Events from the year 1985 in art.

This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these template messages) This article relies largely or entirely on a single source. (December 2009) This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. (December 2018)

• Charles Saatchi's collection opens to the public, arousing interest in Neo-expressionism.
• Germano Celant publishes Arte Povekira: Storie e protagonisti.
• Art gallerist Andrew Crispo and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum are involved in a dispute over Constantin Brâncuși's 1912 sculpture "The Muse" which ends in the museum paying $2 million US for the artwork, at the time believed to be the most ever paid for a 20th century sculpture.^[1]

• Archibald Prize: Guy Warren – Flugelman with Wingman
• John Moores Painting Prize - Bruce McLean for "Oriental Garden Kyoto^[2]
• Turner Prize – Howard Hodgkin

Shortlisted were: Terry Atkinson, Tony Cragg, Ian Hamilton Finlay, Milena Kalinovska and John Walker.

• Mai Dantsig – And the Saved World Remembers
• Robyn Denny – Coloured lines at Embankment tube station in London, England
• Christo and Jeanne Claude - "The Pont Neuf Wrapped" at the Pont Neuf in Paris, France
• Thomas Morandi – Yankee Champion (sculpture, Portland, Oregon)
• Odd Nerdrum – The Cloud (Skyen)
• George Rickey – Double L Excentric Gyratory (sculpture)
• Sally Robinson (Australian) – Kakadu (screen print)
• Wayne Thiebaud – Sunset Streets
• Andy Warhol – Reigning Queens series

• September 24 – Eric Adjetey Anang, Ghanaian sculptor
• date unknown
  • Lawrence Abu Hamdan, Jordanian-born artist
  • Helen Marten, English sculptor and installation artist

• 8 January – Grace Morley, American-born curator (b. 1900)^[3]
• 18 January – Anwar Shemza, Pakistan-born British artist and writer (b. 1928)
• 7 March – Jessie Oonark, Canadian Inuit artist (b. 1906)
• 28 March – Marc Chagall, Russian-Belarusian-French painter (b. 1887).
• 21 April – Rudi Gernreich, Austrian American fashion designer (b. 1922).
• 11 May – Chester Gould, American cartoonist (b. 1900).
• 12 May – Jean Dubuffet, French painter and sculptor (b. 1901).
• 22 May – Wolfgang Reitherman, German-American animator (b. 1909).
• 26 July – Grace Albee, American printmaker (b. 1890).
• 21 August – David Olère, Polish-born Jewish French painter (b. 1902).
• 8 September – Ana Mendieta, Cuban American performance artist, sculptor, painter and video artist
• 28 September – André Kertész, Hungarian-born photographer (b. 1894).
• 17 November – Richard Amsel, American illustrator and graphic designer (b. 1947).
• 8 December – Paul Kelpe, German-born American painter (b. 1902).
• Ovartaci, Danish outsider artist (b. 1894)
• Antonio Rodríguez Luna, Spanish painter (b. 1910).

• 1985 in fine arts of the Soviet Union