Comings and Goings

This month:

  • Haunch of Venison New York brings on Robert Goff as director
  • Rebecca Heid­en­berg opens RH Gallery
  • Tanja Wagner opens gallery in Berlin
  • Ekow Eshun steps down as executive director of London's Institute of Contemporary Arts
  • Tate Liverpool names Gavin Delahunty as new head of exhibitions and displays
  • James Goggin new director of Design, Print, and Digital Media for the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago
  • Istanbul's Dogancay Museum has a new director, Bergin Azer
  • Artist Mark Wallinger appointed to Southbank Centre's Board of Governors
  • Randall Boursheidt stepping down as CEO of The Alliance for the Arts
  • Harvard Art Museums pick Lynette Roth to be Daimler-Benz associate curator
  • Maja Hoffmann appointed Tate trustee
  • New COO for the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences is Justin Estoque
  • John Connelly director of the Felix Gonzalez-Torres Foundation
  • Dr. Kent Lydecker new director of Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg
  • Icelandic artist Erró to receive Chevalier degree of the French Légion d’honneur
  • Anne Barlow appointed curator of Bucharest Biennale
  • Hermann Parzinger made corresponding fellow of the British Academy
  • Alison Yarrington will be new chair of UK’s Association of Art Historians
  • David Anderson to be director general of National Museum Wales
  • Sanne Houby-Nielsen new director general of the National Museums of World Culture
  • Julian Cox named chief curator of the De Young Museum.
  • Kelly Baum becomes first curator of modern and contemporary art at Princeton
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    Elizabeth Wyckoff will be curator of prints, drawings and photographs at Saint Louis Art Museum

    The Saint Louis Art Museum has named Elizabeth Wyckoff to be its curator of prints, drawings and photographs, starting in December. Wyckoff has spent the last six years with the Davis Museum and Curatorial Center at Wellesley College in Massachusetts, where she has most recently held the position of assistant director for curatorial affairs and education. She joined the Davis in 2004 as curator of prints and drawings and was responsible for curating a range of exhibitions, including the 2008 Grand Scale: Monumental Prints in the Age of Dürer and Titian. Wyckoff began her career as a print study room curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and has also worked with the New York Public Library as a print specialist, in addition to having received several grants and fellowships throughout her career.

    Bruce Metro retiring from role as head of preparation at the Getty after 31 years

    Bruce Metro, head of preparation at the Getty Museum and Villa, has announced he is retiring after 31 years with the organisation. Kevin Marshall, who has been with the museum since 1995, will be his successor. Metro joined the Getty in 1979 and has been responsible for the realisation of over 400 exhibitions as well as a number of permanent collection installations and reinstallations. He also played a major role in the launching of the Getty Center in 1997 and the renovation of the Getty Villa by liaising with the architect and contractor on the designs.

    Emmanuel Di Donna leaves Sotheby's to become private advisor

    Emmanuel Di Donna, a Sotheby’s vice chairman and head of impressionist and modern evening sales, has left the auction house to become a New York-based private dealer and advisor. “I had 17 fabulous years at Sotheby’s, but after a while, it’s good to renew oneself,” Di Donna, 38, told The Art Newspaper. Di Donna, along with Simon Shaw, was the public face of Sotheby’s evening impressionist and modern art auctions in New York. Born is France, he has been based in Sotheby’s New York office for the past five years. Sotheby’s does not plan to replace him. Shaw will oversee the evening auctions, aided by other long-serving departmental staff, David Norman, worldwide co-chairman of the impressionist and modern art department who has been with the firm since 1985 and Charles Moffett, the vice-chairman of the impressionist and modern art department in New York, who came aboard in 1998.

    Roy Ritchie to retire as director of research at the Huntington in June 2011

    Robert “Roy” Ritchie will retire from his position as director of research at the Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens in June of next year. He has been in his current position for 18 years and said he will remain at the organisation as a senior research associate. Before joining the Huntington in 1992, Ritchie was a history professor and associate chancellor at the University of California, San Diego. In 2003 and 2004 Ritchie established two institutes with the University of Southern California: the USC­-Huntington Early Modern Studies Institute and the Huntington-­USC Institute on California and the West. And under his direction, the Huntington’s education program has expanded greatly, including a current corps of more than 1,000 volunteers. In his final year as director of research, he is bringing in 152 fellows to the organisation.

