Robert Altman has passed away, aged 81, his production company has announced this afternoon. The acclaimed director born in 1925 has been nominated for 5 Academy Awards in his lifetime. This year Altman was awarded an honourary Oscar for "a career that has repeatedly reinvented the art form". In his acceptance speech, he said he was grateful for the luck he'd had bestowed upon his movies, saying, "No other film-maker has gotten a better shake than I have. I'm very fortunate in my career.” He added, "I've never had to direct a film I didn't choose or develop. My love for film-making has given me an entree to the world and to the human condition." His films have tended to be arty, dark and sublime, and include The Player, Pret A Porter, Short Cuts, period mystery Gosford Park. His latest movie A Prairie Home Companion, starring Woody Harrelson and Tommy Lee Jones, premiered at the South By Southwest festival earlier this year. Altman's cause of death has not been revealed.