Staff Announcement

UNCG Announces New Director for Weatherspoon Art Museum

RELEASE DATE: APRIL 28, 2020

UNC Greensboro (UNCG) today announced the appointment of Juliette Bianco as Director of the Weatherspoon Art Museum and adjunct faculty in the College of Visual and Performing Arts as of September 1. Juliette will succeed Nancy Doll, who steps down on July 31 after 22 years of dedicated and successful service. Ann Grimaldi, Weatherspoon’s Curator for Education, will serve as acting director for August, and Nancy will be available to Juliette during her transition later this year.

Bianco has 25 years of experience as an art museum professional. She comes to UNCG from the Hood Museum of Art at Dartmouth College, her undergraduate alma mater, where she has served in various leadership capacities, including Deputy Director since 2013. The American Alliance of Museums calls the Hood Museum a “national model” for college and university museums. She oversaw the museum’s operations and a recent $50M museum renovation and expansion, managed exhibition planning and design, and led strategic plan development.

Her scholarly interests focus on transformational leadership in higher education and university museums as centers of innovative teaching and learning and hubs for exploring diversity, creative partnerships, and the benefits of strategic planning. In addition to curating and co-curating numerous exhibitions including those of artists Wenda Gu, Stacey Steers, and Edward Burtynsky, Bianco has published on art and museum practice, including Off the Shelf: A Conversation with MANUAL (Gulf Coast, 2015) and Go with the Flow: Fluxus at Play in a Teaching Museum (Museums, Etc. 2011). Needless to say, her experience and philosophy align completely with UNCG’s mission and giant steps mentality.

Bianco holds a master’s degree in art history from the University of Chicago and is a graduate of the Getty Leadership Institute’s residence program for museum administrators. She completed the Doctor of Education degree at Northeastern University in 2020.

“Provost Dana Dunn and I would like to thank the search committee and search chairs Margaret Benjamin and Peter Alexander, whose efforts and expertise saw us through the search to this very successful conclusion,” said UNCG Chancellor Franklin D. Gilliam, Jr. “We welcome Juliette and thank Nancy Doll, whose outstanding leadership has been transformative, resulting in significant increases in non-student attendance, loan requests from major museums on a global scale, fundraising, and enhanced curricular incorporation across a wide array of disciplines. Juliette is well prepared to further this legacy and continue to grow the Museum’s impact on this campus, this community, and beyond.”

“I am thrilled and honored to be joining the Weatherspoon Art Museum,” stated Juliette Bianco, “an institution with an inspiring legacy and diverse collection that I have long admired, as well as the University of North Carolina, Greensboro, and the Greensboro community. Engaging with the art of our times has never been more important than now, and I look forward to leading the Weatherspoon’s efforts to provide a place for campus and community to learn, collaborate, and grow together.”

Photo: Eli Burakian–Dartmouth College.

About the Weatherspoon Art Museum

Mission
The Weatherspoon Art Museum at UNC Greensboro enriches the lives of diverse individuals and connects multiple communities, both on and off campus, by presenting, interpreting, and collecting modern and contemporary art. In recognizing its paramount role of public service, the Weatherspoon fosters an appreciation of the ability of art to positively impact lives.

History
The Weatherspoon Art Museum at UNC Greensboro was founded by Gregory Ivy in 1941 and is the earliest of any art facilities within the UNC system. The museum was founded as a resource for the campus, community, and region and its early leadership developed an emphasis—maintained to this day—on presenting and acquiring modern and contemporary works of art. A 1950 bequest from the renowned collection of Claribel and Etta Cone, which included prints and bronzes by Henri Matisse and other works on paper by American and European modernists, helped to establish the Weatherspoon’s permanent collection.

In 1989, the museum moved into its present location in The Anne and Benjamin Cone Building designed by the architectural firm Mitchell Giurgula. The museum has six galleries and a sculpture courtyard with over 17,000 square feet of exhibition space. The American Alliance of Museums accredited the Weatherspoon in 1995 and renewed its accreditation in 2005 and 2015.

Collections + Exhibitions
The permanent collection of the Weatherspoon Art Museum is considered to be one of the foremost of its kind in the Southeast. It represents all major art movements from the beginning of the 20th century to the present. Among the nearly 6,200 works in the collection are pieces by such prominent figures as Henry Ossawa Tanner, Edward Weston, Joseph Stella, David Smith, Jackson Pollock, Elizabeth Catlett, Louise Nevelson, Gordon Parks, Sol LeWitt, Robert Mangold, Cindy Sherman, Adrian Piper, Betye Saar, Amy Silman, Nick Cave, Jennifer Steinkamp, and Sanford Biggers. The museum regularly lends to major exhibitions nationally and internationally.

The Weatherspoon also is known for its dynamic exhibition program. Through a lively annual calendar of exhibitions and a multi-disciplinary educational program for audiences of all ages, the museum provides an opportunity for visitors to consider artistic, cultural, and social issues of our time—enriching the life of our university, community, and region.

UNC Greensboro
Located in North Carolina’s third largest city, UNC Greensboro is among the most diverse, learner-centered public research universities in the state, with nearly 18,000 students in eight colleges and schools pursuing more than 150 areas of undergraduate and over 200 areas of graduate study. UNCG continues to be recognized nationally for academic excellence, access, and affordability. UNCG is ranked No. 1 most affordable institution in North Carolina for net cost by the N.Y. Times and No. 1 in North Carolina for social mobility by The Wall Street Journal — helping first-generation and lower-income students find paths to prosperity. Designated an Innovation and Economic Prosperity University by the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities, UNCG is a community-engaged research institution with a portfolio of more than $67M in research and creative activity. The University’s 1,100 faculty and 1,700 staff help create an annual economic impact for the Piedmont Triad region in excess of $1B. For additional information, please visit uncg.edu and follow UNCG on FacebookTwitter, and Instagram.

Weatherspoon Art Museum
UNC Greensboro
1005 Spring Garden Street
Greensboro, NC 27412, (336) 334-5770, weatherspoon@uncg.edu

For more information or press images, contact:
Loring Mortensen, (336) 256-1451, lamorten@uncg.edu