    Director of the Frick Collection, Anne L. Poulet, announces she will retire in autumn 2011

    Anne L. Poulet, director of The Frick Collection, has announced that she will retire in the autumn of 2011 after more than eight years with the institution. During her time at the Frick, Poulet has made many acquisitions for the museum and directed a refurbishment of the mansion's galleries and public spaces. Before she retires, she will continue this work by overseeing the enclosure of the Fifth Avenue portico in order to give the museum its first new gallery space in over thirty years. Under Poulet's direction, the Frick Art Reference Library has pursued both the digitization of its materials as well as collection sharing initiatives. Poulet has also had success in building up the fundraising program at the Frick Collection, developing the Director's Circle, a group of members who each give a minimum of $25,000 a year. Poulet said she is planning to continue to pursue research and writing during retirement, but at a more leisurely pace.

    Alice Beamesderfer is the Philadelphia Museum of Art's new deputy director for collections and exhibitions

    The Philadelphia Museum of Art has named Alice Beamesderfer as deputy director for collections and exhibitions. Beamesderfer has been with the museum since 1987 and has held numerous positions during that time, most recently serving as associate director of collections and interim head of curatorial affairs from 2008 onwards. In 2002, she organised the exhibition and catalogue for Gifts in Honor of the 125th Anniversary of the Museum. And she collaborated on the exhibition A Conversation in Three Dimensions: Sculpture from the Collections in 2007. Before joining the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Beamesderfer was special assistant to the director at the Institute of Contemporary Art, University of Pennsylvania.

    Smithsonian American Art Museum names E. Carmen Ramos curator for Latin Art

    The Smithsonian American Art Museum has appointed E. Carmen Ramos as its curator for Latin Art, meaning she will be responsible for acquiring works for the museum's permanent collection. She will also produce a major exhibition and catalogue based on the museum's Latin holdings for fall 2013. Ramos is an independent curator who was formerly curator of exhibitions for the Arts Council of Princeton at the Paul Robeson Center for the Arts and assistant curator for cultural engagement at the Newark Museum. She co-curated the fifth biennial at El Museo del Barrio in New York City in 2007 and is currently a doctoral candidate at the University of Chicago with a focus on modern art in Latin America.

    Architect David Rockwell joins the board of the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum

    Architect and designer David Rockwell has joined the board of the Smithsonian Institution’s Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum. Rockwell has been on the museum's exhibitions committee since 2006 and is founder and chief executive of the Rockwell Group. His most recent work includes building the sets for the Academy Awards in 2009 and 2010 as well as the newly opened Imagination Playground at New York's South Street Seaport, which encourages children to create their own play environment. Rockwell was also a finalist for the Cooper-Hewitt's National Design Awards in 2007 for his work on the Union Square W hotel.

    Daniel Walker now head of two curatorial departments at Art Institute of Chicago

    The Art Institute of Chicago has named Daniel Walker as the head of two curatorial departments of its museum: the Pritzker chair and curator of Asian Art and the chair and Christa C. Mayer Thurman curator of Textiles. Walker served as director of the Textile Museum in Washington, D.C. From 2005 to 2009 and as head of the Islamic department at the Metropolitan Museum of Art from 1988 to 2005. Before that, he was curator of Ancient, Near Eastern, and Far Eastern Art at the Cincinnati Art Museum. Walker is currently collaborating on a major catalogue of oriental carpets in the collection of Lisbon's Gulbenkian Museum.

    Alexandra Schwartz to be first curator of contemporary art at Monclair Art Museum

    Alexandra Schwartz has been appointed the first curator of contemporary art at the Monclair Art Museum in New Jersey. Schwartz has worked in curatorial contexts at the Museum of Modern Art since 2004, most recently as the coordinator of MoMA's Modern Women's Project for which she curated “Mind and Matter, Alternative Abstractions, 1940s to now”, a group exhibition of ten artist. Schwartz also published a book earlier this year “Ed Ruscha's Los Angeles”, examining Ruscha's work in relation to the cultural contexts of its production. And she has also taught at Columbia University and in the education departments at MoMA and the Whitney Museum.

    Dr. Margaretta Frederick named chief curator of Delaware Art Museum

    Dr. Margaretta Frederick has been named chief curator of the Delaware Art Museum. Frederick will continue to serve as curator to the museum's collection of Pre-Raphaelite art while also leading the curatorial vision for the museum's upcoming centennial celebration, including a major retrospective exhibition on Howard Pyle. She joined the Delaware Art Museum after college, returning after completing her doctorate to achieve full curatorship in 1997. Frederick organized Waking Dreams, the two-year tour of the museum's pre-Raphaelite collection, which is the largest holding outside of Britain. She also oversaw the collection's reinstallation in 2007.

