In 2020, the art world weathered the loss of pioneers of painting and avant-garde illustrators, titans of curation and collectors whose memory endures beyond their idiosyncratic holdings (some of which will hopefully make an appearance on a museum wall). Take a moment to mourn those we've lost so far—including a few who have died as part of the coronavirus pandemic, which has claimed the lives of thousands around the world.
There were the whimsical, heartfelt doodles of illustrator Jason Polan, who pursed nothing less than sketching every living New Yorker, and the paintings and drawings of Japanese provocateur Toshio Saeki, who defied postwar Tokyo’s moral conventions in the quest for erotic liberation. There were the monumental steel sculpture by American sculptor Beverly Pepper, whose towering creations decorate public spaces worldwide, and the quiet photographs of Santu Mofokeng, who pictured post-Apartheid South Africa. And these are just a few of the memorable artworks by creators whose legacy will continued to be explored.
In January, artist John Baldessari, who in the 1970s helped build Los Angeles into an international art capital, died. In his obituary, ARTnews wrote that Baldessari “pioneered a style that placed an emphasis on ideas over images, crafting works that scrambled traditional notions about what was considered high art.” Or, in the late artist’s own words: “I just stare at something and say: Why isn’t that art? Why couldn’t that be art?” The question, like most art with long-lasting power, remains relevant.
Watch the slideshow of honorees 2020
❖❖https://www.artnews.com/gallery/art-news/photos/art-world-deaths-2020-in-memoriam-1202685539/