Capital’s Gain

© 2007 Succession H. Matisse, Paris/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York, Courtesy the Dallas Museum of Art

"Matisse: Painter as Sculptor" included "Reclining Nude (Aurora)" (1907).

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The D.C. museum, founded by Duncan Phillips in 1921 to display his holdings of modern art, “is the perfect match in terms of my expertise and professional training,” says Kosinski, who replaces the retiring Jay Gates. “Essentially the Phillips is about 19th- and 20th-century art, so it’s the type of painting and sculpture that will allow me, as a modernist, to dive deeply into those areas I know best.”

After earning a bachelor’s degree from Yale and a master’s and doctorate from New York University, Kosinski worked at the Guggenheim Museum; the Bruce Museum, in Greenwich, Connecticut; and the Douglas Cooper collection of Cubist art in Geneva, in addition to acting as an independent curator in Wolfsburg, Germany; Basel, Switzerland; and London.

In Dallas, Kosinski served as co-curator and project director for “Matisse: Painter as Sculptor,” which just ended its national tour at
the Baltimore Museum of Art. Other major shows to her credit include “Degas to Picasso: Painters, Sculptors and the Camera” and “Henry Moore: Sculpting the 20th Century.” At the Phillips, Kosinski is prepared to relinquish some curatorial duties to focus on administrative needs, such as the museum’s effort to triple its $20 million endowment.

An important reason for Kosinski’s selection, according to Phillips board chairman George Vradenburg, was her plan to take the collection into the 21st century. “I will bring in ideas and a vision of what the Phillips can be in the future,” Kosinski says. “The thing Duncan Phillips felt passionate about—an intimate dialogue with the artists of his time—has been lost. If we let him give us clues, we can make the museum a living monument to his taste.”

"Capital’s Gain" originally appeared in the March 2008 issue of Art+Auction. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Art+Auction's March 2008 Table of Contents.