PORTLAND, ME.- The Portland Museum of Art announced today that Curator of American Art Karen Sherry has been promoted to Chief Curator. Her new title will be Chief Curator and Curator of American Art. Sherry joined the museum staff in June 2012 and was instrumental in the opening of the Winslow Homer Studio and the exhibition Weatherbeaten: Winslow Homer and Maine last September. Sherry will organize her first exhibition at the PMA, entitled Winslow Homer’s Civil War, which opens on September 7, 2013. She is also working on a major reinterpretation and installation plan for the museum’s permanent collection slated for 2015.

“Over the last few months, Karen has shown strong leadership skills in directing the vision of the museum’s curatorial staff and programs,” said PMA Director Mark H.C. Bessire. “The schedule of future exhibitions and the reinstallation of our permanent collection will give the museum new and diverse offerings for our visitors and members.”

In addition to her curatorial duties related to the interpretation and exhibition of pre-1950 American art, Sherry will supervise the PMA’s curatorial activities and staff, which includes: Jessica May, Curator of Contemporary and Modern Art; Margaret Burgess, The Susan Donnell and Harry W. Konkel Associate Curator of European Art; Ariel Hagan, Curatorial Coordinator; and Emily Friedman, Curatorial Assistant.

Prior to coming to the PMA, Karen Sherry was the Associate Curator of American Art at the Brooklyn Museum in New York, where she worked from 2003 to 2012. She has contributed to numerous exhibitions, catalogues, and other publications including: Fine Lines: American Drawings from the Brooklyn Museum (2013); American Moderns: From O’Keeffe to Rockwell, 1910-1960 (2012); Japonisme in American Graphic Arts, 1880-1920 (2008); “Under the Open Sky”: Landscape Sketches by Nineteenth-Century American Artists (2007); Picturing Place: Francis Guy’s Brooklyn, 1820 (2006); and The Gist of Drawing: Works of Art on Paper by John Sloan (1997). She also worked as a research assistant at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Brandywine River Museum in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, and as an adjunct professor at various colleges. In addition to her professional positions, Sherry has been the recipient of fellowships from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Smithsonian American Art Museum, and Winterthur Museum. She earned a Ph.D. and M.A. in Art History from the University of Delaware and a B.A. in Art History from Boston University.