Sackler Family Endowment Establishes Brooklyn Museum Curatorial Position

A significant endowment from members of the Sackler family has established the position of Sackler Family Curator for the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art of the Brooklyn Museum. The inaugural position will be held by Catherine J. Morris, who has been Curator of the Sackler Center since 2009.

Announcing the position, Museum Director Arnold L. Lehman states: "On behalf of the Board of Trustees and the Museum staff, I wish to thank members of the Sackler family and our Trustee Dr. Elizabeth A. Sackler for their exceptional generosity and leadership in establishing an endowment for this vital curatorial position in our dynamic Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art. Since its inception, the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art has made important contributions to the scholarly study and public understanding of the past and present of feminism art."

Catherine Morris has been responsible for a wide range of special exhibitions in addition to overseeing the Permanent Collection for the Sackler Center, which includes The Dinner Party by Judy Chicago on long-term view. Among the exhibitions organized by Morris are Twice Militant: Lorraine Hansberry's Letters to "The Ladder," on view November 22, 2013, through March 16, 2014; the award-winning Materializing "Six Years": Lucy R. Lippard and the Emergence of Conceptual Art, the first exhibition to explore the impact of that key feminist writer, curator, and activist on the Conceptual art movement; Rachel Kneebone: Regarding Rodin; Lorna Simpson: Gathered; Kiki Smith: Sojourn; "Workt by Hand": Hidden Labor and Historical Quilts; Healing the Wounds of War: The Brooklyn Sanitary Fair of 1864; and Matthew Buckingham: The Spirit and the Letter. Catherine Morris was also the Brooklyn Museum coordinating curator for Eva Hesse: Spectres and Seductive Subversion: Women Pop Artists, 1958-1968. As an independent curator prior to joining the Museum, Morris organized exhibitions that explored issues related to feminism--among them Decoys, Complexes, and Triggers: Women and Land Art in the 1970s at the Sculpture Center, Long Island City, New York. She has authored or contributed to several scholarly publications and catalogues.

"It is an honor to be the curator of the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art at the Brooklyn Museum, and it is now doubly an honor to be the first Sackler Family Curator of the Center. The larger Sackler family support of Elizabeth A. Sackler's vision is a remarkable tribute, and I am fortunate to play a part in helping to realize the goals set out by Dr. Sackler and Arnold Lehman," comments Catherine Morris.

The Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art is an innovative exhibition and education venue dedicated to feminist art. Among the most ambitious, influential, and enduring artistic movements to emerge in the late twentieth century, feminist art has played a leading role in the art world over the last forty years. Dramatically expanding the definition of art to be more inclusive in all areas, from subject matter to media, feminist art reintroduced the articulation of socially relevant issues after an era of aesthetic "formalism," while pioneering the use of performance and audiovisual media within a fine art idiom.

The Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art, founded in 2007, strives to raise awareness of feminist cultural contributions through dialogues and debates--about feminist art, theory, and activism--that take place in the Sackler Center's Forum and through groundbreaking exhibitions that are held in its special-exhibition and Herstory galleries. The only public facility of its kind in the United States, the dramatic 8,300-square-foot, award-winning space was designed by Susan T. Rodriguez, a partner in Ennead Architects. The Council for Feminist Art, a Membership group that supports the ongoing educational programming and the continuing success of the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art.

The Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art was established through the generosity of the Elizabeth A. Sackler Foundation.

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