Events

April – A Belgian activist group cuts off the left hand of a bronze Congolese figure in a monument to Leopold II of Belgium in Ostend as a protest against colonial atrocities.^[1]
24 May – A fire in the Momart storage warehouse destroys major works by Helen Chadwick, Tracey Emin, Patrick Heron, Damien Hirst and other British artists.
18 July – The subterranean Chichu Art Museum on the Japanese island of Naoshima, designed by Tadao Ando, opens.
11 December – İstanbul Modern (art museum) is established in Turkey. The country's first modern art museum, the Doğançay Museum, opened earlier in the year, also in Istanbul; it is dedicated to the artistic legacy of Burhan Doğançay.

Works

4 January – Jeff Nuttall, English poet, publisher, actor, painter and sculptor (b.1933)
9 January – Nissim Ezekiel, Indian poet, playwright and art critic (b.1924)
3 February - Ward Jackson, American painter (b. 1928)
7 February – Norman Thelwell, English cartoonist (b.1923)
4 March – Stephen Sprouse, American fashion designer and artist (b.1953)
12 March – Milton Resnick, American painter (b.1917)
13 March – René Laloux, French animator and film director (b.1929)

1 April – Enrique Grau, Colombian painter and sculptor (b.1920)
7 April – Wolfgang Mattheuer, German painter and sculptor (b.1927)
13 April – Muriel Berman, American art collector and philanthropist, co-founder of the Philip and Muriel Berman Museum at Ursinus College in Collegeville, Pennsylvania
25 April – Jacques Rouxel, French animator (b.1931)
12 May – Syd Hoff, American children’s book author and cartoonist (b.1912)
28 May – Jean-Philippe Charbonnier, French photographer (b.1921)
5 June – Fiore de Henriquez, Italian-born British sculptor (b.1921)
11 June – Egon von Fürstenberg, Swiss fashion designer (b.1946)
15 June – Lothar Fischer, German sculptor (b.1933)

2 July – John Cullen Murphy, American comics artist (b.1919)
19 July – Sylvia Daoust, Canadian sculptor (b.1902)
3 August – Henri Cartier-Bresson, French photographer (b.1908)
4 August – Cécile Guillame, first woman to engrave a French postal stamps (b.1933).
8 August – Leon Golub, American painter (b.1922).
9 August – Liisi Beckmann, Finnish artist and designer (b.1924).
8 September – Frank Thomas, American animator (b.1912)
19 September – Eddie Adams, American Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer (b.1933)

1 October – Richard Avedon, American photographer (b.1923).
13 October – Ivor Wood, English stop-motion animator (b.1932).
15 October – Irv Novick, American comic book artist (b.1916).
13 November – Harry Lampert, American cartoonist, advertising artist and author (b.1916).
19 November
- Trina Schart Hyman, American illustrator of children's books (b.1939).
- Piet Esser, Dutch sculptor (b.1914).
22 November – Leo Dee, American silverpoint artist (b.1931).
25 November – Ed Paschke, Polish-American painter (b.1939).
9 December – Sergey Voychenko, Belarusian artist and designer (b.1955).
16 December – Agnes Martin, Canadian-American painter (b.1912).
17 December – Tom Wesselmann, American pop artist (b.1931).
December – Cleve Gray, American Abstract expressionist painter (b.1918).