2010 Awards for Excellence Announced

ASSOCIATION OF ART MUSEUM CURATORS ANNOUNCES

THE RECIPIENTS OF THE ANNUAL AWARDS FOR EXCELLENCE IN 2010

For Release May 16, 2011, New York, NY

The Association of Art Museum Curators (AAMC) announced today its annual Awards for Excellence in the categories of museum catalogues, articles, and exhibitions. Members of the AAMC are eligible for nomination, and awards are determined by the organization’s membership. "Each year our awards stand as the high-water mark for acknowledging the exemplary work of curators from across North America, " says Sally Block, Executive Director of the Association of Art Museum Curators, "What is most impressive is the these are the only awards given to curators by their peers.”

In the field of publications, the AAMC has honored Modern Women: Women Artists at the Museum of Modern Art as the Outstanding Catalogue based on a Permanent Collection. Edited by Cornelia Butler and Alexandra Schwartz, the catalogue includes essays from forty-eight contributing authors. "Modern Women is a refreshing and innovative model for rethinking what a collection catalogue can be,” says Austen Barron Bailly, prize juror and Associate Curator of American Art at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, "With its impressive range of voices and self-conscious approach to documenting the women artists in MoMA’s collection, this well-designed and thoughtfully researched book makes a vital contribution to art history and sets a new standard for the permanent collection catalogue.”

The Original Copy: Photography of Sculpture, 1839 to Today, also published by the Museum of Modern Art, took the top award for Outstanding Catalogue based on an Exhibition. "The Original Copy represents a ground-breaking contribution to the study of photography,” says Jay Clarke, Manton Curator of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, and AAMC prize jury chair, "Its conceptual frame invites the reader to reconsider the photography of sculpture and indeed to question the genres of sculpture and performance all together. The authors approach what could be overly dense theoretical material in clear and insightful ways. The forward-looking yet user-friendly methodology of the text is paired with an equally clean and elegant book design.”

The awards will be formally announced at the AAMC 10^th Anniversary Annual Meeting, to be held May 16, 2011 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The following is a complete list of winners (AAMC member’s names are listed in italics):

Outstanding Catalogue Based on a Permanent Collection

First Place

Cornelia Butler and Alexandra Schwartz with foreword by Glenn D. Lowry and essays by Esther Adler, Paola Antonelli, Carol Armstrong, Sally Berger, Johanna Burton, Cornelia Butler, Yenna Chan, Christophe Cherix, Beatriz Colomina, Huey Copeland, Aruna D’Souza, Michelle Elligott, Jennifer Field, Starr Figura, Samantha Friedman, Yuko Hasegawa, Jodi Hauptman, Jenny He, Judith B. Hecker, Jytte Jensen, Laurence Kardish, Juliet Kinchin, Pat Kirkham, Susan Kismaric, Nora Lawrence, Andres Lepik, Barbara London, Roxana Marcoci, Mary McLeod, Sarah Hermanson Meister, Helen Molesworth, Anne Morra, Luis Pérez-Oramas, Paulina Pobocha, Griselda Pollock, Christian Rattemeyer, Eva Respini, Alexandra Schwartz, Romy Silver, T’ai Smith, Sally Stein, Sarah Suzuki, Emily Talbot, Ann Temkin, Lilian Tone, Anne Umland, Gretchen L. Wagner, Deborah Wye

Modern Women: Women Artists at the Museum of Modern Art, New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 2010.

Runner-up

Denise Patry Leidy and Donna Strahan

Wisdom Embodied: Chinese Buddhist and Daoist Sculpture in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2010.

Honorable Mention

Kelly H. L'Ecuyer; with contributions by Michelle Tolini Finamore, Yvonne J. Markowitz, and Gerald W. R. Ward

Jewelry by Artists: In the Studio, 1940-2000, Boston: Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 2010.

OUTSTANDING EXHIBITION CATALOGUE

First Place

Roxana Marcoci with essays by Geoffrey Batchen and Tobia Bezzola

The Original Copy: Photography of Sculpture, 1839 to Today, New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 2010.

Honorable Mention

Stephanie D'Alessandro and John Elderfield

Matisse: Radical Invention, 1913–1917, Chicago: The Art Institute of Chicago, 2010.

OUTSTANDING ARTICLE, ESSAY or EXTENDED CATALOGUE ENTRY

First Place

Benedict Leca

"A Favourite among the Demireps”: Thomas Gainsborough and the Modern Woman in Thomas Gainsborough and the Modern Woman, Cincinnati: Cincinnati Art Museum, 2010.

Honorable Mention

Lauren Lessing

"Ties That Bind: Hiram Powers’s Greek Slave and Nineteenth‐Century Marriage," American Art 24 (Spring, 2010): 41–65.

Outstanding Monographic or Retrospective Exhibition

"Matisse: Radical Invention, 1913–1917”

Curated by Stephanie D’Alessandro, The Art Institute of Chicago, and John Elderfield.

Co-organized by the Art Institute of Chicago and The Museum of Modern Art.

Outstanding Thematic Exhibition

"Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture”

Curated by David C. Ward and Jonathon Katz. Organized by The National Portrait Gallery

Outstanding Exhibition in a University Museum

"For All the World to See: Visual Culture and the Struggle for Civil Rights”

Curated by Maurice Berger. Organized by the Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture, University of Maryland, Baltimore County in partnership with the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture.

Honorable Mention

"Lynda Benglis”
Curated by Diana Franssen, Franck Gautherot, Caroline Hancock, Laura Hoptman, Seungduk Kim, and Judith Tannenbaum. Organized by the Museum of ArtRhode Island School of Design, Providence, for the U.S. in collaboration with the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin; Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven; Le Consortium, Dijon; and New Museum, New York.

Outstanding Permanent Collection New Installation (or Re-installation)

"The Art of the Americas Wing”

Curated by Elliot Bostwick Davis; Erica E. Hirshler; Gerald W. R. Ward; Karen Quinn; Nonie Gadsden; Kelly H. L’Ecuyer; Dorie Reents-Budet; Cody Hartley; Dennis Carr; Heather Hole, Art of the Americas department, in collaboration with: Darcy Kuronen, Musical Instruments; Pamela Parmal, Textiles and Fashion Arts; Karen Haas and Elizabeth Mitchell, Prints, Drawings, and Photographs. Organized by The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Outstanding Small Exhibition (based on square footage: no more than 2,000 square feet)

"The Mourners: Medieval Tomb Sculptures from the Court of Burgundy”

Curated by Heather MacDonald and Sophie Jugie. Organized by the Dallas Museum of Art and the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon, in association with FRAME (French Regional American Museum Exchange)

Mission of the AAMC

The mission of the Association of Art Museum Curators is to support and promote the work of museum curators by creating opportunities for networking, collaboration, professional development, and advancement.

With a membership of over 1100, the goals of the AAMC are to:

· Serve as an advocacy group for the curatorial profession

· Articulate professional standards and best practices

· Promote best practices and professional relationships through Annual Meetings and educational programs on selected themes held at venues throughout North America

· Promote research, scholarship, and networking opportunities through travel grants

· Use the website to exchange scholarly and procedural information as well as traveling exhibition and employment opportunities

· Recognize distinguished achievement in the field through annual awards

· Provide an open forum for discussion about museum issues in North America

· Accomplish these goals in cooperation with museum directors, trustees, and other staff as well as other national cultural and arts advocacy organizations

END

Contact: Sally Block, AAMC Director, 212-879-5701

sally.block@artcurators.org