstead, who captured the first American combat troops entering Vietnam in 1965, among other seminal moments in U.S. history, died on March 25 at 85.

Andrea Éva Győri, a Hungarian-born artist whose works about sensuality and strength brought her presentations at some of the European art world’s top institutions, died on March 19 at 37.

Delfina Entrecanales, a London-based philanthropist who backed the Young British Artists before they drew acclaim, died on April 1 at 94.

Jean Tatge and Ashton Hawkins (at right). Hawkins, a pioneer in the field of art law who helped guide the Metropolitan Museum of Art as executive vice president and counsel to its trustees, died in March at 84.

Musician and sound artist Mira Calix, whose work ranged from DJ sets to a piece for a commuter bus in Nanjing, China, died on March 25 at 51.

Nancy Lane, a collector and patron who was the Studio Museum in Harlem’s longest-serving trustee, died in March at 88.

Doris Derby, the activist and photographer who captured countless indelible images, from candid portraits of Civil Rights leaders to scenes of everyday life in African American communities, died on March 28 at 82.

Patrick Demarchelier, the fashion photographer and personal portraitist for Princess Diana, died on March 31 at 78.

The pioneering, prolific architect Gyo Obata died on March 9 at the age of 99.

Noni Olabisi, a Los Angeles artist whose incisive, unflinching murals tackle Black history and social issues, died in March at 67.

Leo Bersani, the deeply influential and sometimes controversial literary critic and queer theorist, died on February 20 at 90. 

Maya Widmaier-Picasso, the only child of Pablo Picasso and his lover Marie-Thérèse Walter, died on December 20 at 87.

Donald Baechler, a New York artist whose painted collages received significant attention starting in the 1980s, died in April at 65.

Photographer Jerry Uelsmann, who created eye-catching, surreal, and trailblazing photomontages in the United States beginning in the 1960s, died in April at 87. Pictured: Untitled, from 1976.

Hermann Nitsch, a pioneer of Austrian Actionism with a flair for the macabre, has died on April 18 at 83.

Margo Feiden, the colorful art dealer of caricaturist Al Hirschfeld, died in April at 77.

Ron Galella, the controversial and seemingly inexhaustible photographer, died on April 30 at 91.

Suzi Gablik, an art critic and artist whose polarizing work dealt with the end of modernism and the growth of a newer, more spiritual style, died in May at 87.

Knox Martin, the New York School artist who made vividly colored, boldly painted canvases that pushed art in new directions during the postwar era, died on May 15 at 99. Pictured: Installation view of “Knox Martin: Radical Structures” at Hollis Taggart in New York in 2019.

Samella Lewis, an artist, curator, and historian whose writings shaped African American art history, died in May at 98.

Claude Rutault, a French artist whose paintings were made according to rigorous sets of rules, died in May at 80.

Jacques Villeglé, an artist whose work made use of torn posters spotted on the street, died in June at 96.

Billionaire money manager, collector, and philanthropist Fayez Sarofim died in May at 93.

Sophie Lauwers, the director-general of the Bozar Centre for Fine Arts in Brussels, died on May 29 at 55.

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Heidi Göess-Horten, an Austrian department store heiress who this year opened a long-awaited private museum in Vienna, died on June 12 at 81.

Tarek Al-Ghoussein, a widely praised Kuwaiti-born photographer whose work dealt with displacement in the Middle East, died in June at 60.

Paula Rego, a feminist artist whose totemic chronicles of womanhood tackled many societal taboos, died on June 8 at 87.

Children’s book illustrator Ronni Solbert, who frequently collaborated with her husband, the writer Jean Merrill, on books, including the 1964 hit The Pushcart War, died on June 9 at 96.

Duncan Hannah, an American painter known for his depictions of idyllic landscapes and portraits inspired by adventure stories and classic films, died on June 11 at 70.

Hunter Reynolds, an artist and activist whose work influenced generations and poignantly reflected on the immense loss wrought by the AIDS crisis, died on June 12 at 62.

Arnold Skolnick, the artist who designed the original Woodstock poster, died on June 15. 

Michel David-Weill, whose gifts of money and art helped transform the Louvre and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, died in June at 89.

Sam Gilliam, an influential painter whose canvases proposed new possibilities for abstraction, inspiring legions of artists, died on June 25 at 88.

Artist Margaret Keane, whose huge-eyed paintings of cartoonish children delighted the public and enraged more than a few critics, died on June 26 at 94.

Storied tattooist Spider Webb, who fought laws that restricted his medium while pushing it into the realm of high art, died on July 2 at 78.

Manga artist Kazuki Takahashi, who created the wildly popular Yu-Gi-Oh! manga series, which began as a comic and became a trading-card game, films, video games, and more, died on July 4 at 60.

