New head of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts says the museum is changing, but it will survive

Casual observers would be forgiven for thinking that the longest-standing art museum and school in America had given up the ghost. The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts announced in January that this was the case finishing his university educationand a few months later closed its historic monumental building.

The abrupt, inexplicable collapse of the University of the Arts on Broad Street only added to the impression that PAFA had also closed. A New York Times article from June about UArts reported that PAFA was fixing, and the piece traveled far before it was corrected.

But while questions remain about the new certificate program PAFA plans to launch to replace college degrees, the institution remains and the museum at PAFA continues to move forward.

For starters, exhibitions at PAFA’s Samuel MV Hamilton Building have continued uninterrupted. “Making Strange: Sacred Imagery and the Self,” a small exhibition featuring works by Moe A. Brooker, Kara Walker, Anne Minich, Violet Oakley and others, opens Nov. 14.

For another, the museum has a new leader.

“I started 49 hours ago – Monday morning at 9am, so I am a fountain of knowledge and wisdom,” Harry Philbrick said one recent morning.

Playful sarcasm aside, Philbrick comes to the job with insider knowledge. He started as interim director of the PAFA museum on October 1, but previously served as director from 2011 to 2016.

These are his main tasks redesign of the permanent collectionplanning for a 2026 opening is well underway, as is museum programming for the next two or three years.

“We currently have a small number of projects in the pipeline and given the cuts that have been made, we have a very small staff. So my focus is on really trying to keep the museum open and running and keep the shows going, but on a smaller scale until 2026, when I hope we can really ramp up the programming.

Philbrick, 66, expects he will remain in the post only sometime into 2026, when he expects to be replaced by “presumably someone younger and more long-term than me,” he said. However, his influence over those twenty months or so promises to be crucial. President and CEO Eric G. Pryor ends his three-year term of office in late December, and Philbrick is part of a trio with chief operating officer Lisa Biagas and chief academic officer Sonia Bassheva Mañjon that has already taken charge of the institution.

One of Philbrick’s first assignments is to find a successor for Anna O. Marley, who left her job as curator of historic American art in July and director of curatorial affairs at the Toledo Museum of Art. (Marley was also PAFA’s head of curatorial affairs, but the new curator will not assume that title. Brooke Davis Anderson most recently held the title of museum director. She left in May 2021.)

Interviews for a new curator of American art have begun, said Philbrick, who came to PAFA after a stint as interim director of the Fabric Workshop and Museum.

A big part of his job will be fundraising. He is already talking to individuals and foundations, and given the post-pandemic challenges for the arts sector and, “frankly, the trauma we have all experienced with the closure of UArts”, he said, the first question financiers have is whether PAFA will survive.

“And the answer is a resounding yes. We will survive. The board has taken a close look at the financial reality and made a number of difficult decisions. We have significantly reduced headcount than in the past. So difficult decisions have been made. But they are decisions made to create a sustainable context for the institution. Yes, we are going to survive and yes, we are developing plans to do more than survive to actually thrive.”

PAFA still predicts that a series of operating deficits will end in 2028 or sooner. But Philbrick reiterated expectations that no artwork from the museum’s 16,000-plus collection would be divested for financial reasons – either to fund capital projects or for work at the Furness Building, which is closed due to HVAC work and is expected to reopen in spring 2026.

“No divestiture is being considered at this time,” he said.

Philbrick says discussions about the revamped certificate program are still ongoing, and that while the content of that program is ultimately not up to the museum side of the institution, “we remain active participants in that conversation.” PAFA hopes to launch the certificate program in fall 2025.

“We really support the idea of ​​the museum as a place of learning. And that’s everything from UPenn students who come here to intern and do research, to summer camp programs and everything in between.

It is essential that the making of art and the viewing of it take place in the same place and have a relationship with each other. As it has been for centuries.

“That’s really what brought me back to PAFA, the magic of this place, that combination of art of the highest caliber on display and art being created cheek by jowl. And that is an energy that no other institution has.”