January 4. The Ghanaian photographer Felicia Abban (88 years old), first female professional photographer in West Africa. She participated in the 54th Venice Biennale in 2019.
January 8. The French artist Paul-Armand Gette (96 years old), sculptor, photographer, videographer and writer. Nature and eroticism were at the heart of his work.
January 24. The American sculptor Carl Andrew (88 years old). He was one of the last great figures of minimalism, a movement that appeared in the 1960s and was based on the use of elementary structures and raw materials.
February 2. French historian and curator Jean-Pierre Babelon (92 years old), specialist in the modern era. He directed the Museum and National Estate of Versailles and Trianon from 1989 to 1996.
February 10. The Austrian artist Gunter Brus (85 years old), last representative of Viennese actionism, who staged himself in extreme and provocative performances.
March 6. The Icelandic artist Hreinn Fridfinnsson (81 years old), figure of conceptual art strongly linked to nature.
March 7. Greek-American artist Lucas Samaras (87 years old), whose paintings, sculptures and photographs explore themes of identity and self-representation.
March 21. The former Minister of Culture and very media personality Frédéric Mitterrand (76 years old). First known as a television show host, he managed the Villa Medici in Rome in 2008 and 2009.
March 26. The American sculptor Richard Serra (85 years old), whose monumental works in steel redefine the spectator’s place in space. He was awarded the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the 49th Venice Biennale in 2001.
April 3. Italian architect and designer Gaetano Pesce (84 years old), creator of the famous “Up” armchair series.
April 6. The Italian architect Italo Rota (70 years old), who worked on the transformation of the Orsay station into a museum and the renovation of the Center Pompidou.
April 8. The painter and director of art centers Chantal Cusin-Berche (80 years old), who chaired the National Center for Visual Arts (CNAP) from 2003 to 2008.
April 13. African-American artist and activist Faith Ringgold (93 years old), whose pictorial, literary and woven works reflect issues of gender, race and social class.
April 21. The French photographer Pierre Gonnord (60 years old), portraitist of the marginalized and chiaroscuro.
May 3. The curator and director of museums Germain Viatte (84 years old), who participated in the creation of the Center Pompidou and the Musée du quai Branly.
May 4. The American artist Frank Stella (87 years old), pioneer of minimalism. An essential figure in post-war American art, he first explored monochrome before turning to color and three-dimensionality.
May 23. The French artist Marc Camille Chaimowicz (77 years old), whose presentations of objects are at the crossroads between art and furniture, public and private space.
May 25. Hugues Gall (84 years old), former director of the Paris Opera, the Grand Théâtre de Genève and the House and gardens of Claude-Monet in Giverny.
June 5. The French artist Well (88 years old), leading figure of the Nice school. Representative in France of the Fluxus movement, he acquired worldwide fame with his handwritten messages in white on black, full of humor and irony.
June 16. The American gallery owner Barbara Gladstone (89 years old), influential figure in the New York contemporary art market, whose gallery is established internationally.
June 16. French architect and urban planner Paul Shemetov (95 years old), fervent defender of social housing. He is the author of the rehabilitation of the Grande Galerie de l’évolution and the Ministry of Finance in Bercy.
June 29. The Dutch painter Jacqueline de Jong (85 years old) whose figurative paintings combine humor, violence and eroticism.
July 2. The French ethnologist Roger Boulay (80 years old), specialist in Oceanian art. He inventoried the Kanak collections of museums in France and Europe.
July 7. The French painter André-Pierre Arnal (84 years old), member of the Supports/Surfaces group (1968-1971).
July 12. The American videographer Bill Viola (73 years old), pioneer and famous exponent of video art. His films, installations and sound performances question time, life and death, and the relationship with nature. In 2014, he benefited from a retrospective at the Grand Palais.
July 23. The British artist Mel Ramsden (79 years old), major figure in conceptual art and pillar of the Art and Language collective.
August 9. The German Conservative Kasper Konig (80 years old), curator of renowned contemporary art exhibitions. In 1977, he co-founded the Skulptur Projekte Münster, an exhibition of public sculptures organized every ten years in the German city.
September 6. The German artist Rebecca Horn (80 years old), whose hybrid performances and sculptures play on the notion of metamorphosis, by featuring his own body.
September 18. The Italian antiques dealer based in Paris Giovanni Sarti (81 years old), great connoisseur of Italian primitives.
September 19. Art critic and journalist Elisabeth Couturier (74 years old). She chaired the International Association of Art Critics from 2018 to 2024 and collaborated on the magazine The Eye.
October 13. François Duret-Robert (92 years old), lawyer and journalist (art market law).
November 2. The French visual artist and writer Eric Rondepierre (74 years old), who practiced the misappropriation of cinematographic images in his works.
November 3. The French artist Louis Cane (80 years old), member of the Supports/Surfaces group and furniture designer. He made color an essential component of his work.
November 6. The Swiss artist of Romanian origin Daniel Spoerri (94 years old), inventor of “eat art”. Renowned for his “trap paintings” which elevate the remains of a meal to the status of a work, he was one of the signatories in 1960 of the Manifesto of New Realism.
November 11. The German-British painter Frank Auerbach (93 years old), figure of the London school with Francis Bacon and Lucian Freud. He won the Golden Lion at the 42nd Venice Biennale in 1986.
November 28. Jean-Pierre Badyformer director of Heritage and the National Fund for Monuments and Sites, was the first director of the Heritage Institute (1990-1999).