Donald Jonas, a collector and philanthropist who, with his wife Barbara, assembled a collection of prized Abstract Expressionist works that they sold to donate to charities, died in July at 92.

Tan Boon Hui, a veteran museum leader who served as director of the Asia Society Museum in New York and the Singapore Art Museum, died on July 7 at 53.

Philanthropist and collector Lily Safra, who built a formidable art collection, died on July 9 at 87.

Claes Oldenburg, whose oversize sculptures of everyday objects made him one of the leading artists of the Pop art movement, died on July 18 at 93.

Brazilian art collector and museum benefactor Gilberto Chateaubriand died on July 14 at 97.

Doreen Adengo, an acclaimed architect who founded Adengo Architecture in Kampala, Uganda, died on July 22 at 45.

Herbert W. Franke, a pioneering digital artist, scientist, and writer of both nonfiction and science fiction, died in July at 95.

Fulya Erdemci, a leading curator of the Turkish art scene whose exhibitions had captured the minds of many, both within the country and outside it, died in July.

Jennifer Bartlett, whose experiments with subjecting painting to predetermined rule systems had earned her a loyal following, died on July 25 at 81.

The English-born Irish artist and illustrator Pauline Bewick, who created lively, fantasy-infused landscapes and portraits of people and animals, died on July 28 at 86.

Mary Obering, a painter whose geometric abstractions brought her a cult following, died on July 29 at 85.

Takahiko Iimura, an artist and filmmaker whose early experiments with video during the 1970s made him one of the first to use the medium to artistic ends, died on July 31 at 85.

Carole Caroompas, an influential Los Angeles artist, performer, and teacher, died on July 31 at 76.

The free-thinking Belgian architect Lucien Kroll died on August 1 at 95.

Perry Rubenstein, a dealer with deep social connections in New York and Los Angeles whose career was brought to a halt by a grand theft conviction, died in July.

Nelson Stevens, an AfriCOBRA member known for creating inventively constructed, brilliantly hued portraits, died on July 22 at 84. Pictured: Towards Identity, 1970.

Lourdes Grobet, the multifaceted Mexican artist who immortalized lucha libre legends with her camera lens, died in July at 81. Pictured: La Bruja, La Briosa, 1980.

Issey Miyake, a Japanese fashion designer whose avant-garde clothes and exhibitions garnered significant attention within the international art world, died on August 5 at 84.

Raymond Briggs, the illustrator and author of much-beloved children’s books, most famously The Snowman (1978), died on August 9 at 88.

Hanae Mori, the Japanese fashion designer who blazed a trail to the upper-most echelon of her industry, died on August 11 at 96.

Natalia LL, an artist whose boundary-pushing performances and films helped usher in a wave of avant-garde art in Poland, died on August 12 at 85. Pictured: Works from Natalia LL’s “Consumer Art” series, from 1972–75.

Charlie Finch, a cantankerous art columnist whose gossipy writings were widely read in the New York scene, has died at August 24 at 68. Pictured: Lee Arthur LaPlante and Charlie Finch.

Graffiti artist Dmitry Vrubel, who created a famed mural on the Berlin Wall in 1990 that has the late Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev and East German leader Erich Honecker kissing, died on August 14 at 62.

MacGregor Harp, an artist who founded a New York gallery that attracted a number of young up-and-comers before they achieved fame, died in August at 41.

French illustrator Jean-Jacques Sempé, who provided graphics for the “Little Nicolas” series of books, which have sold north of 15 million copies, died on August 11 at 89.

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Tsuneko Sasamoto, who was among the first women to become a professional photojournalist in Japan, has died on August 15 at 107.

Tim Page, a revered, swashbuckling photographer of the Vietnam War and other conflicts who was wounded four times, died in August at 78.

Marta Palau, a sculptor whose work took up feminist themes at a time when few others in Mexico were doing so, died in August at 88.

Elias Zayat, a Syrian painter who helped formulate a kind of modernism specific to his home country, died in September at 87.

Virginia Dwan, a dealer whose short-lived gallery propelled many Minimalist and Land artists to fame during the late ’60s and early ’70s, died on September 5 at 90.

Architect James Stewart Polshek, who won renown for understated buildings and renovations that emphasized smooth functionality over aesthetic dazzle, died in September at 92. Among his architectural achievements was the new entrance to the Brooklyn Museum of Art.

Emanoel Araújo, a renowned artist and teacher who founded the Museu Afro Brasil in São Paulo, died on September 7 at 81.

Photographer and film director William Klein died in September 10 at 96.

Jean-Luc Godard, the legendary French-Swiss film director, screenwriter and film critic, died on September 13 at 91.

Art Rosenbaum, the painter, folk musician, and tireless cataloguer of American folk music, died on September 4 at 83.

The fashion photographer Melvin Sokolsky, whose high-concept, highly surreal images graced leading fashion magazines in the 1960s, died on August 29 at 88.

