Mario Amaya

Mario Amaya (October 6, 1933 – June 29, 1986) was an American art critic, magazine editor, and museum director. He played a significant role in shaping contemporary art discourse in the United States and Europe. Known for his energetic and eclectic approach, he led major institutions including the New York Cultural Center and the Chrysler Museum of Art, and authored influential early studies of Pop art and decorative arts. He was also the chief curator of the Art Gallery of Ontario and the founding editor of London's Art and Artists magazine.

Biography Mario Amaya was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Cuban immigrants Mario Amaya and Maria Garofalo. He studied under painters Mark Rothko and Ad Reinhardt at Brooklyn College before relocating to England in 1958, where he became assistant editor of the Royal Opera House magazine About the House (1962–1968) and founding editor of Art and Artists (1965–1968). In 1968, he organized The Obsessive Image, inaugurating the Institute of Contemporary Arts' new premises in London.

In June 1968, he was present at Pop artist Andy Warhol's studio, the Factory, when Warhol was critically wounded in a shooting by Valerie Solanas; Amaya himself sustained a minor injury. Amaya, then a journalist, was visiting New York from his base in London and was waiting to interview Warhol. He later wrote, "It was like a Magritte painting for me, with everything so real and yet so totally unreal at the same time." Bouguereau (organized with Robert Isaacson, 1975), a retrospective of visual artist Man Ray (1975), and a survey of theater director Max Reinhardt.

Amaya also contributed to art magazines such as Studio International and Art in America, and served as a visiting professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo. At one point, Amaya was engaged in research for a proposed biography of photojournalist Lee Miller (with which she co-operated), but the project did not materialize. He interviewed Miller for the May/June 1975 issue of Art in America. He interviewed art collector Peggy Guggenheim for the December 1979 issue of Warhol's Interview magazine.

Amaya was noted for his charisma, curatorial ambition, and ability to engage broad audiences with contemporary art. He was survived by his mother, who lived in Brooklyn.