1990 in art

Events

*18 March – Twelve paintings, collectively worth from $100 to $300 million, are stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, Massachusetts by 2 thieves posing as police officers. This is the largest art theft in US history, and the paintings (as of 2007) have not been recovered.
*6 April – Robert Mapplethorpe's "The Perfect Moment" show of nude and homosexual photographs opens at the Cincinnati Contemporary Art Centre, in spite of accusations of indecency by Citizens for Community Values.
*15 May – "Portrait of Doctor Gachet" by Vincent van Gogh is sold for a record $82.5 million.

Awards

Exhibitions

"British Art Show" at Hayward Gallery includes work by Young British Artists

Works

*"Peine Del Viento XVII" - Eduardo Chillida
*"Meaning and Location" - Douglas Gordon
*"A Thousand Years" - Damien Hirst
*"September Defeat" - Tadeusz Kantor

Deaths

January to June

*22 January - Roman Vishniac, Russian-American photographer (b.1897).
*16 February - Keith Haring, American artist and social activist (b.1958).
*21 April - Romain de Tirtoff, Russian-born French artist and designer (b.1892).
*30 June - Jacques Lob, French comic book creator (b.1932).

July to December

*18 July - Yves Chaland, French cartoonist (b.1957).
*23 July - Pierre Gandon, French illustrator and engraver of postage stamps (b.1899).
*25 July - Leonard Bahr, American portrait and mural painter (b.1905).
*14 October - Clifton Pugh, Australian artist (b.1924).
*26 October - Joan Brown, American figurative painter (b.1938).
*8 December - Tadeusz Kantor, Polish painter, assemblage artist, set designer and theatre director (b.1915).
*23 December - Serge Danot, French animator (b.1931).

Full date unknown

*Daniel du Janerand, French painter (b.1919).
*Fuller Potter, American Abstract expressionist artist (b.1910).