Peter Nagy, artist and Nature Morte founder, dies at 67

Peter Nagy, the artist who founded the Nature Morte gallery, has died aged 67 after an illness. His death was reported by ARTnews on 13 October 2026.

The report gave illness as the cause. It did not publish further medical details. Those limits are common, as families often keep health information private.

Nagy worked on both sides of the art world. He made work as an artist. He also ran a gallery, a business that stages exhibitions and works with collectors and museums.

That second job needs a brief gloss. A gallerist finds artists, books dates, installs shows and keeps the paperwork. Provenance, the documented chain of ownership, often starts in that office and decides what can later be lent, sold or researched.

He co-founded Gallery Nature Morte in New York City with fellow artist Alan Belcher. That account comes from the gallery's own history page. Nature Morte names the two men as its founders.

Artist-run galleries were often small and hands-on. The people who chose the show sometimes hung the lights themselves. They cut the glass, built the crates and paid for insurance. For a reader in Lagos, Lima or Leeds who has never visited, the point is simple: the person who made the art and the person who decided how it met the public were, in this case, the same.

Nagy continued to show his own work. Early this year he presented "America Invented Everything" at Nature Morte. Mousse Magazine covered the exhibition in January 2026.

For readers new to this world, that double role matters. A founder shapes more than his own career. Each invitation to another artist affects what the public sees and what museums can later acquire.

No information about survivors or services appeared in the dated reports available so far. Galleries usually confirm those details later by statement. Until that happens, social media posts should be treated as rumour.

He was 67. The figure comes from the latest published report, which takes precedence over older pages. His gallery name will live on in labels, invoices and lot notes, where the history of objects is carefully written and kept.