National Gallery Has New Director; Baltic Head Steps Down

NEW YORK—Sara Tecchia Roma New York has added Norwegian painter Steinar Jakobsen to the roster of artists it represents. The gallery is planning a solo exhibition in September 2008, and will be previewing his work at Aqua Wynwood during Art Basel Miami Beach from December 5 to 9.

LONDON—The National Gallery has named Nicholas Penny as its new director, the Times (London) reports. Penny is an authority on Renaissance art who worked as a curator at the museum from 1990 to 2002 before moving to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C, where he also serves as a curator. He will return to London in spring 2008, replacing Charles Saumarez Smith, who moved to the Royal Academy last spring.

GATESHEAD, England—Peter Doroshenko, director of the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, is stepping down from his post after months of tension with staff members, who have accused him of running the £46 million complex in a “climate of fear,” the Times (London) reports. In July, employees signed a document lamenting his leadership. Ten members of the approximately 28-member staff are reported to have called it quits in the previous 12 months.

TEMPE, Ariz.—The Herberger College of the Arts at Arizona State University has named Heather Lineberry interim director of the ASU Art Museum, effective January 1, 2008. Lineberry is currently the museum’s senior curator and brings to the position more than 20 years of experience curating contemporary art, the past 17 years at the museum. She replaces Marilyn Zeitlin, who announced her retirement after 15 years as chief curator and director of the museum. Zeitlin will pursue independent curatorial projects and research.

Farewells
LONDON—The photographic historian and museum curator Brian Coe died on October 18 at the age of 76, the Guardian reports. He is credited with championing Britain’s photographic heritage and making it more accessible. He spent decades working for Kodak, including serving as the curator of its museum in London, where he collaborated with the Science Museum to produce an extensive list of exhibitions and books. Later he cataloged collections and produced exhibitions at the Royal Photographic Society before moving on to another curatorial role at the Museum of the Moving Image. In addition, he narrated the BBC's Pioneers of Photography series in 1975.

LONDON—The artist Bernard Myers died September 30 at the age of 82, the Guardian reports. Myers, who served as senior tutor and professor at the Royal College of Art from 1961 to 1980, was an early advocate of exploring connections between art, science, and technology. He taught at various art schools before joining the Royal College, and his work, including oil pastels finished by burnishing with an agate tool, is featured in many national collections, including the Tate's. He also wrote books published by Studio Vista, Hamlyn, Macdonald Macmillan, World Publications Chicago, and Architectural Press.  He continued to paint even after a series of strokes affected his vision and mobility over the last seven years. His last exhibition was at the New Grafton gallery in 2006.

LONDON—The Dutch sculptor and novelist Jan Wolkers died October 19 at the age of 81, the Times (London) reports. Born in the Dutch town of Oegstgeest, he studied painting in Leiden and sculpture at the Royal Academy of Art in Amsterdam before becoming widely recognized known for breaking taboos and questioning death, sex, and emotions in his novels, including A Rose of Flesh in 1967 and Turks Fruit in 1969 (the English translation is called Turkish Delight). Wolkers also produced plays, short stories, and essays, many of which addressed political themes. He also created outdoor sculptures, the most famous of which is After Auschwitz, a memorial to the victims of Auschwitz commissioned for the city of Amsterdam.

LONDON—Shelagh Cluett, who founded the postgraduate sculpture program at Chelsea College of Art, London, in 1980, has died at the age of 59, the Guardian reports. Born in Dorset, she studied at Hornsey and Chelsea art schools and toured as a visiting lecturer at institutions around England starting in the 1970s. She was also an external examiner to several art schools, a faculty member at the British School at Rome, and a member of advisory panels at the Arts Council of Great Britain, the Henry Moore Foundation, and the London Arts Board.

LOS ANGELES—The interior designer and architect Charles D. Kratka died November 8 at the age of 85, the Los Angeles Times reports. Kratka’s best known Modernist projects include mosaic walls in tunnels at Los Angeles International Airport, which were commissioned in 1961 to make the airport’s 300-foot tunnels seem shorter, and leading the design of the original interiors for the Los Angeles County Museum of Art when it opened in 1965. He started his own interior design firm in 1967. Born in Pasadena, he also served as a pilot in the Navy during World War II.

FRESNO, Calif.—The textile artist Mary Walker Phillips, who “took the utilitarian craft of knitting and gave it bold new life as a modern art form to be displayed on the walls of museums around the world,” died November 3 at the age of 83, the New York Times reports. Phillips, born in Fresno, used unorthodox materials such as linen, silk, paper, tape, and metal in her work, which has been exhibited worldwide and is in the collections of museums such as New York's Museum of Modern Art, the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, and the Art Institute of Chicago. She was also known for her books, including Creative Knitting: A New Art Form, published in 1971.  She lived in Greenwich Village for many years before returning to Fresno.