    Former Men's Health publisher Steven Pleshette Murphy takes over as ceo of Christie's

    Christie’s has brought in an art world outsider its new chief executive. Steven Pleshette Murphy, former head of US publisher Rodale replaces Edward Dolman. Dolman , who joined Christie’s in 1984 initially as a European furniture specialist, has been named chairman and will concentrate on client and business development, relinquishing the firm’s daily operations to Murphy. “I don’t have an official art background,” Murphy said in an interview. “I’m not a collector with a capital ‘C’.” Murphy does have strong managerial skills. He ran Rodale from 2002 to 2009, overseeing the launch of magazines including “Men’s Health” and “Prevention”. He took a year off in 2009 for “personal exploration”, when he learned that Christie’s was seeking a new head. He is to focus on building the firm’s business in Asia, expanding new markets as well as exploring alternative channels of selling, he said. Murphy is the first American appointed as chief executive of the London-based auctioneer. He will relocate to London with his wife.

    Alexie Glass-Kantor and Natasha Bullock named as curators of the 2012 Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art

    Art Gallery of South Australia director Nick Mitzevich announced the appointment of Alexie Glass-Kantor, pictured, and Natasha Bullock as curators of the 2012 Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art, calling the two a “dynamic duo”. Bullock is the curator of contemporary art at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney and Glass-Kantor is the director of Gertrude Contemporary Art Spaces, Melbourne. The biennial was established in 1990 and is staged by the Art Gallery of South Australia.

    New name and location for Francesca Kauf­mann gallery

    Milan’s Francesca Kauf­mann gallery has moved to a new address on via di Porta Tenaglia, and changed its name to Kaufmann Repetto to reflect the addition of sister Chiara Repetto as a partner.

    Cristopher Canizares joins Hauser & Wirth

    Cristopher Canizares has joined Hauser & Wirth in New York as associate director. Canizares was most recently director at the Richard Gray Gallery and was at Matthew Marks gallery before that.

    Cornell DeWitt director of Pulse fair

    Cornell DeWitt has replaced Helen Allen as director of Pulse art fair. DeWitt previously ran his own gallery and worked as an advisor and curator. Allen continues to run her own consulting firm.

    Schroeder Romero & Shredder open new space

    “A whole new way of looking at art” courtesy of Lisa Schroeder and Sara Jo Romero, pictured, of Schroeder Romero & Shredder, who have teamed up to create a hybrid gallery opening this autumn on West 26th street. The 4,000 sq ft space will show simultaneous exhibitions of works from Schroeder Romero's contemporary holdings alongside historical works from Shredder's catalogue.

    Dan Morphy expands auction house

    Dan Morphy Auctions in Pennsylvania has started on an expansion project to double the company’s space. Owner and CEO Dan Morphy says that his firm has been bursting at the seams and simply needs more space thanks to explosive growth. At the end of construction, the new auction gallery will feature 110 theatre-style seats, each with a fold-over lap desk and cup holder.

    Charles Martin returns to Bonhams as consultant

    Charles Martin has returned to Bonhams company after 25 years, to work as a consultant. Martin first joined Bonhams in 1983 as a porter and junior cataloguer for silver. He moved to Sotheby’s in 1985 and became head of their silver department in 1992. Since then he has worked for various local auction houses and continued as a Sotheby’s consultant.

    Jon Baddeley managing director of Bonhams Knights­bridge

    Jon Baddeley is the new managing director of Bonhams Knights­bridge saleroom. He joined Bon­hams in 2003 as global director of collectors’ sales, and is known for his appearances on the UK version of “The Antiques Roadshow”.

    Georgina Pemberton joins Agnew's new space

    Agnew’s opened its new space on Albemarle Street in London with old masters on the first-floor of the gallery while showcasing modern and contemporary on the ground floor. Georgina Pemberton, pictured, formerly of Sotheby’s Australia, has joined the gallery as director and Gina Agnew has been appointed as associate director.

    Charlotte Eyerman starts consulting firm

    Charlotte Eyer­man has left the Los Angeles branch of Gag­osian to work as a freelance consultant. Before joining Gag­osian, she was curator of modern and contemporary art at the St Louis Art Museum and assistant curator of paintings at the Getty Museum.

    Beatrice Chang closes gallery and goes private

    The contemporary Japanese and Chinese ceramics dealer Beatrice Chang has shuttered her Dai Ichi Arts gallery on the East Side to go private. She now displays the contemporary ceramic work for sale alongside other furnishings in her Central Park South duplex for clients to view by appointment.

    Joel Mesler relocates and renames gallery

    Rental Gallery has undergone a facelift. The New York gallery, which changed its name to Untitled, moved to 30 Orchard Street and welcomed former White Cube director Carol Cohen, as a new partner for Joel Mesler.

