Jeffrey Uslip, who resigned as chief curator of the Contemporary Art Museum St Louis (CAM) this month, has been offered a job at the Bass Museum in Miami Beach, according to sources close to the institution. It is unclear, however, if he will take up the position as some Bass board members have strongly opposed his move to the museum.
Many have wondered where Uslip, who was also CAM’s deputy director for exhibitions and programmes, would go next after the St Louis museum announced on 10 October that he had "unexpectedly accepted a new position at another institution." The announcement followed weeks of criticism over a CAM show he organised that was described by some as racially offensive.
In September an exhibition of work by the artist Kelley Walker organised by Uslip, Direct Drive (until 31 December), opened at CAM. It includes appropriated images of police brutality against black people overlaid with chocolate and sexualised images of black women on magazine covers smeared with toothpaste. At a talk in September in St Louis, the artist, who is white, failed to explain the meaning of the works, his critics say.
Some Bass board members, including the president George Lindemann, were deeply unhappy about Uslip’s appointment, sources say. A board meeting to discuss the appointment was held yesterday (20 October). The outcome of the meeting is unknown. Lindemann and the Bass Museum’s director Silvia Karman Cubiñá both declined to comment. Jeffrey Uslip did not respond to a request for comment.
