Kathryn Hixson, 1955-2010

Kathryn Hixson, a respected member of AICA-USA, passed away unexpectedly on November 7, 2010 of unknown natural causes at her home in Evanston, Illinois.  As a devoted art critic and curator, Hixson mentored many into prolific careers since she began teaching at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1988.  From 1993 to 2002, she was the editor of the New Art Examiner, a non-profit, national magazine that was based in Chicago.  Under Hixson’s stewardship, the New Art Examiner dramatically increased the discourse surrounding emerging and mid-career artists who lived across the country, while maintaining a critical eye on the mainstream art market that was fast evolving in New York City.

In 2007, Hixson posed two provocative questions:  “Why do we continually want to depict?  What power is brokered when something is transformed into an image?”  In 2008, she was a winner of the prestigious Arts Writers Grant offered by Creative Capital and the Andy Warhol Foundation.  At the time of her death, Hixson was in the midst of completing her PhD dissertation in Modern and Contemporary Art at the University of Texas, Austin.  She was also revising a review about Tony Tasset’s exhibition that had appeared at Chicago’s Kavi Gupta Gallery for ArtUS magazine.

ArtUSeditor, Paul Foss, recalls Hixson as a critic, “with much gusto, who was never shy of saying her piece.”  Lisa Wainwright, Dean of Graduate Studies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, stated, “Kathryn Hixson was one of the most distinguished art critics in Chicago. Many of us know how Kathryn liked to play. She loved to dwell in a world of ideas about love, music, art and politics. Kathryn was unafraid of strong opinions—really she was charmingly indignant. Her fortitude and her friendship will be greatly missed.”

—Jill Conner