Australian art critic and writer Robert Hughes dies

Influential Australian art critic, historian and writer Robert Hughes has died aged 74 in New York after a long illness, a statement from his family said Tuesday.

Hughes, whom the New York Times once proclaimed the world's most famous art critic, died at the Calvary Hospital in the Bronx on Monday.

"He had been very ill for some time," said a statement from his wife Doris Downes, who was with him when he died. "Robert Hughes, critic, historian, fisherman, has died in New York City. Farewell my dear old mate.

Rest in peace," tweeted Malcolm Turnbull, an Australian politician who is married to Hughes' niece Lucy.

Born in Sydney in 1938, Hughes studied arts and architecture at Sydney University at the same time as feminist Germaine Greer and fellow writer Clive James.

AFP