Jeffrey Weiss Named First Kirk Varnedoe Visiting Professor at Institute of Fine Arts
July 14, 2006

The Institute of Fine Arts of New York University is delighted to announce the appointment of Dr. Jeffrey Weiss, Head and Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the National Gallery of Art, as the first Kirk Varnedoe Visiting Professor at the Institute. Dr. Weiss will hold the Kirk Varnedoe Visiting Professorship for the academic year 2006-2007.

Dr. Weiss earned both his M.A. and Ph.D. at the Institute. His 1993 dissertation on The Popular Culture of Modern Art: Picasso, Duchamp and Avant-Gardism in Paris, 1909-1917 was written under Kirk Varnedoe’s supervision. By the time of his graduation, Dr. Weiss had already been a Research Associate in the National Gallery’s Department of Modern Painting for two years. After serving in various curatorial positions at the Gallery, he was elected Head of Modern and Contemporary in Art 2000.

A distinguished scholar of the wide span of modern art, from Paris in the 1910s to Abstract Expressionism and Minimalism, Dr. Weiss has numerous leading exhibitions and catalogues to his credit. He was the initiating curator for the National Gallery’s landmark shows Picasso: The Cubist Portraits of Fernande Olivier (2003), Mark Rothko (with the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, 1998), and Picasso: The Early Years 1892-1906 (with Mark Rosenthal and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1997). He also served as coordinating or collaborating curator at the Gallery for the acclaimed exhibitions Cy Twombly: The Sculpture (2001), Henry Moore (2002), and Dan Flavin: A Retrospective (2004).

Dr. Weiss is the curator of the forthcoming exhibitions Jasper Johns: An Allegory of Painting 1955-65 (with the Kunstmuseum Basel, 2007) and Henri Matisse: Painting and Drawing, 1935-48 (2009). His acquisitions record at the Gallery includes major works by Mel Bochner, Lee Bontecou, Marcel Broodthaers, Jean Fautrier, Dan Flavin, Robert Gober, Al Held, Ray Johnson, On Kawara, Yayoi Kusama, Ellsworth Kelly, Sol Lewitt, Robert Mangold, Robert Morris, Claes Oldenburg, Pablo Picasso, Robert Ryman, Richard Serra, Tony Smith, Chaim Soutine, Myron Stout, James Turrell, Andy Warhol, and Rachel Whiteread.

Apart from publishing in major exhibition catalogues, Dr. Weiss continues to publish actively in leading journals and research volumes, on a wide variety of topics in modern and contemporary art.

In his role as Kirk Varnedoe Visiting Professor, Dr. Weiss will teach a class to Institute of Fine Arts graduate students and give several public lectures. The seminar class, on “Process Art, 1960-1975”, will be taught in the fall of 2006, and the lectures, on a series of topics in art of the 1960s, will follow in the spring of 2007.

The Kirk Varnedoe Visiting Professorship was established at the Institute of Fine Arts in 2006 to honor and perpetuate the memory of Kirk’s dedicated and innovative teaching, mentoring, and scholarship. Kirk vigorously maintained these roles at the Institute throughout his career at the Museum of Modern Art and the Institute for Advanced Study. The Varnedoe Professorship has been endowed through the tremendous generosity of Kirk’s many friends, colleagues, and students who were inspired by his work. Each Kirk Varnedoe Visiting Professor will be appointed for one academic year.