Photos: Parrish Art Museum Celebrates Alicia Longwell, Chief Curator for 38 Years
Photography By Lisa Tamburini @hamptonsphotog
The Parrish Art Museum and East End art community celebrated Alicia Longwell, Ph.D, who announced in October she is retiring after 38-years from her position at the Parrish as the Lewis B. and Dorothy Cullman Chief Curator.
Longwell has been an integral and influential force in the East End art scene, championing local, national, and international artists and organizing critically acclaimed exhibitions for decades.
“We celebrate Alicia Longwell’s dedication and tremendous contributions the Parrish Art Museum and the field of art through her expertise on the artists of the East End,” said Museum Executive Director Monica Ramirez Montagut. “Alicia was key in establishing a direction for the Parrish collection and legacy of scholarship and excellence for 38 years. She embodies the passion and knowledge of those few extraordinary curators who so deftly combine the historical and contemporary in exhibitions that generously invite viewers to see art in entirely new contexts. The whole Parrish family is grateful and honored for her unwavering guidance.”
Said Longwell: “I can look back on a career immeasurably enriched by reading, studying and, most importantly, looking at art, It has been my great good fortune to have that passion daily rewarded during my years working at the Museum alongside dedicated colleagues, a devoted docent corps, and a supportive board of trustees. To be in an artist’s studio looking at art is of course the greatest privilege and the best part of the job. Conveying that same excitement to the visitors in our galleries—bringing art and people together—is what I’ve always hoped to achieve.”
Alicia Longwell, a Career in Art
Alicia Longwell received her Ph.D. degree from the Graduate Center, City University of New York, where her dissertation topic was John Graham.
Throughout her tenure, Longwell was integral in building the Museum’s collection through identifying and pursuing acquisitions, including major works by Ross Bleckner, Mary Heilmann, Lonnie Holley, Elizabeth Peyton, David Salle, Alan Shields, and Joe Zucker.
She has authored many publications for the Parrish including Jane Freilicher and Jane Wilson: Seen and Unseen (2015); William Merritt Chase in the Collection of the Parrish Art Museum (2014); Angels, Demons, and Savages: Pollock, Ossorio, Dubuffet (2013), contributing essay for The Phillips Collection catalogue; American Landscapes: Treasures from the Parrish Art Museum (2010); and First Impressions: Nineteenth-century American Master Prints (2010) — among others.
Longwell’s contributions to the East End art community were unparalleled. She will be missed.
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