Dimitrios Pandermalis, the president of the board of directors of Greece’s Acropolis Museum, died on September 14 at 82.

Loïc Raguénès, a French painter known for his spare, semi-abstract paintings, died in September at 54.

Valerie Maynard, a sculptor and printmaker whose works ambitiously sought to chronicle the nuances of the Black experience, died at 85.

Donald Blinken (far right), the venture capitalist, diplomat, university leader, art collector, and one-time president of the Mark Rothko Foundation, died in September at 96.

Brian Catling, the multidisciplinary artist and writer of inexhaustible invention, died in September at 74.

Katharine Lee Reid, who led the Cleveland Museum of Art from 2000 to 2005, died on September 22 at 80.

Sonia Handelman Meyer, the pioneering street photographer who chronicled New York life at mid-century before falling into obscurity, only to be rediscovered decades later, died in September at 102. Pictured: the Mint Museum in Charlotte, North Carolina, which staged the exhibition of Meyer’s work in 2013.

American visual artist Lewis Stein, known for his conceptual rigor, died on April 22 at age 76. Pictured: Untitled, ca. 1971.

Peter Hort (at left), a lawyer and collector who became close with a range of artists and other figures in the New York art world, died on October 3 at 51.

Kim Jung Gi, the famed South Korean illustrator, died on October 3 at 47.

Silke Otto-Knapp, a painter whose muted watercolors often depict landscapes and dancers, died in October at 52.

Billy Al Bengston, a painter whose unclassifiable semi-abstractions made him a core figure of Los Angeles’s postwar art scene, died in October at 88.

Grace Glueck, a pioneering art reporter at the New York Times who helped bring to light a major controversy over sex-discrimination at the paper, died at 96.

Freddy Rodríguez, a New York–based painter whose works acted as a means of processing issues related to Latinx identity, died on October 10 at 77.

Angelo Venosa, whose sculptures resemble fantastic beings and futuristic fauna, died in October at 68.

Peter Schjeldahl, whose exuberant prose and perceptive mind made him one of the most widely read art critics in the U.S., has died on October 21 at 80.

Angus Trumble, who led the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra, Australia, from 2014 to 2018, died on October 8 at 58.

Pierre Soulages, a French painter who created hundreds of canvas almost exclusively in shades of black for decades, died on Ocotber 26 at 102.

The Chinese artist Lu Shengzhong, who won acclaim for his “little red figures,” which he cut from paper and assembled into awe-inspiring installations, died on October 26 at 70.

Rodney Graham, an artist whose dryly funny works about repetition made him one of Canada’s most celebrated artists, died on October 22 at 73.

Brian O’Doherty, a beloved artist and critic whose work took an unusually diverse array of forms, from forward-thinking art writing to abstract painting, died in October at 94.

Lee Bontecou, one of the most accomplished sculptors of the postwar generation whose constructions pushed sculpture past its limits, died on November 8 at 91.

Dangy Corcoran (at right), a dealer whose influence loomed large in the L.A. art scene, with Sharon Johnston. Corcoran died in November at 77.

Hervé Télémaque, a French artist born in Haiti whose poignant works tackled racism and colonialism died on November 10 at 85.

Bernadette Mayer, a poet, publisher, and artist who wrote with a singular stream of consciousness, died on November 22 at 77.

Ashley Bickerton, an artist who became the toast of the New York art world in the 1980s, only to depart the scene in a surprise move during the ’90s, died on November 28 at 63.

Actor Bill Murray and film curator Adrienne Mancia, who died on December 11 at 95.

Polymath British artist Tom Phillips, who worked as an painter, curator, poet, and composer, among much more, died in November at 85.

Elena Xausa, an inventive illustrator of sharp, wry drawings, died on November 27 at 38. Her husband, Lorenzo Fonda, posted this picture on his Instagram with the caption: “Your journey is far from over. Your everything will keep touching me and the thousands of people that loved you…”

Pioneering cartoon artist Aline Kominsky-Crumb, whose self-deprecating drawings about frustrations and sexual longing made her a feminist hero, died on November 29 at 74.

The Italian graphic designer, architect, and curator Pierluigi Cerri, who conceived the visual identities for the 1976 Venice Biennale and Milan’s Salone del Mobile fair, died on November 29. He was 83.

Judith Lauand, a key figure of the Brazilian Concretist movement, has died in December at 100. Pictured: Collection 197, 1968.

Banker, art collector, and patron Evelyn De Rothschild died in November at 91.

Philip Pearlstein, an American painter best known for his realist nude portraits, died on December 17 at 98.

Annie Flanders, who founded Details magazine in 1982 to document the hothouse cultural world of Downtown Manhattan, died on March 10 at 82.

Barry Bauman, a veteran restoration artist and conservator who donated his services to nonprofits that could not afford them, died on February 5 at 73.