The actor was 94 years old.

Sidney Poitier, the first Black man to win an Academy Award for best actor and paved the way for Black actors in Hollywood, died on January 6. He was 94 years old.

Poitier's death was confirmed by the personal assistant to Frederick A. Mitchell, the minister of foreign affairs in the Bahamas, where Poitier was raised. No further details are available at this time.

Author and civil rights activist Cornel West called Poitier "the towering American artist of African descent in the history of film."

Winning the Best Actor Oscar for Lillies of the Field, Poitier also had roles in In the Heat of the Night and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner.

In 2001, Poitier received an honorary Academy Award for his overall contribution to American cinema. Then in 2002, when Denzel Washington accepted his best actor Oscar for Training Day, he said, "Forty years I've been chasing Sidney ... I'll always be chasing you, Sidney. I'll always be following in your footsteps."

Poitier was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009 by President Obama, who said, "It's been said that Sidney Poitier does not make movies, he makes milestones ... milestones of artistic excellence, milestones of America's progress."

Our thoughts and condolences go out to Sidney Poitier's family.