NEW HAVEN, CT.- The Governing Board of the Yale University Art Gallery has elected Robert W. Doran, Yale class of 1955, as its chair, and Robert F. Shapiro, Yale class of 1956, as vice chair. Frederick R. Mayer, Yale class of 1950, the former chair, will continue as a member of the board.
“The Yale Art Gallery is in the midst of a challenging period of both restoration and growth,” said Jock Reynolds, the Henry J. Heinz II Director. “I am greatly heartened to have Bob Doran take over the leadership of our Governing Board to continue the outstanding work of Frederick Mayer. We have already undertaken the awesome responsibility of returning the landmark Louis I. Kahn building to its original splendor,” he continued, “and have ambitious plans for expanded exhibition and teaching space, the better to serve the Yale, New Haven, and global communities. To realize these plans we need the imaginative and vigorous guidance of leaders like Bob Doran and Bob Shapiro.”
Mr. Doran received an M.B.A. from the Harvard Business School in 1958, and two years later was a founder of the Boston-based investment firm Thorndike, Doran, Paine and Lewis, which merged with the Wellington Management Company in 1967. He served for two decades as chief executive officer and managing partner of Wellington Management, a private investment management company headquartered in Boston, with offices around the globe. Since his retirement in 1999, he continues to serve as curator of the firm’s art collection, and has, with his wife, assembled an “eclectic” personal collection of primarily contemporary art. He is currently a trustee of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, serving on several committees, including the collections and nominating, and chairman of the Polly Hill Arboretum on Martha’s Vineyard. He has been a member of the Yale University Art Gallery Governing Board since 1999 and this year he and his wife established the Happy and Bob Doran Artist-in-Residence Program, which was launched in October with visits from performance and installation artist Janine Antoni.
“It was an agreeable surprise and great honor to be asked to head this remarkably knowledgeable and generous board,” said Mr. Doran. “I am dazzled by the Art Gallery’s holdings and the outstanding curatorial expertise, and I look forward to working with Jock Reynolds on Yale’s plans for the strengthening of the arts in the twenty-first century.”
Immediately following his graduation from Yale University, Mr. Shapiro joined Lehman Brothers and has spent his entire career in investment banking. Among the companies he has served in executive positions are Wertheim and Company, Wertheim Schroder and Company, and New Street Capital Corp. Since 1997 he has been vice chairman and partner at Klingenstein Fields and Co., LLC. Both Mr. Shapiro and his wife, Anna Marie, are active supporters of New York’s civic and arts life. He is a trustee of Lenox Hill Hospital, treasurer of the Skowhegan School board of trustees, and a trustee of the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation, and Mrs. Shapiro is a trustee of the Museum of Modern Art. They have been engaged and unstinting benefactors of Yale University and particularly the Art Gallery, supporting capital projects and making numerous exhibitions and publications possible.
