February 15 – Singapore surrenders to Japanese forces. Among the British troops captured is illustrator Ronald Searle.
March 28–29 – Bombing of St. Mary's Church, Lübeck, destroys Adriaen Isenbrandt's Bröhmse triptych, Jacob van Utrecht's Trinity Altar, Friedrich Overbeck's Entrance of Christ into Jerusalem and Bernt Notke's Gregorsmesse and replica Totentanz, but reveals medieval frescos.
May 8 – English novelist David Garnett marries painter and writer Angelica Bell, the daughter of painters Duncan Grant (Garnett's lover) and Vanessa Bell.
October 14–November 7 – The "First Papers of Surrealism" exhibition, arranged by André Breton and Marcel Duchamp, is held at the Whitelaw Reid Mansion on Madison Avenue in New York City, including Duchamp's His Twine and Breton's Hanging.
Salvador Dalí publishes his autobiography, The Secret Life of Salvador Dalí.
Archibald Prize: William Dargie – Corporal Jim Gordon, VC
Rita Angus – Portrait (Betty Curnow)
Thomas Hart Benton – Year of Peril (series)
George Berry – Benjamin Franklin (sculpture, Franklin High School (Portland, Oregon))
Pierre Bonnard – Red Roofs in Cannet
Paul-Émile Borduas – Abstraction No 7
Russell Drysdale – Soldier
Richard Eurich
HMS Revenge Leaving Harbour
The Raid on the Bruneval Radio-location Station
Marie Hadad – Portrait of Mr. Dahesh (Dahesh Museum of Art)
Edward Hopper – Nighthawks (Art Institute of Chicago)
Dame Laura Knight – A Balloon Site, Coventry
Jacques Lipchitz – Theseus (sculpture)
L. S. Lowry – After the Blitz
Roberto Matta
The Apples we Know
Composition in Magenta: The End of Everything
The Disasters of Mysticism
The Hanged Man
Paul Nash – The Archer
Méret Oppenheim – Sun, Moon, Stars
Pablo Picasso
Portrait of Dora Maar
Woman in a Fish Hat (Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam)
Diego Rivera – The Flower Seller
Ruskin Spear – We Can Take It
Dorothea Tanning – Birthday (Philadelphia Museum of Art)
Carel Weight – Recruit's Progress – Medical Inspection
Andrew Wyeth – Winter Fields
Philip Zec – The price of petrol has been increased by one penny – Official (political cartoon)
January 8 – George Passmore, English artist partnering with Gilbert (Proesch)
February 2 – Alonzo Davis, African American artist
February 10 – Lawrence Weiner, American conceptual artist
February 28 – Oliviero Toscani, Italian photographer
March 2 – Jonathan Borofsky, American painter, sculptor and installation artist
March 16 – Danny Lyon, American documentary photographer
March 31 – Dan Graham, American conceptual and performance artist
August 18? – Charlotte Johnson Wahl, born Charlotte Fawcett, English painter
October 6 – Dan Christensen, American abstract painter (d.2007)
October 29 – Bob Ross, American painter and television presenter (d.1995)
November 7 – Stan Rice, American poet and artist (d.2002)
date unknown
Susan Crile, American painter
David Medalla, Filipino-born sculptor
De Es Schwertberger, born Dieter Schwertberger, Austrian painter
January – Albert Moulton Foweraker, English painter (b. 1873)
January 5 – Tina Modotti, Italian photographer and model (b. 1896)
January 22 – Walter Sickert, British Impressionist painter (b. 1860)
January 23 – Bogdan Šuput, Serbian painter (b. 1914)
January 27 – Petar Dobrović, Serbian painter (b. 1890)
February 9 – Anna Elizabeth Klumpke, American portrait and genre painter (b. 1856)
February 12 – Grant Wood, American painter (b. 1892)
February 20 – Herbert Dicksee, English canine painter (b. 1862)
April 18 – Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, founder of the Whitney Museum of American Art (b. 1875)
May 23 – C. R. Ashbee, English designer (b. 1863)
June 30 – William Henry Jackson, American photographer (b. 1843)
August 10 – Albert Guillaume, French painter and caricaturist (b. 1873)
August 30 – Sava Šumanović, Serbian painter (b. 1896)
September 7 – Cecilia Beaux, American portrait painter (b. 1855)
September 9 – Eric Ravilious, English painter (b. 1903) (lost on active service as a war artist)
November 24 – Bohumil Kafka, Czech sculptor (b. 1878)
December 19 – T. F. Šimon, Czech painter (b. 1877)
date unknown
Nampeyo, Hopi ceramicist (b. 1860)
Adolphe Valette, French painter (b. 1876)
1942 in art Wikipedia (Text) CC BY-SA
