The Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD) will hold its annual meeting in Dallas/Fort Worth, from Saturday, May 31 through Tuesday, June 3, 2014. This will be the final meeting under the presidency of Timothy Rub, Director of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. He will be succeeded as AAMD president at the conclusion of the meeting by Susan Taylor, Director of the New Orleans Museum of Art.

In addition to a series of panel discussions, presentations by outside speakers, and committee and task force meetings, this meeting will also continue AAMD’s Leadership Development Program sessions. Geared towards member directors with less than 10 years of experience in that role, the Dallas/Fort Worth sessions will explore:

• The increasing demands of governance faced by art museums, in a session led by Southern Methodist University (SMU) Professor Wayne Shaw Ph.D., The Helmut Sohmen Endowed Professorship in Corporate Governance
• Strategies for good financial modeling and management, presented by William Maxwell, Professor of Finance at SMU

Among the other panel discussions and presentations scheduled for the meeting are:

• “Learning in Art Museums,” moderated by Lori Fogarty, Chair of AAMD’s Education Committee (Oakland Museum of California), and featuring: Gretchen Dietrich, Executive Director of the Utah Museum of Fine Arts; Richard Evans, Director of EmcArts’ programs and strategic partnerships; and Terry K. Peterson, PhD,  Director of the Afterschool and Community Learning Network;
• A series of workshops with leading experts in the field of education from inside and outside the museum community;
• A session on “Change Management,” presented by Dr. Tassu Shervani, the Marilyn and Leo Corrigan Endowed Professor of Marketing at the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University;
• A keynote address by Dan Pallotta, author of “Uncharitable: How Restraints on Nonprofits Undermine Their Potential,” and the founder and Chief Humanity Officer of Advertising for Humanity;
• And a closing program on the Getty Foundation's Online Scholarly Catalogue Initiative (OSCI).

In addition, AAMD will hold a series of member workshops with museum directors, educators, and leading experts from inside and outside the museum field.

Another featured part of the program in Dallas/Fort Worth is a panel discussion titled “Cities and Cultural Investment: A Snapshot,” which will be held at the Dallas Museum of Art on Sunday, June 1 at 5:30 p.m. and is free and open to the public. Reservations, which are required, can be made at http://www.dma.org/programs/event/cities-and-cultural-investment-snapshot. The discussion will explore how city governments are investing in the arts and culture, and what the research data tells us about the impact of those investments on different communities. Moderated by Maxwell Anderson (Dallas Museum of Art), other participants include: John Rossant, Executive Chairman of Publicis Live! in Paris, and Chairman of the New Cities Foundation, based in Geneva; and Professor Zannie Voss, Chair and Professor of Arts Management and Arts Entrepreneurship in the Meadows School of the Arts and the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University, Director of the National Center for Arts Research.

Additional informal sessions will provide opportunities for members to discuss other current issues of relevance and share information on a range of different topics. This will include a special presentation by Peter Jaszi, Professor of Law at American University in Washington, DC, and one of the authors of the College Art Association’s (CAA) recently released “Copyright, Permissions and Fair Use among Visual Artists and the Academic and Museum Visual Arts Communities: An Issues Report.”

The Association was invited to hold its meeting in Dallas by the directors of its six member institutions in the region: Maxwell Anderson (Dallas Museum of Art), Eric Lee (Kimbell Art Museum), Marla Price (Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth), Mark Roglán (Meadows Museum, SMU), Jeremy Strick (Nasher Sculpture Center), and Andrew Walker (Amon Carter Museum of American Art). This is AAMD’s first meeting in Dallas since 2003, and in addition to events hosted by those member museums, attendees will also tour the AT&T Cowboys Stadium Art Collection and visit a series of private collections.

The Association of Art Museum Directors—representing 240 art museum directors in the US, Canada, and Mexico—promotes the vital role of art museums throughout North America and advances the profession by cultivating leadership and communicating standards of excellence in museum practice. Further information about AAMD’s professional practice guidelines and position papers is available at www.aamd.org.