'Striking Iron' at the Fowler Museum recognized with a 2019 Award for Excellence
Association of Art Museum Curators Announces 2019 Award Winners
The Association of Art Museum Curators (AAMC) and the AAMC Foundation has named the 20 U.S. curators who will be receiving its 2019 Awards for Excellence. Among those selected are Tom Joyce, professional artist and lead guest curator at the Fowler Museum at UCLA; Marla C. Berns, director of the Fowler Museum at UCLA; and Allen F. Roberts, professor of world arts and cultures/dance at UCLA, for “Striking Iron: The Art of African Blacksmiths” at the Fowler Museum at UCLA. This year’s honorees were selected from 150 nominations, and work in a variety of fields, including native and indigenous art, contemporary art, folk art, medieval art, American art, media art, and photography.
"The Association of Art Museum Curators (AAMC) and AAMC Foundation has named the recipients of its 2019 Awards for Excellence. The twenty winners of the annual, peer-juried awards were recognized for groundbreaking projects on race, sexuality, censorship, and the environment, among other topics, and were honored at a special celebration held at the Rubin Museum in New York on Sunday, May 5.
Installation view of “Striking Iron: The Art of African Blacksmiths” (2018), curated by Tom Joyce, Marla C. Berns, and Allen F. Roberts, at the Fowler Museum at UCLA. Photo: Joshua White/JWPictures.com. This year’s winners in the category of exhibitions are Mindy N. Besaw, curator of American Art at the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art; Taína B. Caragol, curator of painting and sculpture and Latinx art and history at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery; Kristen Collins, curator of manuscripts at the J. Paul Getty Museum; Bryan C. Keene, associate curator of manuscripts at the Getty; artist Tom Joyce, a guest curator at the Fowler Museum at the University of California, Los Angeles; UCLA professor Allen F. Roberts; Marla C. Berns, director of the Fowler Museum; Karen Kramer, curator of Native American and Oceanic art and culture at the Peabody Essex Museum (PEM); and independent curator Jen Mergel.
In the category of catalogues awards went to Wassan Al-Khudhairi, chief curator of contemporary art at the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis; Corinne Granof, curator of academic programs at the Block Museum of Art at Northwestern University; Amy Beste, director of public programs at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago; Karl Kusserow, curator of American art at the Princeton University Art Museum; William & Mary University professor Alan C. Braddock; Sarah Kelly Oehler, chair and curator of American art at the Art Institute of Chicago; and Esther Adler, associate curator at the Museum of Modern Art.
In addition, John P. Lukavic, curator of Native arts at the Denver Art Museum received an award for his essay “What Should Have Been, What Is, And What Will Be” in the Denver Art Museum’s exhibition catalogue for “Jeffrey Gibson: Like a Hammer” (2018) and Trevor Smith, curator of the Present Tense initiative at the Peabody Essex Museum, and Lydia Gordon, assistant curator for exhibitions and research at PEM, won for their digital publication “PlayTime” (2018).
“For fifteen years, curators have recognized the trailblazing achievements of their peers through our annual Awards for Excellence,” said Judith Pineiro, executive director of the AAMC and AAMC Foundation. “It is a privilege to celebrate this year’s awardees who, through their work, have fostered dynamic dialogue and broader engagement in the arts."—May 6, 2019
This article originally appearted on the Artforum website.
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