1968 in art

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The year 1968 in art involved some significant events and new works.

Events

• March 5 – Musical chess match between Marcel Duchamp and John Cage takes place at Ryerson Polytechnic, Toronto.
• May 2 – Christ Church Picture Gallery in Oxford, England, designed by Powell and Moya, is opened.
• June 3 – Radical feminist Valerie Solanas shoots Andy Warhol at his New York City studio, The Factory; he survives after a 5-hour operation.
• July 17 – Release of the animated musical fantasy film Yellow Submarine in the United Kingdom, directed by George Dunning with art direction by Heinz Edelmann.
• August 20 – The National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne, Australia, designed by Sir Roy Grounds, is opened.
• September 15 – The Neue Nationalgalerie in West Berlin, Germany, designed by Mies van der Rohe, is opened.
• November 7 – New building for the São Paulo Museum of Art (MASP) in Brazil, designed by Lina Bo Bardi, is inaugurated.
• Rubens' The Adoration of the Magi (1634) is installed as an altarpiece at King's College Chapel, Cambridge.

Awards

• Archibald Prize: William Edwin Pidgeon – Lloyd Rees
• Elaine Hamilton wins first prize at the Biennale de Menton, France

Exhibitions

• Eva Hesse – Chain Polymers, Fischbach Gallery, W. 57th Street, New York City
• Ralph Hotere – Black Paintings, Auckland, New Zealand

Works

• William Anders – Earthrise (photograph)
• Alexander Calder – Gwenfritz (stabile)
• Donald De Lue – The Special Warfare Memorial Statue
• Mark di Suvero – Snowplow (sculpture)
• Joseph Drapell – Life (sculpture, Halifax, Nova Scotia)
• M. C. Escher – Metamorphosis III (colored woodcut print)
• Barbara Hepworth – Two Figures (sculpture)
• David Hockney – Christopher Isherwood and Don Bachardy
• Eduardo Kingman – Fin de Mascarada
• Joan Miró – begins series The navigator's hope
• Henry Moore – Three-Piece No. 3: Vertebrae (Working Model)
• Robert Motherwell – Open #23 (loaned by Graham Gund to Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
• Otto Muehl and followers of Viennese Actionism – Kunst und Revolution (performance art)
• Isamu Noguchi – Octetra (concrete sculpture)
• Gerhard Richter – Domplatz, Mailand ("Cathedral Square, Milan")
• Kenneth Snelson – Needle Tower
• David Wynne – River God Tyne and Swans in Flight (sculptures, Newcastle Civic Centre)
• Pangborn-Herndon Memorial Site (memorial column)

Births

• May 21 – Hans-Ulrich Obrist, Swiss-born curator
• June 3 – Eric White, American visual artist
• July 6 – Gaspare Manos, Thai-Italian painter and sculptor
• July 11 – Patrik Andiné, Swedish painter
• July 23 – Paulo Henrique, Portuguese choreographer and multidisciplinary artist
• August 16 – Wolfgang Tillmans, German fine-art photographer
• September 17 – David Shrigley, British visual artist
• December 13 – Michael Triegel, German painter
• December 23 – Manuel Rivera-Ortiz, Puerto Rican documentary photographer
• date unknown
  • Nahem Shoa, British portrait painter

Deaths

• February 11 – Jacob Steinhardt, German-born Jewish painter and woodcut artist (born 1887)
• April 26 – John Heartfield, German graphic designer (born 1891)
• May 9 – Harold Gray, American cartoonist, created Little Orphan Annie (born 1894)
• May 21 – Bror Hjorth, Swedish sculptor (born 1894)
• May 28 – Kees van Dongen, Dutch Fauvist painter (born 1877)
• June 17 – Cassandre, French graphic designer (born 1901)
• July 2 – Sir Hans Heysen, German-born Australian watercolour painter (born 1877)
• July 16 – William John Leech, Irish painter (born 1881)
• August 8 – Orovida Pissarro, English painter and etcher (born 1893)
• October 2 – Marcel Duchamp, influential French artist (born 1887)
• November – Lee Gatch, American painter and mixed-media artist (born 1902)
• November 4 – Michel Kikoine, Litvak-born French painter (born 1892)
• date unknown
  • William Conor, Irish painter (born 1881)
  • Estella Solomons, Irish painter (born 1882)

See also

• 1968 in Fine Arts of the Soviet Union