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Director Emeritus of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Sunday - February 28th, 2010
After 31 years at the helm, Philippe de Montebello, the first ever Director Emeritus of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, is recognized throughout the world as one of the field's most influential and articulate champions of integrity, authority, education, and public access. In December 2008, the dean of American museum directors retired after 32 years as the longest-serving director in the Met’s nearly 140-year-long history.
Under his leadership the Museum nearly doubled in size, vastly increasing its exhibition space. The Metropolitan also acquired significant collections and individual masterpieces, mounted acclaimed international loan exhibitions, developed wide-reaching educational programs, and reinstalled much of its permanent collections in new and refurbished galleries. In fall 2008, the curators of the institution paid tribute to Mr. de Montebello’s tenure by mounting an unprecedented tribute exhibition of some 300 major works that entered the collections under his leadership, entitled The Philippe de Montebello Years: Curators Celebrate Three Decades of Acquisitions.
In 2008, Mr. de Montebello became the first scholar in residence at the Prado Museum in Madrid, and joined the Board of Trustees of the Musée d'Orsay in Paris. In the fall of 2009, Mr. de Montebello launches a new academic career as the first Fiske Kimball Professor in the History and Culture of Museums at the Institute of Fine Arts of New York University and as a special advisor for NYU’s Abu Dhabi campus. He is currently co-host with Paula Zahn of the WNET/PBS weekly culture series SundayArts, and serves as Special Advisor to the Leon Levy Foundation. He continues to lecture throughout the world on art, museums, and other cultural matters.
Mr. de Montebello was born in Paris and received his early education in France. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University and received a master’s degree in art history from New York University’s Institute of Fine Arts. With the exception of four and a half years as director of Houston’s Museum of Fine Arts, he has spent his entire career at the Metropolitan. His numerous international honors include the Officier de la Légion d'Honneur; the Amigos del Museo del Prado Prize; and Knight Commander, Pontifical Order of St. Gregory the Great. He has received a number of honorary degrees, notably from Harvard University, Dartmouth College, and New York University.
In March 2003, President George W. Bush awarded him The National Medal of Arts, noting that by "promoting wide-reaching programs that bring art to the American people, he has helped to preserve, protect, and present the cultural and artistic heritage of our world."
Photo Credit: © Wild Bill Melton Images
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