Iris CANTOR

Iris Cantor, nationally respected philanthropist, women's healthcare advocate and champion of the arts, died on February 22, 2026 in Palm Beach, FL. She was 95.
As Chairman of the Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Foundation, Mrs. Cantor nurtured the Cantor legacy in the visual arts, with a primary focus on the work of French sculptor Auguste Rodin (1840-1917) and his contemporaries. Equally passionate in support of women's health, she also was instrumental in furthering gender-targeted healthcare and research at major medical and academic institutions on both coasts.
Born and raised in Brooklyn, NY, Mrs. Cantor launched her career by joining a brokerage firm on Wall Street - then an avenue few women pursued. Through her professional activities she met her future husband, B. Gerald Cantor (1916-1996), founder of the securities brokerage Cantor Fitzgerald, Inc. A pacesetter in the financial arena, Bernie Cantor also was the world's leading private collector of works by Rodin. The Cantors collaborated in organizing exhibitions, promoting scholarship on Rodin and donating artworks to museums and universities across the United States and around the world. They established the Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Foundation in 1978 to fund medical, educational and cultural institutions and programs in the United States and abroad.
In the ensuing years, the Foundation has sent traveling exhibitions of the Cantors' beloved Rodin sculpture to cultural institutions throughout the country and beyond, reaching over 12 million people. In addition, their landmark gifts of sculpture have established or augmented Rodin collections at institutions including the Brooklyn Museum, College of the Holy Cross, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the North Carolina Museum of Art and Stanford University. Another significant beneficiary is the Musée Rodin in France, where Mrs. Cantor was inspired to executive-produce the nationally acclaimed and award winning film documenting the first lost-wax casting of Rodin's monumental work, The Gates of Hell.
"Her legacy is one of imagination, conviction, and unwavering belief in the essential role museums play-not only in what they show, but also in what they help us understand about ourselves and the world around us," said Max Hollein, director and CEO of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
After her husband's death in 1996, Mrs. Cantor continued to lead their foundation in supporting projects and programs consistent with their shared vision of furthering
scholarship on Rodin and making the sculptor's works accessible to the public. Other significant donations have expanded teaching and performance facilities at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, including a new film center and the university's first professional proscenium theater.
Mrs. Cantor also was a philanthropic force on behalf of women's health. Having lost her younger sister to breast cancer, she became a leading advocate for mammography as a tool for early cancer detection. She established the Iris Cantor Center for Breast Imaging at UCLA in 1986. She then expanded her interests to address women's health comprehensively, founding a women's health center at UCLA in 1995 and another at New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center in 2002.
Within a decade, 40 percent of the patients at the New York women's center were men. Responding to the clear need for a counterpart facility for men at New York-Presbyterian, Mrs. Cantor established the Iris Cantor Men's Health Center, the first of its kind in the New York region, in 2012.
The Iris Cantor Health Centers embody the perspective that Mrs. Cantor was among the first, not merely to espouse, but to actively propel toward a new healthcare model: that men and women have different and unique medical needs and respond best to targeted care. In addition, all three facilities reflect Mrs. Cantor's belief in the value of treating the whole person and encouraging preventive measures and healthy lifestyles. Consistent with this perspective, her 2019 gift to the Andrew Weil Center for Integrative Medicine at the University of Arizona enabled construction of one of three structures comprising the new complex.
The Cantor legacy in healthcare is as comprehensive as that in the arts, and certain to be equally enduring. In a joint statement, the New York-Presbyterian Board of Trustees lauded Mrs. Cantor, a Life Trustee, as "one of the earliest and most influential philanthropic voices calling for advancing medical research and improving care for all."
Dr. Janet Pregler, director of the Iris Cantor-UCLA Women's Health Center, noted that
"Iris Cantor's vision for women's health has been transformational. Her sustained advocacy has shaped comprehensive healthcare for tens of thousands of women."
Mrs. Cantor received many accolades for her philanthropic leadership, innovation and patronage. She held honorary doctorates in fine arts from the College of the Holy Cross and Laguna College of Art+Design, as well as an honorary fine arts degree from Brooklyn's Pratt Institute and UCLA's highest honor, The UCLA Medal. The National Medal of Arts was bestowed upon her and her husband by President Bill Clinton in 1995. The French
National Order of the Legion of Honor named her a Chevalier in 2000 for her work in promoting women's healthcare as well as Rodin, and then elevated her to Officier in 2017.
In 2008 she received the Big Apple Award from the Tisch School of the Arts at NYU. New York-Presbyterian Hospital named her its Trustee of the Year in 2003 and honored her at its 2015 Annual Gala. Also in 2015, the premier gallery of the Musée Rodin was named "Hall Iris et B. Gerald Cantor," a distinction rarely accorded by a French museum. She received the New York Weill Cornell Council Leadership Award in 2018.
Mrs. Cantor was active in the philanthropic and cultural life of her native New York as well as Los Angeles and Palm Beach, FL, serving on numerous leadership boards at universities, medical centers and arts institutions.
Iris Cantor was predeceased by her husband Bernie, her beautiful mother Faye, and her sisters Binnie and Enid. She is survived by her nieces Randi Aitken, Suzanne Fisher, Michele Geller, Monica Muhart, great-nephew Ryan Fisher, and many other loving nieces and nephews as well as family friend John Desiderio. Funeral services will be private. A celebration of life will be held in the spring.

Contact:
Ryan Fisher