Yaacov Agam, an Israeli artists whose brightly colored geometric sculptures and paintings delighted the eye with optical illusions and moving parts, and whose many public artworks included the world’s largest menorah and a rainbow-hued fountain that breathed fire and played music, died on June 18 at his home in Rishon LeZion, Israel. He was 98.

Mr. Agam called his works Agamographs, and he created an eyepiece with prisms for viewing them, calling it the Agamoscope.

“Art is one of the most important things from a moral, educational and public point of view,” Mr. Agam told the Haaretz newspaper of Israel in 2011. “We need art in the public space, not in the museums and not in the collections of rich people.”

Rudolph Marcus, a Canadian-born American chemist who received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for developing a theory that helped explain the electrochemical processes behind photosynthesis, respiration, oxidation and even how fireflies produce light, died on July 17 at his home in Pasadena, CA. He was 102.

Sarah Reisman, chair of the chemistry and chemical engineering division of the California Institute of Technology, where Dr. Marcus had taught since 1978, said that it was almost impossible to state the importance of Dr. Marcus’s work. “It provides a simple theory for one of the most fundamental processes in chemistry, and has been applied to understanding reactions ranging from small-molecule catalysts to proteins involved in photosynthesis,” she said.

Dr. Marcus received dozens of awards, among them the Wolf Prize, considered to be the most prestigious award in chemistry after the Nobel, and also the esteemed National Medal of Science.

It is with great sadness that The Shofar reports the unexpected passing on June 13 of Roberta Conway, long-time partner of esteemed shul member Arthur Riegel. Those of us who knew Roberta will remember her warm smile and delightful sense of humor. She will be greatly missed. The Shofar joins the membership in mourning her death.

Alan Greenspan, the influential economist who steered U.S. monetary policy during his five terms as chairman of the Federal Reserve under four presidents, died June 22 at his home in Washington, D.C. He was 100.

Greenspan helped to define modern American capitalism from the final years of the Cold War era through the dawn of the digital age. He presided over the Fed during one of the longest economic expansions in U.S. history, a boom stretching from 1991 to 2001.

Greenspan’s initial foray into the political world came in 1967, when he served as an adviser on Richard Nixon’s presidential campaign. He assisted with Mixon’s transition to the Oval Office, but turned down an official role in the administration.

In Gerald Ford’s administration, he took a position as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, serving until 1977. He pursued policies that, together with tighter monetary policy from the Paul Volcker-led Federal Reserve, helped reduce inflation from 11% to 6.5%.

Greenspan received various national and international accolades: In 2000, the French government awarded him the Legion of Honor; in 2002, Queen Elizabeth II named him an honorary Knight of the British Empire. In 2005, then-President George W. Bush awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the U.S.’s highest civilian honor.

In a statement on Greenspan’s death, the Fed said, he “brought rigorous analytical discipline to monetary policymaking, and helped establish the credibility that remains one of the central bank’s most important assets. Chairman Greenspan’s legacy endures at the Federal Reserve — in those he mentored directly, in the economists and public servants he inspired, and in the frameworks and practices he helped shape.”

Manny Nosowsky, a New York Times crossword puzzle creator who delighted solvers with his witty, pun-filled puzzles for nearly two decades, died on May 20 in San Francisco. He was 91.

Dr. Nosowsky had been practicing urology for about 20 years when he faced a sudden bout of health issues. In 1983, at age 51, he gave up medicine and retired. To fill time, he joined his wife in solving crossword puzzles, and he decided to try constructing them.

His first puzzle for The New York Times ran in 1992. Eugene T. Maleska published eight of Dr. Nosowsky’s puzzles, and Will Shortz, the current editor, chose 246 of them, which The Times has called “bundles of pun” for their wit and humor. [e.g.’s: Breakfaster’s favorite drama: omeletprinceofdenmark; Classic saucy love song: Aiolihaveeyesforyou].

Billie Tisch, the last of the original four family members whose philanthropic legacy endures in the prominent educational, cultural and medical institutions that bear their surname, died June 7 at her home in Manhattan. She was 98.

Mrs. Tisch was the widow of Laurence A. Tisch. Mr. Tisch and his brother, Preston Robert Tisch, became self-made billionaires by transforming a kosher hotel in Lakewood, NJ, into the Loews Corporation, a conglomerate that began as a movie theater chain and now has investments in hotels, drilling, natural gas pipelines, insurance and packaging. Forbes magazine has estimated the family’s fortune at $10 billion.

Mrs. Tisch was the first woman to be elected president of the Federation of Jewish Philanthropies. She was also chair of the WNYC Foundation, vice chair of United Way of New York City, and a trustee of the Carnegie Corporation. Billie and Laurence Tisch made major donations to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Wildlife Conservation Society, and New York University Medical Center, among other organizations. In 1997, they created the Tisch Children’s Zoo in Central Park with a $4.5 million gift.

“I believe that’s what one does with one’s free time is an expression of one’s deepest convictions,” she told The Times in 1981.

Albert Wolsky, a prolific Hollywood costume designer who won Academy Awards for his sequined ensembles for “All That Jazz” and who transformed Olivia Newton-John’s character from saintly to seductive in “Grease,” died May 23 at his home in Los Angeles. He was 95.

After fleeing Paris with his family during WWII and settling in New York, Mr. Wolsky accumulated more than 80 screen credits, winning him a reputation as “the dean of Hollywood costume designers.” In addition to winning two Oscars, he was nominated for five more.

Not all actors were as thrilled with Mr. Wolsky’s creations. And that was fine with him. “When an actor says, ‘I wouldn’t wear that,’” he once said, he liked to respond: “Neither would I. That’s why I call it a costume.”