PAFA Announces Jodi Throckmorton as New Curator
of Contemporary Art

PHILADELPHIA (August 26, 2014) — The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) is pleased to announce that Jodi Throckmorton  has been named Curator of Contemporary Art, effective October 27, 2014.

Throckmorton comes to PAFA from the Ulrich Museum of Art at Wichita State University, where she currently serves as Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art (since June 2013). Prior to that, Throckmorton served as Associate Curator at the San Jose Museum of Art (2007-2013).

“I am delighted that Jodi will be joining PAFA. Her skill as a curator, as well as passion and enthusiasm, became clear when I had the pleasure of working with her on PAFA’s Eric Fischl exhibition in 2012,” says Harry Philbrick, the Edna S. Tuttleman Director of the Museum. “Jodi’s essay in PAFA’s Female Gaze exhibition catalog (2013) is evidence of her superb skills as a writer, as well as her outstanding scholarship. She is, in short, a talented and well-rounded addition to PAFA’s curatorial team. Jodi will be a wonderful ambassador to the community, and play a key role in expanding PAFA’s contemporary program.”

During her time at the Ulrich Museum, Throckmorton curated Postdate: Postdate: Photography and Inherited History in India (2015); Bruce Conner: Somebody Else's Prints (2014); as well as Free Texts: Stephanie Syjuco (2014). Among the exhibitions Throckmorton curated at the San Jose Museum of Art are Questions from the Sky: New Work by Hung Liu (2013); Ranu Mukherjee: Telling Fortunes (2012); Renegade Humor (2012); This Kind of Bird Flies Backward: Paintings by Joan Brown (2011); The Modern Photographer: Observation and Intention (2010); and Vital Signs: New Media from the Permanent Collection (2010).

Throckmorton also co-organized, with Harry Philbrick, Dive Deep: Eric Fischl and the Process of Painting, on view at PAFA and the San Jose Museum of Art (2012-13).

In her new role, Throckmorton will oversee PAFA’s contemporary art exhibition programs, and will work closely with the Collections Committee and Museum Director to reinvigorate PAFA’s historic dedication to acquiring contemporary art. Throckmorton will assume curatorial responsibility for gifts and purchases of artwork, and the care and display of works in the permanent collection, post-1965. She will also use PAFA’s program of contemporary exhibitions and artists’ projects to integrate the Museum and School in creative new ways. 

Throckmorton earned her MFA in Museum Studies from San Francisco State University, and her BA in Art History and French from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

“It is a great honor to join the talented staff at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, an institution that I have admired for many years for its long-standing reputation as a leader in the field of American art. With such a rich legacy of exhibitions and impressive collections, I am eager to build on PAFA's strength in contemporary art and to connect the institution's rich legacy with the art of today,” says Throckmorton.

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Founded in 1805, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) is America's first School of Fine Arts and Museum. A recipient of the 2005 National Medal of Arts presented by the President of the United States, PAFA is a recognized leader in Fine Arts education. Nearly every major American artist has taught, studied, or exhibited at PAFA. The institution's world-class collection of American art continues to grow and provides what only a few other art institutions in the world offer: the rare combination of an outstanding Museum and an extraordinary faculty known for its commitment to students and for the stature and quality of its artistic work.