1988 in art explained

Events from the year 1988 in art.

Events

Opening of the Kiasma Contemporary Art Museum in Helsinki, designed by Steven Holl
Donatello's bronze Judith and Holofernes is replaced on the Piazza della Signoria in Florence by a replica and moved inside the Palazzo Vecchio.
David Hockney begins a series of paintings at his seaside home in Malibu, California.^[1]

July – Freeze, Surrey Docks, London
September 18 until September 24 - White Room: Bill Albertini at White Columns in New York City.^[2]

Fred Cress – John Beard

Artists of Ramingining, Northern Territory, Australia – Aboriginal Memorial
Francis Bacon – Second Version of Triptych 1944
Gordon Bennett – Outsider
Wayne Chabre
- Gargoyles (Eugene, Oregon)
  - Alan Turing
  - Drosophila Fly Head
- Grasshopper (sculpture, Salem, Oregon)
Eldon Garnet – Little Glenn (bronze statue)
Rachel Joynt – People's Island (brass installation, Dublin)
Nabil Kanso – Dance of Salome (first series)
Chris Killip – In Flagrante (photographic book)
Judith Weinshall Liberman – Holocaust Wall Hangings (first works in series)
Richard Lippold – Ex Stasis (sculpture)
Paul Matisse – Kendall Band (sound sculpture)
David K. Nelson, Jr. – Mirth & Girth
Louise Nevelson – Sky Landscape (sculpture)
Éamonn O'Doherty – Anna Livia (bronze installation, Dublin)
Fred Parhad – Ashurbanipal (bronze, San Francisco)
Zlatko Pounov and Steven Lowe – Statue of Mahatma Gandhi (San Francisco)
Paula Rego – The Dance
Gerhard Richter – Betty
Susan Dorothea White – The First Supper
Christopher Wool – Apocalypse Now ("word painting")

19 January – Cesare Brandi, art critic, historian, and specialist in conservation-restoration theory (b. 1906).
31 January – Nedeljko Gvozdenović, a world-renowned Serbian painter (b. 1902).
3 February – Ronald Bladen, American sculptor (b. 1918).
19 March – Isabel Bishop, American painter and graphic artist (b. 1902).
28 March – Neil Williams, American painter (b. 1934).
31 March – Georges Lévis, French comic artist (b. 1924).
2 April – E. Chambré Hardman, Irish-born British photographer (b. 1898).
3 April – Milton Caniff, American cartoonist (b. 1907).
17 April
- Toni Frissell, American photographer (b. 1907]).
- Louise Nevelson, Ukrainian-born American artist (b. 1900).
26 April – Guy Boyd, Australian potter and figurative sculptor (b. 1923)
4 May – Stanley Hayter, English-born printmaker (b. 1901).
6 May – Constantino Nivola, Italian sculptor (b. 1911)
16 May – Charles Keeping, English illustrator, children's book author and lithographer (b. 1924).^[3]
16 June – Andrea Pazienza, Italian comics artist (b. 1956).

12 July – Julian Trevelyan, English printmaker (b. 1910).
24 July – Mira Schendel, Swiss-born Brazilian modernist artist and poet (b. 1919).
12 August – Jean-Michel Basquiat, American neo-expressionist painter, suicide (b. 1960).
21 August – Ray Eames, American artist and architect (b. 1912).
26 September – Marianne Appel, American mural painter and puppet designer (b. 1913).
29 September – Charles Addams, American cartoonist (b. 1912).
28 October – Pietro Annigoni, Italian painter (b. 1910)^[4]
12 November – Primo Conti, Italian Futurist artist (b. 1900).
25 November – Alphaeus Philemon Cole, American portrait artist (b. 1876 [''sic.''])^[5]
2 December – Kimon Evan Marengo, Egyptian-born British cartoonist (b. 1904).
30 December – Isamu Noguchi, Japanese American artist and landscape architect (b. 1904).^[6]

Book: Gayford, Martin. Spring Cannot be Cancelled: David Hockney in Normandy. London. Thames & Hudson. 2021. 978-0-500-09436-5. 132–3.
Web site: White Room: Bill Albertini . 2024-08-20 . White Columns . en.
Book: Douglas Martin. Charles Keeping: An Illustrator's Life. 1993. Julia MacRae Books. 978-1-85681-062-3. 202.
Book: The New York Times Biographical Service. 1988. New York Times & Arno Press. 1161.
Book: Who was who in America. 1989. Marquis-Who's Who. 978-0-8379-0217-3. 73.
Brenson, M. Isamu Noguchi, the Sculptor, Dies at 84. The New York Times December 31, 1988.