Veteran curator Nancy Spector will be back at the Guggenheim, only 10 months after leaving the institution to join the Brooklyn Museum.
On Wednesday, director of the Guggenheim Museum and Foundation Richard Armstrong announced that Spector will take up a newly created position at the Guggenheim as the institution’s artistic director and chief curator.
In her new role she will oversee “conceptual and strategic leadership of collections, exhibitions, and curatorial programs” of the New York museum and its international satellites.
The museum veteran previously worked at the Guggenheim for 29 years in various capacities, most recently as chief curator. In April 2016 Spector left to join the Brooklyn Museum as deputy director and chief curator.
The Guggenheim Foundation hopes the unified position will reinforce its efforts to coordinate and strengthen its activities as it expands internationally by aligning existing and developing projects and initiatives under Spector’s guidance. In her new role she will report directly to director Richard Armstrong.
“Over the past year, we have given fresh thought to the way the Guggenheim creates and manages its artistic program in New York and abroad,” Armstrong said in a statement. “This exploration has identified the need for an individual who provides leadership and strategic vision for collections, exhibitions and programs across all aspects of the Foundation and all the museums in our international constellation. She is the ideal person to take on this new role,” he explained.
Spector, meanwhile, thanked the Brooklyn Museum and explained the opportunity was too good to turn down. “I simply could not let this extraordinary opportunity—which is truly unique to the Guggenheim—pass me by,” she said.