On Friday, January 29, AFA Director & CEO Pauline Willis engaged in an intimate conversation with Christopher Bedford, Director of the Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA). They discussed how the BMA is responding to this current critical moment in our history, its 2020 commitment to collecting work by women artists, and the controversy surrounding deaccessioning.
Christopher Bedford is the Dorothy Wagner Wallis Director of The Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA), which is renowned for its outstanding collections of 19th-century, modern, and contemporary art.
Bedford served as director of the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University for four years prior to joining the BMA and was appointed as Commissioner for the U.S. Pavilion for the 2017 Venice Biennale. Previously, he held the positions of chief curator and curator of exhibitions at the Wexner Center for the Arts (2008-2012); assistant curator and curatorial assistant in the Department of Contemporary Art at LACMA (2006-2008) and consulting curator in the Department of Sculpture and Decorative Arts for the J. Paul Getty Museum (2006-2008).
Born in Scotland and raised in the US and the UK, Bedford has a BA from Oberlin College, a MA in art history through the joint program at Case Western Reserve University and the Cleveland Museum of Art, and has studied in the doctoral programs in art history at the University of Southern California and the Courtauld Institute of Art at the University of London. He is also a noted author and contributor to various arts publications. He is currently a trustee of Art + Practice, Greater Baltimore Cultural Alliance, and Maryland Citizens for the Arts.
