The year 1892 in art involved some significant events.

Events

• February – Claude Monet begins painting his Rouen Cathedral series
• c. February – Alfred Gilbert is commissioned to sculpt the tomb (with recumbent effigy) of Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence, in the Albert Memorial Chapel of St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle, England; although not finished until 1928 it is substantially complete in 1898 as "the finest single example of late 19th-century sculpture in the British Isles"^[1]
• March – James McNeill Whistler stages his major retrospective exhibition, Nocturnes, Marines and Chevalet pieces at Goupil & Cie's London gallery, then moves to Paris
• April 4 – Munich Secession
• May – The Brotherhood of The Linked Ring is founded by Henry Peach Robinson in England to promote photography as a fine art
• November – "The Munch Affair": Adelsteen Normann, on behalf of the Union of Berlin Artists, invites Edvard Munch to stage a one-man exhibition. However, his paintings evoke bitter controversy and after one week the exhibition is closed; Munch's paintings are moved to the Equitable Palast^[2]
• Charles Rennie Mackintosh and Herbert MacNair are introduced to Margaret and Frances MacDonald in Glasgow
• Il Codice Magliabechiano, a 16th century collection of brief biographies and notes on the works of Italian artists by "Anonimo Gaddiano", is first published

Awards

• Legion of Honour (France) – James McNeill Whistler

Works of art

Paintings

• Ivan Aivazovsky – Brig "Mercury" Attacked by Two Turkish Ships
• José Ferraz de Almeida Júnior – Leitura ("Reading")
• John Henry Frederick Bacon – The Wedding Morning
• Gustave Caillebotte
  • Nasturtiums
  • Portrait of the artist
• Gustaf Cederström – Magnus Stenbock in Malmö
• John Collier – Lilith
• Thomas Eakins – The Concert Singer
• James Ensor
  • Man of Sorrows (Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerp)
  • The Skate
• Paul Gauguin
  • Aha Oe Feii?
  • Fatata te Miti ("By the Sea")
  • Spirit of the Dead Watching
  • Te Fare^[3]
  • When Will You Marry?
• J. W. Godward
  • At The Garden Shrine, Pompeii
  • The Betrothed
  • Classical Beauty
  • Far Away Thoughts (two versions)
  • Leaning On The Balcony
  • The Playground
  • With Violets Wreathed And Robe Of Saffron Hue
• Lydia Purdy Hess – Portrait of Miss E. H.
• P. S. Krøyer – Summer Evening at Skagen. The Artist's Wife and Dog by the Shore
• Sir Frederic Leighton – The Garden of the Hesperides
• Isaac Levitan – Evening Bells
• Maximilien Luce – Côte de la citadelle
• Juan Luna
  • The Parisian Life
  • Peuple et Rois
• Jacek Malczewski
  • Christmas Eve in Siberia
  • Self-portrait with palette
• Francis Davis Millet
  • An Autumn Idyll
  • Between Two Fires
• Albert Joseph Moore – Lightning and Light
• Edvard Munch
  • Evening on Karl Johan
  • Inger in Black and Violet
  • August Strindberg
• John Singer Sargent – Mrs. Hugh Hammersley
• Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
  • La Goulue arriving at the Moulin Rouge (Museum of Modern Art, New York)
  • Le Lit
  • At the Moulin Rouge
  • At the Moulin Rouge: two women waltzing
  • Quadrille at the Moulin Rouge
  • Posters for Aristide Bruant
• Henry Scott Tuke – Mrs Florence Humphris
• Félix Vallotton
  • Bathers on a Summer Evening (1892–93)
  • The Invalid
• Édouard Vuillard – Self-Portrait

Sculptures

• Charles E. Barber – United States Barber coinage
• Jean-Léon Gérôme – Bellona
• Felix Görling – Statue of Alexander von Humboldt (Chicago)
• Richard Henry Park – John Plankinton statue
• Jeronimo Sunol – Statue of Christopher Columbus (Central Park, New York City)

Other

• The Diamond Trellis Egg is presented to Maria Feodorovna by her husband Alexander III of Russia

Births

• 29 February – Augusta Savage, African American sculptor (died 1962).
• 5 March - Dean Cornwell, American illustrator, painter, and muralist (died 1960)
• 14 March – Charles Wheeler, English sculptor (died 1974).
• 4 April – Italo Mus, Italian painter (died 1967)
• 8 May – Luigi Del Bianco, Italian-born American sculptor (died 1969)
• 12 May – Colin Gill, English war artist, muralist and portrait painter (died 1940).
• 14 May – Marjorie Watson-Williams, English painter (died 1984).
• 19 May – Wilhelm Heise, German painter (died 1965).
• 30 May – Fernando Amorsolo, Filipino painter (died 1972).
• 31 May – Michel Kikoine, painter (died 1968).
• 30 June – Wilhelm Schnarrenberger, German painter (died 1966).
• 15 July – Walter Benjamin, German philosopher, "comparatists" and art critic (died 1940).
• July 19 – Suzanne Malherbe, French illustrator and designer (died 1972).
• July 24 – Marcel Gromaire, French painter (died 1971).
• 7 August – Einar Forseth, Swedish artist.
• 16 August – Otto Messmer, American animator (died 1983).
• 11 October – Anton Räderscheidt, German painter (died 1970).
• 16 October – Adolf Ziegler, German painter and politician (died 1959).
• 23 November – Romain de Tirtoff, Russian-born French artist and designer (died 1990).
• 7 December – Stuart Davis, American painter (died 1964).
• Undated
  • Lang Jingshan, Chinese photographer (died 1995).
  • Veljko Stanojević, Serbian painter (died 1967).

Deaths

• January 11 – Amanda Sidwall, Swedish painter and illustrator (born 1844)
• January 14 – Alexander Jackson Davis, American architect and illustrator (born 1803)
• January 15 – Randolph Rogers, American neoclassical sculptor (born 1825)
• January 20 – Louis Pierre Henriquel-Dupont, French engraver (born 1797)
• February 27 – Louis Vuitton, French designer (born 1821)
• March 3 – Fedor Solntsev, Russian painter and art historian (born 1801)
• March 21 – Anthon van Rappard, Dutch painter (born 1858)
• June 1 – Louis Janmot, French painter (born 1814)
• October 5 – Albert Aurier, French Symbolist poet, art critic and painter (born 1865)
• October 7 – Thomas Woolner, English sculptor and poet (born 1825)
• October 29 – William Harnett, Irish American trompe l'oeil painter (born 1848)
• December 9 – Ernst Klimt, Austrian mural painter (born 1864)
• Undated
  • Walter Hood Fitch, British botanical artist (born 1817)
  • Serafino De Tivoli, Italian painter (born 1826)