1974 in art

Events

• 26 April – Nineteen Old Master paintings from the Beit collection are stolen from Russborough House in Ireland by a Provisional Irish Republican Army gang including English heiress Rose Dugdale.
• Roy Strong becomes Director of the Victoria and Albert Museum.
• Hallwalls, a non profit exhibition space and arts organization, is established in a converted ice packing warehouse in Buffalo, New York, by the artists Charles Clough, Robert Longo, Diane Bertolo, Nancy Dwyer, Larry Lundy, Cindy Sherman and Michael Zwack.

Awards

• Archibald Prize: Sam Fullbrook – Jockey Norman Stephens
• John Moores Painting Prize - Myles Murphy - "Figure with Yellow Foreground"

Works

• Bruce Beasley – Big Red
• Salvador Dalí – Nieuw Amsterdam
• Judy Dater – Imogen and Twinka at Yosemite
• Audrey Flack - Leonardo's Lady
• Silvio Gazzaniga – FIFA World Cup Trophy
• David Hockney – '
• Nabil Kanso – Vietnam
• Bernard Kirschenbaum – Twist for Max
• Joan Miró
• * Hands flying off toward the constellations
• * The hope of a condemned Man
• Odd Nerdrum – Liberation
• Enzo Plazzotta – Crucifixion
• Tony Rosenthal – 5 in 1
• Ruskin Spear – '
• Graham Sutherland –
• Jack Whitten - Sorcerer's Apprentice
• David Wynne – Boy With a Dolphin
• ''Meet the Residents''

Films

• A Bigger Splash

Births

• 15 May – Kadir Nelson, African American illustrator.
• 31 May – Adrian Tomine, American cartoonist.
• 16 June – Paul Lee, English artist.
• 1 September – Jhonen Vasquez, American comic book artist, cartoonist and writer.
• 8 November – Masashi Kishimoto, Japanese mangaka.
• 13 November – Kerim Seiler, Swiss artist and architect.
• 7 December – Kang Full, South Korean webcomic artist.

Full date unknown

• Banksy, English graffiti artist.
• Bogna Burska, Polish playwright and visual artist.
• Amelie Chabannes, French painter and sculptor.
• Luke Jerram, British installation artist.
• Fabrice Lachant, French photographer.
• OSGEMEOS, Brazilian twin graffiti artists.
• Dulce Pinzon, Mexican-born visual artist.
• Bojan Šarčević, Bosnian-French visual artist.
• Bedwyr Williams, Welsh installation and performance artist.

Deaths

January to June

• 19 January – Edward Seago, English painter.
• 30 January – Robert Darwin, English painter and Rector of the Royal College of Art
• 15 February – Petar Lubarda, Serbian painter.
• 4 March – Adolph Gottlieb, American abstract expressionist painter and sculptor.
• 9 March – Daniel O'Neill, Irish painter.
• 5 April – A. Y. Jackson, Canadian painter.
• 31 May – Juan Bautista Garcia, Puerto Rican painter.
• 7 June
• *Émilie Charmy, French artist
• *Milton Menasco, American painter and art director.
• 22 June – Alain Saint-Ogan, French comics author and artist.
• 30 June – Frank McKelvey, Irish painter.

July to December

• 9 July – Georges Ribemont-Dessaignes, French writer and artist.
• 8 August – Charles Wheeler, English sculptor.
• 11 August – Jan Tschichold, German typographer, book designer, teacher and writer.
• August – André Edouard Marty, French artist.
• 8 September – James Swinnerton, American cartoonist and artist.
• 17 September – André Dunoyer de Segonzac, French painter and graphic artist.
• 26 October - William C. Seitz, American art curator and museum director (b. 1914