Jenny Dixon, Director, The Noguchi Museum, announced that Kenneth Wayne has been named Deputy Director for Curatorial Affairs at The Noguchi Museum. Mr. Wayne, who assumes his post on January 3, 2012, will be the first person to hold this position at the Museum. Ms. Dixon states, “We are delighted that Kenneth Wayne will be joining The Noguchi Museum staff. A highly regarded expert in modern sculpture, with extensive museum experience, he will bring new scholarship on Noguchi and his work to the Museum’s exhibitions, publications, and programming. I know that the Board of Trustees and staff join me in welcoming Kenneth to the Museum.”
Mr. Wayne added, “I am thrilled to be joining The Noguchi Museum, one of New York City’s great cultural treasures. I look forward to working with my new colleagues, and to deepening our understanding of Noguchi, his work, and its place in the history of modern art and society. I am proud to join an institution that pioneered the development of Long Island City into one of New York’s most exciting arts destinations.”
Mr. Wayne’s appointment comes at a time when the Museum, long celebrated for its comprehensive collection of Noguchi’s work and its exquisite sculpture garden and galleries, has firmly established active programs of temporary exhibitions and public programs. These bring a variety of aesthetic and intellectual viewpoints to the Museum, creating engaging dialogues with Noguchi’s art and bringing new perspectives to the cultural context in which his work developed, as well as to his influences on contemporary practice. With the recent publication of the first installment of the Noguchi catalogue raisonné, the Museum is also revitalizing its scholarly focus.
Kenneth Wayne has an accomplished career in both the academic and museum communities. Since 2010 he has consulted for organizations ranging from Christie’s Paris to the Man Ray Trust and Il Museo di Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Trento e Rovereto, Italy, among others. Prior to this, he was chief curator at the Heckscher Museum of Art, in Huntington, New York (2005–2010); curator of modern art at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, in Buffalo, New York (1999–2005); the Joan Whitney Payson Curator at the Portland Museum of Art, in Maine (1995–1999); and the arts director at the University of Maryland, College Park (1994–1995). He has curated or co-curated dozens of successful exhibitions on a range of modern and contemporary art and artists, garnering important administrative experience in the process. Mr. Wayne is a prolific author whose scholarship has appeared in numerous exhibition catalogues and journals and has been translated into French, Spanish, German, and Italian. In addition, he has lectured at such institutions as the Henry Moore Institute, in Leeds, England, and the Royal Academy of Art, in London.
Mr. Wayne currently serves on the board of the Alexander Archipenko Catalogue Raisonné Project and is a member of the Association of Art Museum Curators, where he sits on the website committee. From 2000 to 2005, he was a trustee of Somerset House Art History Foundation, in London and New York. The recipient of a number of honors and awards, he received a Ph.D. in art history from Stanford University, an M.A. in modern art from the Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London, and a B.A. in art history from the University of California, Berkeley.