2002
Florence Knoll Bassett - architect
Trisha Brown - artistic director, choreographer, dancer
Philippe de Montebello - museum director
Uta Hagen - actress, drama teacher
Lawrence Halprin - architect
Al Hirschfeld - artist, illustrator
George Jones - country music composer, performer
Ming Cho Lee - theater designer
William "Smokey" Robinson - songwriter, musician
2001
Alvin Ailey Dance Foundation - modern dance company and school
Rudolfo Anaya - writer
Johnny Cash - singer, songwriter
Kirk Douglas - actor, producer
Helen Frankenthaler - painter
Judith Jamison - artistic director, choreographer, dancer
Yo-Yo Ma - cellist
Mike Nichols - director, producer
2000
Maya Angelou - poet, writer
Eddy Arnold - country singer
Mikhail Baryshnikov - dancer, director
Benny Carter - jazz musician
Chuck Close - painter
Horton Foote - playwright, screenwriter
Lewis Manilow - arts patron
National Public Radio, Cultural Programming Division - broadcaster
Claes Oldenburg - sculptor
Itzhak Perlman - violinist
Harold Prince - theater director, producer
Barbra Streisand - entertainer, filmmaker
1999
Irene Diamond - arts patron
Aretha Franklin - singer
Michael Graves - architect, designer
Odetta - singer, music historian
The Julliard School - performing arts school
Norman Lear - producer, writer, director, advocate
Rosetta LeNoire - actress, producer
Harvey Lichtenstein - arts administrator
Lydia Mendoza - singer
George Segal - sculptor
Maria Tallchief - ballerina
1998
Jacques d'Amboise - dancer, choreographer, educator
Antoine "Fats" Domino - rock 'n' roll pianist, singer
Ramblin' Jack Elliott - folk singer, songwriter
Frank Gehry - architect
Barbara Handman - arts advocate
Agnes Martin - visual artist
Gregory Peck - actor, producer
Roberta Peters - opera singer
Philip Roth - writer
Sara Lee Corporation - corporate arts patron
Steppenwolf Theatre Company - arts organization
Gwen Verdon - actress, dancer
1997
Louise Bourgeois - sculptor
Betty Carter - jazz vocalist
Agnes Gund - arts patron
Daniel Urban Kiley - landscape architect
Angela Lansbury - actor
James Levine - opera conductor, pianist
Tito Puente - Latin percussionist, musician
Jason Robards - actor
Edward Villella - dancer, choreographer
Doc Watson - bluegrass guitarist, vocalist
MacDowell Colony - artist colony
1996
Edward Albee - playwright
Sarah Caldwell - opera conductor
Harry Callahan - photographer
Zelda Fichandler - theater director, founder
Eduardo "Lalo" Guerrero - composer, musician
Lionel Hampton - musician, bandleader
Bella Lewitzky - dancer, choreographer, teacher
Vera List - arts patron
Robert Redford - actor, director, producer
Maurice Sendak - writer, illustrator, designer
Stephen Sondheim - composer, lyricist
Boys Choir of Harlem - performing arts youth group
1995
Licia Albanese - opera singer
Gwendolyn Brooks - poet
B. Gerald and Iris Cantor - arts patrons
Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee - actors
David Diamond - composer
James Ingo Freed - architect
Bob Hope - entertainer
Roy Lichtenstein - painter, sculptor
Arthur Mitchell - dancer, choreographer
William S. Monroe - bluegrass musician
Urban Gateways - arts education organization
1994
Harry Belafonte - singer, actor
Dave Brubeck - pianist, bandleader, composer
Celia Cruz - singer
Dorothy DeLay - violin teacher
Julie Harris - actress
Erick Hawkins - dance choreographer
Gene Kelly - dancer, singer, actor
Pete Seeger - composer, lyricist, vocalist, banjo player
Catherine Filene Shouse - arts patron
Wayne Thiebaud - artist, teacher
Richard Wilbur - poet, teacher, critic, literary translator
Young Audiences - arts presenter
1993
Walter and Leonore Annenberg - arts patrons
Cabell "Cab" Calloway - singer, bandleader
Ray Charles - singer, musician
Bess Lomax Hawes - folklorist
Stanley Kunitz - poet, educator
Robert Merrill - baritone
Arthur Miller - playwright
Robert Rauschenberg - artist
Lloyd Richards - theatrical director
William Styron - writer
Paul Taylor - dancer, choreographer
Billy Wilder - movie director, writer, producer
1992
Marilyn Horne - opera singer
