Yaacov Agam, father of kinetic art, dies at 98 weeks after winning the Israel Prize

Yaacov Agam, the Israeli artist widely regarded as one of the founders of kinetic art, died on Sunday, June 21, 2026, at the age of 98, the museum that bears his name in Rishon Lezion announced. His death came only two months after he received the 2026 Israel Prize for the visual arts, which was presented to him in a private ceremony at his museum because he could no longer travel to Jerusalem.

Agam was born Yaacov Gibstein in 1928 and grew up in Rishon Lezion, the son of a rabbi and kabbalist. He later said that the shifting sand dunes near his childhood home inspired his lifelong interest in art that changes, and that Judaism, learned from his father, was the basis of his work. He studied at the Bezalel Academy in Jerusalem and then in Zurich, and by 1951 had settled in Paris, where he held his first solo exhibition in 1953.

His signature works look static but transform as the viewer moves: painted ridged surfaces show one image from the left and another from the right, and sculptures shift in shape and color with every step. His art was shown at the Museum of Modern Art and the Guggenheim in New York and at the Centre Pompidou in Paris, which gave him a retrospective in 1972. Public works include the monumental fountain at La Défense in Paris, the Fire and Water Fountain in Tel Aviv's Dizengoff Square, and the giant Hanukkah menorah raised each winter on New York's Fifth Avenue. He also developed the Agam Method, a program for teaching visual thinking to young children, which earned a UNESCO medal in 1996.

The Yaacov Agam Museum of Art opened in his hometown in 2018 and houses some of his largest installations. Israeli President Isaac Herzog said Agam had given the world a unique artistic language of movement, change and renewal. He is survived by his wife, the French harpist Chantal Thomas d'Hoste, and his son, the New York artist Ron Agam.