Brian Boucher, a veteran art journalist, has become the latest in a long line of media professionals to migrate over to the commercial side of the art world. As of this month, Boucher has taken the position of creative director at Sperone Westwater, the New York gallery renowned for its spacious Bowery headquarters and representation of such fabled artists as Bruce Nauman and Richard Long.

Most recently senior writer at artnet News, Boucher often covered the intersection of art and politics and became a fan favorite for his participatory—even, on occasion, gonzo—reportage. Over two and a half years, he covered such resonant topics as the Equal Justice Initiative founder Bryan Stevenson’s creation of a new museum devoted to the legacy of slavery and the art collective Superflex’s enlightened scheme to procure surgical equipment for hospitals in Syria by selling it to collectors as art. 

In jumping over to the sales side, Boucher—who worked at Art in America prior to artnet—will be using his storytelling knowhow to share gallery news with the press, while also working closely with the Iranian-American painter Ali Banisadr, sculptor Emil Lukas, and Andrew Sendor, a multimedia artist who experiments with the photorealist style.

Boucher says he’s looking forward to learning a new way of looking at art through the eyes of the gallery. Gallery partner Angela Westwater, he notes, “is a treasure trove of knowledge and experience, and it’s exciting to be around her.” He adds that it is “a particularly triumphant moment to join the gallery, as Bruce Nauman’s exhibition ‘Disappearing Acts’ will be on view at the Schaulager in Basel while we’re manning the booth [art Art Basel].” The exhibition will travel to New York’s Museum of Modern Art this fall, where it will take over not only the main building’s sixth floor but also the entirety of MoMA PS1.

“As a writer and editor, my purpose has been to serve the reader and the artists I’ve championed,” Boucher says. “At the gallery, my mission is no less than helping to secure and boost the gallery artists’ place in art history, as well as to serve curators and collectors in building their collections.”

The excitement about this new chapter is mutual. Westwater, who founded the gallery in 1975 with Gian Enzo Sperone and Konrad Fischer, says: “Brian’s knowledge and experience of the art world will contribute energy and imagination to our team.”