Press Releases & Statements

The Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD) will hold its mid-winter meeting in Los Angeles from Friday, January 22 through Monday, January 25, 2016. The meeting will feature a series of presentations by experts from in and outside the field, committee and Task Force meetings, visits to cultural institutions, as well as informal information-sharing sessions for members to discuss current issues.

William “Bro” Adams, Chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities, will give a keynote address followed by a conversation with Sharon Corwin, Director of the Colby College Museum of Art. Maude Standish, Director of Creative Strategy at Fullscreen, Inc. will give the opening keynote address. Standish has been a millennial trend forecaster and innovation consultant for more than a decade.

Kate Levin of Bloomberg Philanthropies will speak in conversation with Susan Taylor, Director of the New Orleans Museum of Art, on “Museums and the Paradox of Engagement.” Susan Meier, of Meier & Associates, will facilitate a workshop entitled “Optimizing Your Board: Governance as Leadership.”

The meeting will also include a series of presentations on digital practices, highlighting some of the ways AAMD museums are using technology to better carry out their missions. The program includes the following sessions:

• Digital Strategy Implementation with Jennifer Foley, Director of Interpretation at the Cleveland Museum of Art; and Caroline Baumann, Director, Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum
• Digital Strategy Development with Koven Smith, Director of Digital Adaptation at the Blanton Museum of Art; and Eric Shiner, Director of the Andy Warhol Museum
• Digital Content Creation with Ed Rodley, Associate Director of Integrated Media at the Peabody Essex Museum; and Simone Wicha, Director of the Blanton Museum of Art
• Open Access with Cherie Chen, Registrar at the J. Paul Getty Museum; and Charles Venable, Director of the Indianapolis Museum of Art

In addition, Sree Sreenivasan, Chief Digital Officer and Thomas Campbell, Executive Director of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, will present “How (and why) the Met Does Digital.”  Brian Ferriso, Director of the Portland Museum of Art and Chair of AAMD’s Strategic Planning Task Force, will lead member breakout sessions on the strategic plan.

The Association was invited to hold its meeting in Los Angeles by the directors of six of its member institutions in the region: Stuart Ashman (Museum of Latin American Art), Michael Govan (Los Angeles County Museum of Art), Ann Philbin (Hammer Museum), Timothy Potts (J. Paul Getty Museum), Kevin Salatino (The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens) and Philippe Vergne (Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles). In addition to events hosted by those member museums, meeting attendees will also visit Art + Practice, founded by artist Mark Bradford, philanthropist and collector Eileen Harris Norton, and social activist Allan DiCastro; and The Broad, Joanne Heyler, Founding Director.

The 2016 meeting will also have an active social media presence with attendees encouraged to live-tweet and Instagram their experiences with the hashtag #AAMDLA.

The full schedule is available here. 

The Association of Art Museum Directors, representing 236 art museum directors in the U.S., 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.

Generous Support for the mid-winter meeting is provided by: