I don't care how good of an artist, how sweet a friend, nor how cherished a companion he was, he was- first and foremost- a drug addict. And, by losing his life to drugs and alcohol, he was ultimately, just another pitiful, dead addict.

Please stop romanticizing people who abuse drugs and alcohol. They may start off as nice, talented people but eventually, if they don't get help, all of their redeeming personal characteristics and amazing talents are obscured by their illness.

Let's snap photos of each other, and we'll call it 'art' and the NYC tabloidazzi will worship us.

Narcissism is a terminal illness.

He looks like another jerk-off trying to be cool with smack! And his art looks like it belongs in the grave.

"Gentle subject matter does not make genuine art"? Is The Daily Beast actually using an art critic who would write this? There were these guys calle the Impressionists, most of them lived in France. You might want to check them out -- they're almost as interesting at the Bowery School and they even had some cool parties!

Another problem: most, if not all of the quotes in this piece came from other articles and press releases. Please attribute.

And stop attempting to nuance Snow's de Menil connections. He was obviously conflicted, but remained close to members of his family, who paid for his work, covered the cost of the wrecked hotel rooms, PR, etc. If the art were good, you wouldn't feel guilty about attempting to plug the grunge myth of an aristocrat. Judge the work as work; don't repeat hoary canards.

Not once in this article do you explain to us why we should care that Snow is dead, or that he was ever alive for that matter. All I see are sad quotes from his friends and colleagues and a listing of his professional accomplishments.

In much of modern art, the bulk of art consumption is by other artists. Your article fits right in, then.

This user is no longer registered.

Sometimes the saddest of news is that which does not necessarily come as great surprise but creeps up on us all with grave finality.

gorgeous article. sometimes the saddest of news is that which does not necessarily come as great surprise but creeps up on us all with grave finality.

This comment has been removed by The Daily Beast's editors.

art is usually defined and redefined by death. I find it illuminating that some will post about drug addiction like christian rights, as if the drug addict give a damn about how you will puke on his or her grave. Isn't that what tortured the soul, knowing that such evil as the vile comments posted about a complete stranger who is one less human on this planet. i hope your life will be just as unmissed. But hey, he got you comment on his passing. Who will remember you? And most of the time, that's what art is about, not the mistakes of just being human, however flawed. I now know him. I will remember.

Wow, some true heartless bastards out there.. May someone show mercy on your soul for some of these things some of you write here. Dash Snow was a friend first.. While I can kind of see all the backlash at his exotic and kind of troubled art remember, hew was someones son, father, boyfriend, husband and someones FRIEND. Before you go off bad mouthing and saying he's better of dead remember heroin is a disease and heroin is a problem it's not a reason to shit on someone from dying from it... Have some effing compassion and sympathy and some taste!!! DASH SNOW aka SACE IRAK RIP!!! He was a friend of mine in the early years and I will never forget what genuine soul he was...

The vehemence of these comments speaks to the void between the "art world" and the general public. Galleries that promote and wallow in the decadent and self-destructive behavior of these privileged youth for the amusement of their clientele are engaging in a form of sado-masochistic "snuff" art. Nothing that Mr. Snow did remotely can be classified as art. (Take a look at his images on the Saatchi web-site). Saatchi and its patrons are in effect celebrating death, in a cynical, fashionable, and socially acceptable manner. They are in the same pathological camp as neo-nazis and jihadist suicide bombers. They are so bored with life and so inured to violence and ugliness that it becomes the object of their desire. Mr. Snow will become as obscure in death as he was in life.

From reading the comments I guess he was only famous and important to himself and few friends. That's what happens when the media attaches labels to people and expect the world to adhere.

"and we are not saved..."

Yawn....

I'm taken aback not only by the obituary's tone of unfettered worship but by the writer's clear assumption that everyone on the planet has heard of and is as obsessed with all things Dash Snow as she is. Honestly, before today I had never heard of this guy. And didn't romanticizing as "artistes" those super-rich elite brats who have the luxury to trash their lives kind of go out of style about a century ago? I mean there's certainly zero appeal these days.

Listen, I've been working on a Situationist Kinetic art installation called "Motherhood" in which I act like a mother and enact all the varied roles that such a person would be expected to produce throughout an extended length of time. Does anyone want to invest? This piece has serious collector value.

The power of the de Menil and Saatchi families on the mewling celebrity art media is here writ large. Dash Snow's lifestyle 'obituary' has appeated in the New York Times, the London Independent, and now the Teen Beat-section of The Daily Beast.
Soon-to--be Dr. Honigman sources only the artists friends and neglects to interview a single museum curator or art critic to place Snow's work in any kind of context other than the context of right here, right now. And to contextualize the late Mr. Dash by simply adding his name to a list of aesthetic suicides - where's Joplin, Ms. Honigman, or Hendrix - or the idiot boy that bought it in front of the Viper Room in Hollywood way back when? - is criminal and shoddy TMZ-journalism.
Tina Brown, where DO you get these wanna-be writers who have the bald-faced NERVE to use the word Wunderkind? This is not puke-inducing poetry. This is the equivalent of word food-poisoning.

Ana Finel Honigman - So you're a hipster, and you think that this poor Dash Snow was the first beautiful druggie artist scion of a rich family to die young and beautiful. If you actually spent more time learning about the history of art, music, and fashion, and not so much time worrying about staying "cool" and ahead of the curve - then you would have understood that these Beautiful Doomed People have been doing this to themselves and to their surviving families for thousands of years. [e.g. Heath Ledger, Jim Morrison, Shelley] His death was stupid and pointless, and your beatification of him contributes to this hackneyed ridiculous Romantic ideal, as if living and then dying on the edge gave him great artistic insight. It didn't. It just made him dead and made his daughter fatherless.

Thank you, Castigator!

ok, so he was young and full of himself and he suffered the consequences of his lifestyle. boo hoo. but artist....if i put my booger on the wall after doping myself into oblivion and my wacked out friends find it a cosmic statement...is that art or just a pathetic attempt to be a profound prophet of our times..there is a reason heroin addicts and the like are referred to as junkies.

Another dead drug adddict- and your point is

While I agree with the criticisms expressed above a culture that romanticizes people who mistreat themselves and ultimately others through their drug abuse, I am a bit startled by the vehemence of what sometimes seem like personal attacks. You may not like his art (I don't), you may not respect what he did to himself (I don't), but the man just died, can we please reign back the holier than thou name-calling such as "another pitiful, dead addict" and "worthless scumbag"? He was at the very least a human being after all.

This comment has been removed by The Daily Beast's editors.

I don't know about him being a worthless loser or a scumbag, but I agree that he was a drug addict. What bothers me most is the frivolous use of the line, "He's too beautiful a soul in an ugly world to burn out like that..."

When did this become the acceptable eulogy for souls tortured by drug and alcohol abuse? Maybe he was a cool guy, a good artist, a good dad, or a trustworthy friend, but saying that dying of a drug overdose renders him a beautiful soul in an ugly world is simply glorifying substance abuse in my view.