The Museum of Modern Art has named Michelle Elligott chief of archives. Elligott previously served as the senior museum archivist. Her new position was created as part of an ongoing effort to place stronger emphasis on acquiring and preserving archival collections. Elligott joined the museum in 1995 as a Mellon Fellow and has since worked her way up the ladder at the institution.

The Frick Collection has announced the election of two new board members, James S. Reibel and Melinda Martin Sullivan. Reibel and his wife, Barbara, have been Frick supporters since 2003, and joined the Director’s Circle in 2007. Sullivan and her husband Paul began support of the Frick in 2001, and joined the Director’s Circle in 2011.

Tulane University named curator and author Monica Ramirez-Montagut as the executive director of the Newcomb Art Gallery, the Times-Picayune reports. Prior to her appointment, she was a senior curator at the San Jose Museum of Art and an associate director at MACLA/Movimiento de Arte y Cultura Latino Americana. She has also worked as a curator at the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum in Connecticut.

The Israel Antiques Authority mourns the passing of Yehoshua Dorfman, who served as the director general of the Authority since 2000. He passed away on July 31 after a long battle with illness.

Swiss art historian Christian Végh has been named the new director of Hannover, Germany’s Kestnergesellschaft, Monopol reports. Végh will take up the new post on May 1, 2015, and is the first woman in the institution’s history to serve as director. She served form 2008-2014 as the chairman of the Arbeitsgemeinschaft der deutschen Kunstvereine (AdKV), an advocacy group for individuals working for non-commercial art institutions.

W. James Burns
Photo: ASU Magazine

W. James Burns has announced his departure from his post as executive director of the Desert Caballeros Western Museum in Arizona. Burns has held the position since 2010, and during his tenure the institution has thrived, receiving an honor from the Museum Association of Arizona in 2014. Burns has accepted a position as executive director of the University of Arizona Museum of Art and Visual Art Archive. Sandra Harris will serve as interim director of Desert Caballeros beginning in September, 2014.

Wally Mason is leaving his position as director and chief curator of the Haggerty Museum of Art at Marquette University to become director of the Sheldon Museum of Art at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. During his time at Haggerty, Mason worked with faculty to infuse art into their lesson plans, as Marquette is the only university to have an art museum without an art history course of study. Prior to that, he directed galleries at the Ringling School of Art and Design in Sarasota, Fla., the University of Idaho and the University of Maine.

The Oklahoma City Museum of Art hired Michael Anderson to be its film curator, NewsOK reports. Anderson is a film scholar and critic, who has served on the screening and program committees of the Starz Denver Film Festival and has taught film, video, and history classes at Yale University.

The British Council has appointed Ciarán Devane as its new chief executive. Devane is currently the CEO of Macmillan Cancer Support, but will join the team at the British Council in December 2014. Sir Martin Davidson, the current CEO of the Council has served the organization for 30 years.

San Francisco’s Asian Art Museum has appointed Dr. Tianlong Jiao as its new curator of Chinese Art, effective September 15. He comes to the museum after a stint as chief curator of the Hong Kong Maritime Museum, where he directed collections and exhibitions as well as educational and public programming.

The Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University has appointed Catherine M. Hale as its new curator of the arts of Africa, Native America, and Ancient America. She comes to the museum from the University of Iowa Museum of Art, where she served three years as the curator of African and non-Western art.

Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts has announced two new curatorial appointments: Kathryn Gunsch as curator of African and Oceanic Art, and Emily Stoehrer as the curator of jewelry.

Fabrice Stroun has stepped down as the director of the Bern Kunsthalle, Der Standard reports. She had been at the helm of the institution since 2012 and recently found herself at odds with local government over plans to close the Kunsthalle due to a lack of funds.

The Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University has appointed 15 new members to its board of advisers, also reappointing eight former members. According to the university, the unprecedented number of appointments are an important step in ushering in a new era of the museum’s history. New board members are Gannit Ankori, Leslie Aronzon, Mark Bradford, Ronni J. Casty, Rena M. Conti, Tory Fair, John S. Foster, Steven A.N. Goldstein, Susan B. Kaplan, Lizbeth Krupp, Frederick Lawrence, Beth Marcus, Dianne Markman, Tim Phillips and Lisa Yuskavage.  Reappointed board members are Gerald Fineberg, Lois Foster, Matthew Kozol, Jonathan Novak, Betsy Pfau, Meryl Rose, Ann Tanenbaum and George Wachter.