James Earl Jones - actor
Allan Houser - sculptor
Minnie Pearl - Grand Ole Opry performer
Robert Saudek - television producer, Museum of Broadcasting founding director
Earl Scruggs - banjo player
Robert Shaw - orchestra conductor, choral director
Billy Taylor - jazz pianist
Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown - architects
Robert Wise - film producer, director
AT&T - corporate arts patron
Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Fund - foundation arts patron
1991
Maurice Abravanel - music director, conductor
Roy Acuff - country singer, bandleader
Pietro Belluschi - architect
J. Carter Brown - museum director
Charles "Honi" Coles - tap dancer
John O. Crosby - opera director, conductor, administrator
Richard Diebenkorn - painter
R. Philip Hanes, Jr. - arts patron
Kitty Carlisle Hart - actress, singer, arts administrator, dancer
Pearl Primus - choreographer, anthropologist
Isaac Stern - violinist
Texaco Inc. - corporate arts patron
1990
George Francis Abbott - actor, playwright, producer, director
Hume Cronyn - actor, director
Jessica Tandy - actress
Merce Cunningham - choreographer, dance company director
Jasper Johns - painter, sculptor
Jacob Lawrence - painter
Riley "B.B." King - blues musician, singer
David Lloyd Kreeger - arts patron
Harris & Carroll Sterling Masterson - arts patrons
Ian McHarg - landscape architect
Beverly Sills - opera singer, director
Southeastern Bell Corporation - corporate arts patron
1989
Leopold Adler - preservationist, civic leader
Katherine Dunham - dancer, choreographer
Alfred Eisenstaedt - photographer
Martin Friedman - museum director
Leigh Gerdine - arts patron, civic leader
John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie - jazz trumpeter
Walker Kirtland Hancock - sculptor
Vladimir Horowitz (Posthumous award) - pianist
Czelaw Milosz - writer
Robert Motherwell - painter
John Updike - writer
Dayton Hudson Corporation - corporate arts patron
1988
Saul Bellow - writer
Helen Hayes - actress
Gordon Parks - photographer, film director
I.M. Pei - architect
Jerome Robbins - dancer, choreographer
Rudolf Serkin - pianist
Virgil Thomson - composer, music critic
Sydney J. Freedberg - art historian, curator
Roger L. Stevens - arts administrator
(Mrs. Vincent) Brooke Astor - arts patron
Francis Goelet - music patron
Obert C. Tanner - arts patron
1987
Romare Bearden - painter
Ella Fitzgerald - singer
Howard Nemerov - writer, scholar
Alwin Nikolais - dancer, choreographer
Isamu Noguchi - sculptor
William Schuman - composer
Robert Penn Warren - writer, poet
J. W. Fisher - arts patron
Dr. Armand Hammer - arts patron
Mr. and Mrs. Sydney Lewis - arts patrons
1986
Marian Anderson - opera singer
Frank Capra - film director
Aaron Copland - composer
Willem de Kooning - painter
Agnes de Mille - choreographer
Eva Le Gallienne - actress, author
Alan Lomax - folklorist, scholar
Lewis Mumford - philosopher, literary critic
Eudora Welty - writer
Dominique de Menil - arts patron
Exxon Corporation - corporate arts patron
Seymour H. Knox - arts patron
1985
Elliott Carter, Jr. - composer
Ralph (Waldo) Ellison - writer
Jose Ferrer - actor
Martha Graham - dancer, choreographer
Louise Nevelson - sculptress
Georgia O'Keeffe - painter
Leontyne Price - soprano
Dorothy Buffum Chandler - arts patron
Lincoln Kirstein - arts patron
Paul Mellon - arts patron
Alice Tully - arts patron
Hallmark Cards, Inc. - corporate arts patron
NOTE: In 1983, prior to the official establishment of the National Medal of
Arts, the following artists and patrons received a medal from President Reagan at a White House
luncheon arranged by the President's Committee on the Arts and the Humanities. They were: (artists)
Pinchas Zukerman, Frederica Von Stade, Czeslaw Milosz, Frank Stella, Philip Johnson and Luis
Valdez; (patrons) The Texaco Philanthropic Foundation, James Michener,* Philip Morris, Inc., The
Cleveland Foundation, Elma Lewis and The Dayton Hudson Foundation.
* who was considered a patron
National Endowment for the Arts
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