Background

Nan Rosenthal was born on August 27, 1937, in New York City. She was the Daughter of Alan Herman and Lenore (Fry) Rosenthal.

Education

In 1959, Rosenthal received a Bachelor of Arts from Sarah Lawrence College. Later, she received a Master of Arts from Harvard University in 1970, and a Doctor of Philosophy in 1976.

Career

After college, Rosenthal worked as a journalist for a number of publications including Art in America and the New York Post. After her graduate studies, Rosenthal taught at Princeton University, New York University, and University of California, Santa Cruz.

In 1985, Rosenthal became the curator of twentieth-century art at the National Gallery of Art. She organized several important exhibitions including The Drawings of Jasper Johns (1990), acquired works by Alberto Giacometti and Barnett Newman, and began the lecture series "Conversations with Artists."

Rosenthal then joined the staff of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1993 as senior consultant of modern and contemporary art, where she organized a number of other important exhibitions including Anselm Kiefer: Works on Paper 1969-1993 (1998), Robert Rauschenberg: Combines (2005), Jasper Johns: Gray (2008), and others featuring Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollack, and Judith Rothschild. She retired from the Metropolitan Museum in 2008.

In addition to her curatorial activities, Rosenthal authored several books and catalogs including George Rickey (1977), Robert Rauschenberg (1990), and Terry Winters: Printed Works (2001).

Achievements

• Nan Rosenthal is known as a curator who helped bring the 20th century to the National Gallery of Art in Washington and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
  
  Over three decades, Ms. Rosenthal organized exhibitions and oversaw the acquisition of contemporary art, first at the National Gallery, which she joined in 1985, and afterward at the Met, with which she was associated from 1993 until her retirement in 2008.
  
  Neither institution had traditionally emphasized modern art, and Ms. Rosenthal was responsible for bringing work by a spate of major 20th-century artists into both collections.
  
  At the National Gallery, where she was a curator of 20th-century art, she helped acquire a number of paintings by Barnett Newman, and Ad Reinhardt oil and a pair of bespoke granite settees by the American sculptor Scott Burton, among other artworks.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Terry Winters: Printed Works

    (The American artist Terry Winters (b 1949), known for his...)

    2001
  • The Drawings of Jasper Johns 1990
  • The Jackson Pollock Sketchbooks in the Metropolitan Museum of Art 1997
  • Anselm Kiefer: Works on Paper in the Metropolitan Museum of Art 1998

Personality

Parties at Nan's house were filled with fun and interesting people. She went in for raising chickens, learning the different types, just as she required students to learn works of art. She could be difficult, always intense, but her hard-working personality came with much humor accompanied by an infectious laugh.

She was a friend of the leading artists of the day, including Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, and Yvonne Rainer.

Connections

First, Rosenthal married Otto Piene, but they divorced, and, on September 5, 1990, Rosenthal married Henry Benning Cortesi.

Father:

Alan Herman Rosenthal

Mother:

Lenore (Fry) Rosenthal

Ex-husband:

Otto Piene

husband:

Henry Benning Cortesi

Friend:

Jasper Johns

Born on May 15, 1930

Jasper Johns is an American painter, sculptor and printmaker whose work is associated with abstract expressionism, Neo-Dada, and pop art.

Friend:

Robert Rauschenberg

October 22, 1925 – May 12, 2008

Milton Ernest "Robert" Rauschenberg was an American painter and graphic artist whose early works anticipated the pop art movement.

Friend:

Yvonne Rainer

Born on November 24, 1934

Yvonne Rainer is an American dancer, choreographer, and filmmaker, whose work in these disciplines is regarded as challenging and experimental.

References

• Contemporary Authors New Revision Series: A Bio-Bibliographical Guide to Current Writers in Fiction, General Non-Fiction, Poetry, Journalism, Drama, Motion Pictures, TV, & Other Fields, Vol. 193 In response to the escalating need for up-to-date information on writers, Contemporary Authors New Revision Series brings researchers the most recent data on the worlds most-popular authors.
  2010