PITTSBURGH, PA.- Carnegie Museum of Art announces two staff promotions and two curators sharing responsibilities of the chief curator.
Dan Byers, previously assistant curator of contemporary art, and Amanda Zehnder, previously assistant curator of fine arts, have been promoted to associate curators. Zehnder, who joined the museum in 2005, has curated numerous exhibitions in the Works on Paper Gallery, including the current Caricature, Satire, and Comedy of Manners: Works on Paper from the 18th through 20th Centuries. Byers has been with the museum since 2009 and is currently working on Forum 65: Jones, Koester, Nashashibi/Skaer: Reanimation, opening July 3 in the Forum Gallery, and the exhibition Ordinary Madness, opening November 6.
The museum also announces that Louise Lippincott has stepped down as chief curator, a position she has held since 2006, to focus on curatorial responsibilities while heading the department of fine arts. The chief curator role has historically rotated among senior curatorial staff at the museum. “During her tenure as chief curator, Louise oversaw the acquisition of important works of art, was a mentor to staff, and crafted celebrated exhibitions,” said Lynn Zelevansky, The Henry J. Heinz II Director of Carnegie Museum of Art. “Additionally, she was one of the acting co-directors in 2008 through 2009. She has taken on projects above and beyond her day-to-day curatorial responsibilities, and I understand and support her desire to fully dedicate herself to the scholarly research and exhibition planning at which she excels.”
Lippincott, who has been head of fine arts since 1991, is currently working on two exhibitions opening next year: Andrey Avinoff: In Pursuit of Beauty and a retrospective of the photographer Charles “Teenie” Harris. She will also oversee a major reinstallation of the museum’s Impressionist collection, scheduled for 2012.
Previously, Lippincott organized the celebrated exhibition Fierce Friends: Artists and Animals, 1750–1900 in 2006 and Light! The Industrial Age, 1750–1900 in 2001. She was project manager of the popular exhibition Pittsburgh Revealed: Photographs since 1850 in 1997. She is also responsible for managing the conservation, cataloguing, and digital imaging of the Teenie Harris Archive, a collection of more than 80,000 negatives by Charles “Teenie” Harris that documents the historic events and daily life in Pittsburgh ’s African American community from the 1930s and to 1970s.
Taking on duties previously associated with the chief curator are Linda Benedict-Jones, curator of photography and the new curatorial chair, exhibitions, and Jason Busch, The Alan G. and Jane A. Lehman Curator of Decorative Arts and the new curatorial chair, collections.
“This is the first time we have people sharing the responsibilities for chief curator,” said Zelevansky. “I’m interested to see if this new strategy is workable in the long term.”
Busch, who has worked at the museum since 2006 as the head of decorative arts, was the force behind the recent reopening of the Ailsa Mellon Bruce Galleries of decorative arts and design. Benedict-Jones, who joined the museum in 2008 to head the newly created department of photography, was the curator of Digital to Daguerreotype: Photographs of People in 2009.
Busch will oversee the activities of departments focusing on collection care and management, while Benedict-Jones will coordinate exhibition planning and implementation. They will also continue to organize and curate exhibitions for their respective departments. Zelevansky will supervise the curators and assume staff evaluations and other human resources responsibilities formerly handled by the chief curator.
