1940 in art

Events

February – The series of 'Careless Talk Costs Lives' propaganda posters by 'Fougasse' is published by the Ministry of Information (United Kingdom).
October – Grandma Moses' second solo exhibition, "What a Farm Wife Painted", opens at Otto Kallir's Galerie Saint-Etienne in New York City.
November 3 – The War Artists' Advisory Committee of the U.K. Ministry of Information opens its first exhibition of War Pictures by British Artists to the public at the otherwise-evacuated National Gallery in London.
November 13 – Release of Walt Disney's animated movie Fantasia in the United States.
December 8 – Mexican painters Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera remarry in San Francisco (U.S.)
Cecil Beaton is among the photographers commissioned by the U.K. Ministry of Information to undertake war photography.
Xawery Dunikowski is deported to Auschwitz concentration camp, where he survives until 1945.
Jacques Lipchitz flees France for the United States.
The Reichsleiter Rosenberg Taskforce (Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg) of the Nazi Party begins its task of appropriating cultural property from occupied territories, initially in France.
Henry Moore is commissioned as a war artist and produces drawings of Londoners sleeping in the London Underground while sheltering from The Blitz.

Eric Aumonier – The Archer (East Finchley tube station, London Passenger Transport Board)
Carl Milles – The Wedding of the Waters (fountain, St. Louis, Missouri)
Isamu Noguchi – News (stainless steel bas-relief, Rockefeller Center, New York)
Attilio Piccirilli – Guglielmo Marconi (bronze, Washington, D.C.)
José Ângelo Cottinelli Telmo (architect) and Leopoldo de Almeida (sculptor) – Padrão dos Descobrimentos (temporary version)

January – Anthony d'Offay, British art dealer
January 2 – Peter Young, American painter
January 6 – John Byrne, Scottish painter and writer
January 24
- Vito Acconci, American conceptual artist, installation artist, performance artist and filmmaker
- Mel Bochner, American conceptual artist
February 22 – Billy Name, born William Linich, Jr., American photographer, collaborator with Andy Warhol
March 7 – Hannah Wilke, American painter, sculptor and photographer (d. 1993)
March 20 – Mary Ellen Mark, American photographer (d. 2015)
April 11 – Marcia Tucker, American museum curator (d. 2006)
April 16 – Joan Snyder, American painter
April 30 – Burt Young, born Gerald DeLouise, American actor, painter and author
May 11 – Juan Downey, Chilean-American video artist (d. 1993)
June 17 – Alton Kelley, American poster and album artist (d. 2008)
July 5 – Chuck Close, American "photorealistic" painter
September 6 – Elizabeth Murray, American painter, printmaker and draughtsman (d. 2007)
September 10 – David Mann, American painter
September 27 – Rudolph Moshammer, German fashion designer (d. 2005)
date unknown
- Jaune Quick–to–See Smith, Native American painter and printmaker
- Stevan Knežević, Serbian painter, sculptor and professor of art (d. 1995)
- Anthony McCall, British-born American avant-garde installation artist, projected film
- Dušan Otašević, Serbian painter and sculptor

January 18 – Jonas Lie, Norwegian American landscape painter (b. 1880)
February 11 – Ellen Day Hale, American painter and printmaker (b. 1855)
February 27 – Nicolae Tonitza, Romanian painter and etcher (b. 1886)
March 16 – Iso Rae, Australian Impressionist painter (b. 1860)
April 15 – Alexandru Plămădeală, Moldovan sculptor (b. 1888)
June 21 – Édouard Vuillard, French painter (b. 1868)
June 29 – Paul Klee, Swiss painter expressionism, cubism, and surrealism (b. 1879)
July 4 – Józef Pankiewicz, Polish painter, graphic artist and teacher (b. 1866)
July 28 – Gerda Wegener, Danish artist (b. 1886)
July 31 – Elfriede Lohse-Wächtler, German avant-garde painter, by involuntary euthanasia (b. 1899)
August 22 – Paul Gösch, German artist and architect (b. 1885)
September 15 – Dick Ket, Dutch painter (b. 1902)
September 27 – Walter Benjamin, German philosopher, "comparatist" and art critic (b. 1892)
October 15 – Karl Uchermann, Norwegian canine painter (b. 1855)
November 17 – Eric Gill, English sculptor and engraver (b. 1882)
date unknown – Francesco Stella, Italian painter and set designer (b. 1862)