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Director
National Gallery of Art (Washington DC)
| Appointee | Kaywin Feldman |
|---|---|
| Role | Director |
| Organisation | National Gallery of Art (Washington DC) |
| Domain | Art Institutions |
| Start | 4 March 2019 |
| End | Currently in role |
| Notes | First woman to direct NGA in its 82-year history |
Institutional context
The National Gallery of Art in Washington was established by an Act of Congress in March 1937 following Andrew W. Mellon's gift of his private art collection. The Director is the senior officer of the institution. From 1939 through 2019, every Director was male — a span of 80 years.
Career path
Feldman earned a BA from the University of Michigan, an MA from the Courtauld Institute of Art, and an MA from the Institute of Archaeology at University College London. She held curatorial and directorial positions at the Fresno Metropolitan Museum, the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, and the Minneapolis Institute of Art, where she served as Director from 2008 to 2019.
Appointment
The National Gallery of Art Board of Trustees announced her appointment in December 2018; she took office on 4 March 2019, succeeding Earl Powell.
Tenure
Active. Tenure has included the National Gallery's response to the pandemic and visitor-recovery period, expansion of the institution's collecting and programming around American art and underrepresented artists, and the 2024 Modern Wing reopening.
Cluster context
Feldman's 2019 appointment is the earliest of the principal art-institutional cluster events. Together with des Cars at the Louvre (2021) and Alemani at the Venice Biennale (2022), the National Gallery first-woman appointment marks the cluster's reach into the senior US institution. The Smithsonian American Art Museum and several other major US museums have had earlier female directors; the National Gallery had not.