Assistant Curator, American Painting & Drawing

About the Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Met presents over 5,000 years of art from around the world for everyone to experience and enjoy. The Museum lives in two iconic sites in New York City—The Met Fifth Avenue and The Met Cloisters. Millions of people also take part in The Met experience online.

Since its founding in 1870, The Met has always aspired to be more than a treasury of rare and beautiful objects. We are committed to fostering a collaborative and respectful work environment with a staff as diverse as the audiences we engage. Our staff members are art lovers who are passionate about working toward a common goal: creating the most dynamic and inspiring art museum in the world.

At The Met, every staff member – from security officers to researchers to scientists and beyond – lives by our core values of respect, inclusivity, collaboration, excellence, and integrity. 

Respect: Engage one another with collegiality, empathy, and kindness, always.

Inclusivity: Ensure that all are and feel welcome and valued.

Collaboration: Reach across boundaries to exchange ideas and work together toward our shared mission.

Excellence: Lead the cultural world in quality and expertise—and inspire curiosity and creativity.

Integrity: Hold ourselves to the highest moral standards, admit when we fall short, and then evolve. 

About the Department:

Established in 1924, the American Wing is the only western collecting area of The Met’s seventeen curatorial departments to regularly blend art and design in our more than 75 galleries. With a collection of roughly 20,000 works by African American, Asian American, Euro-American, Latin American, and Native American makers—ranging primarily from the mid-17th to early-20th century—the American Wing represents one of the largest and most comprehensive holdings of North American artistic expression in the world. These dynamic collections include paintings, sculptures, drawings, furniture, textiles, regalia, ceramics, basketry, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, as well as historic interiors and architectural fragments, produced by highly trained and self-taught artists, both identified and unrecorded, comprising an expansively defined American art department housed within a global museum. A fast-paced environment of more than 20 colleagues—with a curatorial staff of 11—the Wing regularly programs diverse exhibitions and installations that bring fresh approaches to our wide-ranging and evolving holdings.

GENERAL STATEMENT OF RESPONSIBILITIES & DUTIES:

As the Assistant Curator of American Painting and Drawing, you will have expertise in 18th- and 19th-century art and culture. Working with diverse Museum colleagues, you will contribute to researching, cataloguing, interpreting, and enhancing works in the American Wing collection, while also proposing installations and publications. You are committed to telling expansive and inclusive stories with a broadly conceived collection of American art.

PRIMARY RESPONSIBILITIES & DUTIES:

• Contribute to ongoing collection research, assessment, and refinement

• Identify opportunities within the collection to bring fresh ideas and narratives to installations and gallery rotations

• Research and write interpretive materials, including gallery texts as well as printed and online Museum publications

• Assist with and propose gallery installations, some with accompanying publications

• Recommend artwork for acquisition in collaboration with other curators, conservators, collectors, and communities

• Cultivate and steward donors for acquisition and fundraising support, including membership in departmental support groups

• Contribute ideas to and participate in programming for departmental support groups and American Wing Visiting Committee (advisory group)

• Lead tours of departmental exhibitions and installations

• Develop and lead training sessions for American Wing volunteer guides

• Contribute to educational mission of Museum through public lectures, gallery talks, classes, and mentoring of interns and fellows

• Contribute to broad range of public and patron programs and to building relationships with local communities as well as global audiences

• Foster and maintain positive working relationships with museum colleagues across the U.S. as well as with members of scholarly communities, dealers, collectors, and diverse audiences

• Respond to public inquires

• Other duties as assigned

REQUIREME