    Bernarducci Meisel gallery's move doubles its size

    Bernarducci Meisel gallery is doubling its exhibition space from 3,000 to 6,000 sq. ft with a move to the third floor of its current home on West 57th street. Co-owner Frank Bernarducci, left, with Louis Meisel, said the move was thanks to “the softer commercial real estate market”.

    Haunch of Venison New York brings on Robert Goff as director

    Haunch of Venison, which was bought out by Christie’s in 2007, has a new director. Chelsea dealer Robert Goff will head up the New York operation. Founders Harry Blain and Graham Southern left the gallery in June.

    Rebecca Heid­en­berg opens RH Gallery

    Rebecca Heid­en­berg, daughter of dealer Lillian, has opened a gallery on New York’s Duane St, dedicated to international contemporary art and design.

    Tanja Wagner opens gallery in Berlin

    Tanja Wagner has left Berlin’s Max Hetzler Gal­lery and opened her own space on Pohl­strasse. Wagner will take part in this year's Artforum Berlin (7-10 October).

    Ekow Eshun steps down as executive director of London's Institute of Contemporary Arts

    Ekow Eshun has announced he will be stepping down as executive director of London's Institute of Contemporary Arts in March of next year. Eshun has been with the institute, first as its artistic director, for five years and has recently helped build a new five-year plan for the beleaguered institution. He says he is leaving to write a new book, continue his broadcasting commitments, and develop new cultural initiatives.

    Tate Liverpool names Gavin Delahunty as new head of exhibitions and displays

    Tate Liverpool has announced that Gavin Delahunty will be the new head of exhibitions and displays. Currently a curator at Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art, Delahunty will join the gallery in November. He succeeds Peter Gorshlüter, who has taken up the position of deputy director at the Museum für Moderne Kunst in Frankfurt. Delahunty previously worked at Modern Art Oxford, the Douglas Hyde gallery, and the Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin.

    James Goggin new director of Design, Print, and Digital Media for the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago

    Designer James Goggin is the newest director of Design, Print, and Digital Media for the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. Goggin established his design studio, Practise, in 1999. Since 2003 he has been a design consultant for Tate Britain and Tate Modern and has worked with a variety of other organizations and companies. He is also a lecturer at various design institutions.

    Istanbul's Dogancay Museum has a new director, Bergin Azer

    The Dogancay Museum in Istanbul, Turkey has a new director in Bergin Azer. A graduate of SUNY Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, Azer worked with the Smithsonian Institution and Metropolitan Museum of Art before moving to the private sector. The Dogancay Museum is Turkey's first modern art museum, established in 2004.

    Artist Mark Wallinger appointed to Southbank Centre's Board of Governors

    Artist Mark Wallinger has been appointed to Southbank Centre's Board of Governors. Last year Wallinger's exhibition “The Russian Linesman” was shown at the Hayward Gallery. He represented Britain at the 2001 Venice Biennale and won the Turner Prize in 2007. His life-sized figure of Christ, Ecce Homo, occupied the Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar square in 1999.

    Randall Boursheidt stepping down as CEO of The Alliance for the Arts

    Randall Boursheidt will step down as chief executive officer of The Alliance for the Arts at the end of this year. He will become president emeritus of the alliance and serve as a consultant to assist with projects. The Alliance board has appointed a search committee to supervise the transition and appoint a new CEO.

    Harvard Art Museums pick Lynette Roth to be Daimler-Benz associate curator

    The Harvard Art Museums have named Lynette Roth as Daimler-Benz associate curator of the Busch-Reisinger Museum, effective January 2011. Roth is a specialist in early 20th-century German art and is currently the Mellon post-doctoral fellow in Modern Art at the St. Louis Art Museum, where she has been creating the first comprehensive catalogue on the museum's extensive collection of paintings by Max Beckmann.

    Maja Hoffmann appointed Tate trustee

    Maja Hoffmann has been appointed as a Tate trustee. Hoffmann is a contemporary art collector as well as the founder of the LUMA Foundation, which aims to produce artistic and cultural projects worldwide. She is also president of the Kunsthalle Zurich Foundation and a board member of the New Museum. The appointment is for four years.

    New COO for the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences is Justin Estoque

    Justin Estoque is the new chief operating officer for the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences. He was formerly with the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian, where he served as the director of the executive planning office. Estoque also managed several major capital projects for the Smithsonian Institution and has worked with libraries and library resource centers in Washington and throughout the Native American world.

