1944 in art

Events from the year 1944 in art.

Events

 * June 6 – Normandy landings: Robert Capa takes "The Magnificent Eleven" photographs.
 * July – Dulwich Picture Gallery in London is substantially damaged by a V-1 flying bomb; half a dozen paintings are destroyed, but most have been evacuated to Aberystwyth.
 * Autumn – Peggy Guggenheim's The Art of This Century gallery on Manhattan releases a 78 rpm 3-record album containing Paul Bowles' Sonata for Flute and Piano and Two Mexican Dances with a cover by Max Ernst.
 * Clandestine publication of Vaincre, an album of 12 colour lithographs by 8 artists in support of the French Resistance.

Awards

 * Archibald Prize: Joshua Smith – Hon Sol Rosevear, MHR, Speaker of the House of Representatives

Exhibitions

 * Jean Dubuffet's first solo exhibition.

Works

 * David Aronson – The Last Supper
 * Duffy Ayers – Portrait of Tirzah Garwood
 * Francis Bacon – Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion
 * David Bomberg – Evening in the City of London
 * Stella Bowen – Bomber Crew
 * Robert Capa – "The Magnificent Eleven" (photographs)
 * William Coldstream – Casualty Reception Station, Capua
 * Salvador Dalí –
 * Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening
 * Tristan and Isolde created for the ballet Mad Tristan by Leonide Massine and Dali which in turn was inspired by the opera Tristan und Isolde by Richard Wagner
 * Paul Delvaux – Sleeping Venus
 * Jacob Epstein – sculptures
 * First Portrait of Esther (with long hair)
 * Lucifer
 * George Grosz – Cain, or Hitler in Hell
 * Jean Hélion – The Stairway
 * Bror Hjorth – Gås-Anders (sculpture)
 * Frida Kahlo
 * The Broken Column
 * Diego and Frida 1929-1944
 * Dame Laura Knight – Take Off
 * Fernand Léger – Three Musicians (Museum of Modern Art, New York)
 * Henri Matisse – Annelies, White Tulips and Anemones
 * Joan Miró – Barcelona Series (lithographs)
 * Piet Mondrian (died February 1) – Victory Boogie-Woogie (unfinished)
 * Walter Thomas Monnington
 * Southern England: Spitfires Attacking Flying-bombs
 * Tempests Attacking Flying-bombs
 * Felix Nussbaum – Triumph of Death
 * Pablo Picasso – Man with Sheep (sculpture)
 * William Roberts
 * The Ballet
 * The Ferry (at Marston near Oxford)
 * Parson's Pleasure (On the Lawn)
 * Robert F. Sargent – Into the Jaws of Death (photograph)
 * Ben Shahn – The Red Stairway

Births

 * 9 January – Ian Hornak, American painter and draughtsman (d. 2002).
 * 10 January – Jeff Jones, American illustrator.
 * 12 February - Jane Livingston, American curator.
 * 4 March – Glen Baxter, English cartoonist.
 * 29 March – Abbas, Iranian-born documentary photographer (d. 2018).
 * 4 April – Phyllida Barlow, English sculptor (d. 2023).
 * 8 May – David Vaughan, English psychedelic artist and muralist (d. 2003).
 * 24 July – Maya Wildevuur, Dutch painter (d. 2023).
 * 4 August – Allan McCollum, American conceptual artist, all media.
 * 15 August – Gianfranco Ferré, Italian fashion designer (d. 2007).
 * 20 August – Brian Barnes, English mural artist.
 * 27 August – Catherine Leroy, French-born photographer (d. 2006).
 * 1 September – Louis Delsarte, American painter (d. 2020).
 * 4 November
 * Don Eddy, American painter.
 * Michael Heizer, American sculptor, earth artist.
 * 23 November – Peter Lindbergh, born Peter Brodbeck, Polish-born fashion photographer (d. 2019).

Full date unknown

 * Richard Mock, American painter, sculptor and cartoonist (d. 2006).
 * Allen Ruppersberg, American conceptual artist, installation artist.

Deaths

 * January 23 – Edvard Munch, Norwegian expressionist painter (b. 1863)
 * February 1 – Piet Mondrian, Dutch abstract painter (b. 1872)
 * February 26 – Lucienne Heuvelmans, French sculptor (b. 1885?)
 * April 25 – George Herriman, American cartoonist (Krazy Kat) (b. 1880)
 * July 18 – Rex Whistler, English painter (killed in action) (b. 1905)
 * August 2 – Felix Nussbaum, German Jewish surrealist painter (in Auschwitz concentration camp) (b. 1904)
 * August 18 – Hans Mertens, German painter (b. 1906)
 * September 3 – William Logsdail, English landscape, portrait and genre painter (b. 1859)
 * September 27
 * Aristide Maillol, French sculptor (b. 1861)
 * Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky, Russian-born color photographer (b. 1863)
 * David Dougal Williams, British painter (b. 1888)
 * October 14 – Marko Murat, Serbian painter (b. 1864)
 * October 21 – Hilma af Klint, Swedish abstract painter and mystic (b. 1862)
 * November 22 – Sir George Clausen, English artist (b. 1852)
 * December 10 – Miklós Ligeti, Hungarian sculptor (b. 1871)
 * December 13 – Wassily Kandinsky, Russian abstract painter (b. 1866)
 * December 24 – Alfred Drury, English sculptor (b. 1856)
 * Undated – Esther Kenworthy Waterhouse, English flower painter (b. 1857)