Obituaries - Obituary

Robert P Bergman, 53 museum director, died May 6 after a two-week flexure with a rare blood disorder. Since 1993 he was director of the Cleveland Museum of Art. beneath his leadership, annual museum attendance rose from just above 400,000 to more than 600000 He oversaw the renovation or reinstallation of almost half of the museum's galleries, and organized of the like kind shows as "Faberge in America" and "Vatican Treasures: Early Christian, Renaissance and Baroque Art from the Papal Collections." From 1981 to 1993 he was director of the Walters Art Gallery in Baltimore. In the decade before his museum career, Bergman was a professor at Princeton and Harvard universities.

Tibor Kalman, 49 designer, editor and self-proclaimed "creative troublemaker," died May 2 after a four-year do one's best with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. Born in Budapest, he immigrated with his family to Poughkeepsie, NY at the age of eight. Largely self-taught, he began doing the window displays at the pupil bookstore at N.Y.U. in 1971; the bookstore was be in possession ofed by Leonard Riggio, who later bought Barnes & Noble and hired Kalman as its first creative director. A major influence upon contemporary design, Kalman earned a reputation as the "bad boy" of his profession after opening his be in possession of company, M&Co, in 1980. His company designed a series of clock and watches with misnumbered dials and other surprising phenomenons like crumpled "paper" paper-weights. Early upon he produced an innovative album overspread for the Talking Heads and later worked with various publications, including stints as art director for Artforum and creative director for Interview. He maintained a relationship with the latter until his death. Known for his social consciousness, Kalman did his greatest in quantity impressive work as editor in chief of Benetton's magazine Colors, which is known for its courageous design and sometimes shocking imagery as well as its risk-taking stance upon social issues. His monograph, Tibor Kalman: distorted Optimist, was recently published by dint of Booth-Clibborn Editions. Shortly before his death, he was at work upon the exhibition "Tiborcity," which render free of accesss at the San Francisco Museum of late Art on July 16 [through Oct 19]

Ronald Alley, 73 art historian, author and curator who was keeper of the late collection at the Tate Gallery in London for 21 years (1965-86) died upon Apr. 25. The cause of death was not announced. Alley studied at the Courtauld Institute of Art and in 1951 joined the Tate staff as an assistant keeper He was appointed legate keeper three years later. Dedicated to present art, he focused on expanding the museum's collection of 20th-century works. He established an ambitious acquisitions program and ofttimes found himself at the center of discussion as the Tate's first works of Ab Ex burst and Minimalist art entered the collection. He organized important exhibitions of works by the agency of British artists such as Francis Bacon, Barbara Hepworth, Ben Nicholson, Graham Sutherland, Patrick Heron and William Scott Alley's numerous publications include the two-volume catalogue of the Tate's foreign fresh art collection. He also coauthored with John Rothenstein the catalogue raisonne of Francis Bacon.

Edith Lewin, 88 collector of Mexican art, died May 23 in Palm Springs. She and her husband, Bernard, emigrated from Germany in 1933 and eventually render free of accessed art galleries in Palm Springs and Beverly Hills. In 1958 they acquired three paintings by the agency of Diego Rivera and over the years assembleed works by such artists as Rufino Tamayo, David Siqueiros, Frida Kahlo and Josh Clemente Orozco. In 1997 the brace donated their collection of 1800 works, valued at above $25 million, to the L.A. shire Museum of Art.

Lois Rivkin, 69 a novel York arts administrator, died Apr. 27 of lymphoma. In 1988 she established the organization Friends of the Public place of educations which introduced public school learners to the city's cultural and business communities. She was also a institutor of the National Museum of Women in the Arts.

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