    John Connelly director of the Felix Gonzalez-Torres Foundation

    Dealer John Connelly closed his Chelsea gallery after eight years to take up the mantle of director of the Felix Gonzalez-Torres Foundation. Connelly was formerly the director at Andrea Rosen’s gallery, which represents the Gonzalez-Torres estate. Rosen also established the foundation.

    Dr. Kent Lydecker new director of Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg

    The Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg has named Dr. Kent Lydecker as its new director. He begins his duties 12 October, replacing Dr. John Schloder, who retired in July after more than nine years in the position. Lydecker led the education department at the Metropolitan Museum of Art for 18 years. Before that, he was director of education at the Art Institute of Chicago and he began his career at the National Gallery of Art in 1974.

    Icelandic artist Erró to receive Chevalier degree of the French Légion d’honneur

    Icelandic artist Erró (born 1932 as Gudmundur Gudmundsson) is to get the Chevalier degree of the French Légion d’honneur. Erró, who moved to France in 1958, receives the recognition for his 52 years service to art and culture in France and internationally. Erró is widely known since the 60s for his works often referring to the comic culture and using collage technique. The Reykjavík Art Museum is almost continuously showing shifting exhibitions with Erró´s works. After a focus on his portraits an exhibition titled “Collages” will follow from September on. Next year when Iceland is the guest of honour at the Frankfurt Book fair an Erró exhibition will be held in Frankfurt.

    Anne Barlow appointed curator of Bucharest Biennale

    The organisers of the Bucharest Biennale have appointed Anne Barlow as the curator for the event’s fifth edition in 2012. Originally from Scotland, Barlow is the Executive Director of the non-profit organization Art in General, New York. The Biennale, staged by Bucharest’s Pavilion magazine, is Romania’s most prominent contemporary art event, with Barlow’s appointment marking the first time a woman has been selected as curator. She will take over from German, Felix Vogel who curated the fourth edition of the Biennale held between May and July this year. Barlow will announce her plans for the 2012 Biennale at a press conference at Art in General on 21st September.

    Hermann Parzinger made corresponding fellow of the British Academy

    Hermann Parzinger, Professor of Pre-History, archaeologist and President of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, has been made Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy. Parzinger is convinced that the membership will strengthen the foundation’s profile as an academic institution and its strategic position within the international museums’ network. Among many others he is also a member of the Research Centre of Ancient Civilization Peking, the Real Academia de la Historia Madrid and the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences.

    Alison Yarrington will be new chair of UK’s Association of Art Historians

    Following a call for nominations in July, the UK’s Association of Art Historians has named its new chair, Alison Yarrington. The University of Glasgow-based specialist in sculpture was elected to the post unopposed. She takes over at the next annual conference, to be held at the University of Warwick in April 2011.

    David Anderson to be director general of National Museum Wales

    David Anderson is to be the new director general of National Museum Wales, which runs the main museum in Cardiff’s Cathays Park, along with six other sites. In October Anderson takes over from Michael Houlihan, who went to Wellington last month to head the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tonga­rewa. Anderson was the director of learning and interpretation at the Victoria & Albert Museum, where he worked for 20 years, recently overseeing its Sackler Centre for arts education. His immediate task at Cathays Park will be to finish refurbishment of the upper galleries for modern and contemporary art (due to reopen in July 2011) and upgrade the ground floor displays of natural history (and further ahead, to develop plans for an extension to provide more space for natural history). Anderson takes over in Wales on 11 October.

    Sanne Houby-Nielsen new director general of the National Museums of World Culture

    The Swedish government has appointed Sanne Houby-Nielsen as director general of the National Museums of World Culture, Gothenburg. She has led institutions under the National Museums of World Culture umbrella since 2000, including the Museum of Mediterranean and Near Eastern Antiquities and the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities. She holds a doctorate in classical archaeology, and she previously worked as head of the Royal Cast Collection at the National Gallery of Denmark in Copenhagen and was field manager for the Danish-Greek excavations in Chalcis.

    Julian Cox named chief curator of the De Young Museum.

    The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, which administers the Legion of Honor and De Young Museum, has named Julian Cox as its founding curator of photography, and chief curator of the De Young Museum. He takes over this month with the post supported by a gift from the John and Lisa Pritzker Family Fund, which will also cover the acquisition, publication, exhibition and programming costs of the photography department.

    Kelly Baum becomes first curator of modern and contemporary art at Princeton

    Princeton University Art Museum continues to strengthen its expertise in modern and contemporary by appointing Kelly Baum as its first curator of the department. Baum has worked at the Princeton museum since December 2007 as the curatorial fellow for contemporary art. She has already expanded the contemporary collection and developed an international artist-in-residency programme.

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