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Pianist Maria Tipo Has Died At Age 94

"(She) married technical mastery with charming unpredictability, receiving international acclaim for her sensitive and expressive interpretations of Scarlatti’s sonatas, Bach’s Goldberg Variations and the work of Romantic masters such as Frédéric Chopin." - The Washington Post (MSN)

Filmmaker Lars Von Trier Moves Into Care Center For Parkinson’s Disease

The controversial Danish director announced in 2022 that he'd been diagnosed with the neurological disorder but that he intended to maintain his career. This year he was working on a film about death and the afterlife; it's evidently unclear whether he'll be able to continue the project. - New York Daily News

Soprano Edith Mathis Is Dead At 86

On the opera stage, she was known mainly for Mozart, but she was particularly active as a recitalist and concert soloist, and she built up a very large discography in Lieder and vocal-orchestral works from the 1960s into the '80s. - Presto Music

Hilton Als, Curator (And Critic)

It is unusual for a critic at a major publication to get paid for curating gallery and museum exhibitions, though Als, 64, has cleared his independent hat-switching endeavors with his boss, David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker. And Als says he stays clear of reviewing any institution where he has curated a show. - The New York Times

Jeff Koons: Here’s What Really Motivates Me (It Isn’t Money)

He has been frustrated by suggestions that his art was partly driven by a desire to make a lot of money. “The value in art is in how we transcend. It’s a joy. But that got misrepresented and connected to financial aspects which had nothing to do with my intentions.” - Prospect

“I Was Screaming Because Of The Pain”: Salman Rushdie Testifies In Attempted Murder Trial

"Rushdie, 77, is testifying for the prosecution against Hadi Matar, 27, the man accused of assaulting him with a knife as he was about to address an open-air audience on a theme of shelter and home … (at) the Chautauqua Institution." - The Guardian

Estranged Husband Of Art Dealer Brent Sikkema Charged With Hiring His Murderer

"On Tuesday, Daniel Sikkema was charged in New York for murder-for-hire, passport fraud, and conspiracy to murder a person in a foreign country. … (Brent Sikkema) was found stabbed to death in his Rio de Janeiro apartment in January 2024." - ARTnews

Painter And Critic Walter Robinson, Founding Editor of Artnet Magazine, Is Dead At 74

"(His) art was known to many, ... and (his) writing was at one point read by just about anybody who mattered in the city’s art world. Even though he was not a household name, he quietly shaped the New York art community by chronicling its happenings with pith and élan." - ARTnews

Rutherford Chang, Conceptual Artist Who Made His Collections Art, Has Died At 45

Chang "turned his collection of the Beatles’ White Album into a meditation on the aging of a vinyl classic,” for instance, and also, "melted down 10,000 pennies into a copper block to make a statement about the value of each red cent.” - The New York Times

Tom Robbins, Author Of Novels Including Even Cowgirls Get The Blues, Has Died At 92

“With their meandering plots, pop-philosophical asides and frequent jabs at social convention and organized religion, Mr. Robbins’s books were the perfect accompaniment to acid trips, Grateful Dead shows and weekend yoga retreats, long before those things became middle-class and mainstream.” - The New York Times

Barbara Kingsolver Took Her Profits From The Massive Hit Demon Copperhead And Built A Rehab Center

In the novel, Demon and his people experience a full range of opioid addictions. With the money she made from her Pulitzer prize-winning (and hugely bestselling) book, Kingsolver "has founded a recovery house for women in Lee County, where the novel is set.” - The New York Times

Denzel Washington Can Be A Rather Tough Interview

He drops gems anyway. About his wife, who competed for the Cliburn: "Acting just sort of chose me, and I got going. But she’s an artist. I never looked at myself that way. I learned a lot about it, the discipline, the appreciation, from her.” - The New York Times

Mort Kunstler, Whose Epic War Paintings Were Meticulously Researched, Has Died At 97

“Künstler developed a sense of dramatic realism early in the 1950s as an illustrator for pulp novels and men’s adventure magazines,” which carried over into his fine art, especially his Civil War paintings. - The New York Times

Amy Lau, A Co-Founder Of Design Miami, Has Died At 56

Interior designer Vicente Wolf: “Amy was the first of a new generation of designers. … She was unrestrained in the sense that she wasn’t going to do things the way everyone else was doing things — in her mixture of furniture and her use of color.” - The New York Times

David Edward Byrd, 83, Designed Iconic Broadway And Rock Posters

"(His) swirling, psychedelic, instantly entrancing illustrations gave the rock mecca Fillmore East its signature look and contributed at least two of the greatest, most recognizable posters in modern Broadway history, for … Follies and Godspell." - Deadline

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