The trailblazing Los Angeles artist Betye Saar died on Sunday (26 July), aged 99, just days before her centenary. Born Betye Irene Brown in Los Angeles in 1926, Saar was raised in a middle-class family, the oldest of five children. Betye Saar, Black Girl’s Window (1969) © 2026 Betye Saar, courtesy the artist and Roberts Projects, Los Angeles. Betye Saar’s assemblage Globe Trotter (2007), with a doll in a birdcage above a globe in reference to the slave trade Courtesy of Betye Saar and Roberts Projects, Los Angeles. In 2018, the Getty acquired Saar's archive; and in 2025, she established the Betye Saar Legacy Group to oversee her estate, in collaboration with her gallery Roberts Projects.