On November 8, 2023, Lynette Lombard, 69, of Galesburg, IL and Glenford, NY, passed away peacefully with her beloved husband Tony Gant by her side, after a courageous 20 month battle with glioblastoma.
Lynette was born in Newton, Massachusetts to the late June H. (Leshynska) and Peter A. Lombard, and grew up in the Boston suburbs. From her earliest years, Lynette was enraptured by art. After completing high school at The Ethel Walker School in Connecticut, she lived for a year in Paris and took courses at L’Ecole des Beaux Arts. She earned her B.A. Honours from Goldsmiths’ College, University of London, and lived in London for well over a decade until relocating to New York City in the 1980s, where she attended the New York Studio School for two years before earning her MFA at Yale University. At Yale she met her cherished and devoted husband, Tony Gant.
Together they taught studio art and art history at Knox College for over three decades. She was a happy warrior for art and devoted her life to creating, celebrating, and bringing art alive to generations of devoted students as the Chancie Ferris Booth Distinguished Professor of Art at Knox College. She interpreted the world around her with a joyful energy and intensity that pulse through her paintings and drawings. Those qualities were abundantly in evidence even as she struggled with her disease these last 20 months. She took refuge in the joy of creating radiant landscape drawings, most recently with her left hand, that were as brilliantly colorful as her prognosis was dark.
Lynette received numerous awards at Knox, including in 2022 the Presidential Award for Faculty Excellence and the Philip Green Wright Lombard Award for Distinguished Teaching in 1999, as well as several Knox Faculty Research and Creative Work grants.
She also taught at the Chautauqua Institute School of Art in New York, the Ox-Bow School of Art at SAIC in Michigan, and Mt. Gretna School of Art in Pennsylvania. She was a visiting artist at Brandeis University, Rider University, Bethany College, Western Connecticut State University, and the International School in Montecastello di Vibio, Italy.
Lynette was represented by the Bowery Gallery in New York City, the Confluence Collective in Spain, the Midwest Paint Group, and the group Seven on Site.
Her work has been exhibited in galleries in the U.S. and abroad: at the Lohin Geduld Gallery, The Painting Center, and Westbeth Gallery, all in New York City; the Artemisia Gallery, Chicago; The Figge Museum, in Davenport, IA; the Lakeview Museum and Riverfront Museum in Peoria, IL; the Museum of Modern Art in Mojacar, Spain and La Barquilla Gallery in Sorbas, Spain; and Newtownbarry House in Bunclody, Ireland.
Until her illness, she and Tony spent summers at their home on Spain’s Costa del Sol.
Above her many accomplishments, Lynette will be lovingly remembered for her great strength and gentle soul, goodwill towards all, and unbounded positive energy.
In addition to Tony, she leaves her brother Peter (Ann), niece Sarah Sliney (Matt) and nephew Julian. She also leaves an extraordinarily devoted group of friends who helped her throughout her illness: Natania Rosenfeld and Neil Blackadder, Roberta Glick, Judy Koon, Megan Williamson, Mark Holmes, and Mary Kay and Frank Shaw. Her loving sister-in-law Darsi Miller was with her and Tony close to the end. The family also thanks her doctors and caregivers.
There will be a celebration-of life ceremony at a future date.
In lieu of flowers, please consider making a donation in Lynette’s memory to the Mount Gretna School of Art. ( https://www.mgsoa.org/lombard ).
Online expressions of sympathy may be sent to the family at www.watsonthomas.com.
