Bonnie Clearwater - Flickr - Knight Foundation

Bonnie Clearwater (born 1957) is an American writer and art historian. She is the director and chief

curator A curator (from la, cura, meaning "to take care") is a manager or overseer. When working with cultural organizations, a curator is typically a "collections curator" or an "exhibitions curator", and has multifaceted tasks dependent on the parti ...

of Nova Southeastern University's

Museum of Art Fort Lauderdale The NSU Art Museum Fort Lauderdale is an art museum in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Originating in 1958 as the ''Fort Lauderdale Art Center'', the museum is now located in an modernist building designed by Edward Larrabee Barnes. The current buildin ...

. Previously, Clearwater was the director and chief curator of

Museum of Contemporary Art, North Miami The Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) is a collecting museum located in North Miami, Florida. The building was designed by the architecture firm Gwathmey Siegel & Associates Architects, New York City. History The Museum of Contemporary Art began ...

. She has a particular interest in the work of

Mark Rothko Mark Rothko (), born Markus Yakovlevich Rothkowitz (russian: Ма́ркус Я́ковлевич Ротко́вич, link=no, lv, Markuss Rotkovičs, link=no; name not Anglicized until 1940; September 25, 1903 – February 25, 1970), was a Lat ...

. Clearwater studied art history at

NYU New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then-Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, the ...

then attended graduate school at

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

, where she studied modern and medieval art, graduating with a master's degree in the late '70s. Clearwater went on to be personal curator for

Leonard Lauder Leonard Alan Lauder (born March 19, 1933) is an American billionaire, philanthropist, art collector. He and his brother, Ronald Lauder, are the sole heirs to the Estée Lauder Companies cosmetics fortune, founded by their parents, Estée Lauder ...

for six years while she then curated the Rothko Foundation in New York City from 1980, and she was then the program director of the

Lannan Foundation The Lannan Literary Awards are a series of awards and literary fellowships given out in various fields by the Lannan Foundation. Established in 1989, the awards are meant "to honor both established and emerging writers whose work is of exceptional ...

in Los Angeles from January 1986. In the early '90s, she moved to Miami where she saw potential for an exciting, emerging art scene. Clearwater became head curator of the MOCA North Miami in 1994, and programs director in 1997.A Director With an Eye For the Fresh and the Local
" (12 March 2008). ''The New York Times'' Some of Clearwater's publications include "The Rothko Book: Tate Essential Artist Series," "Julian Schnabel: Versions of Chuck," and "Roberto Juarez: A Sense of Place."List of Books by Bonnie Clearwater at Amazon.com
/ref> Clearwater is originally from

Rockland County Rockland County is the southernmost county on the west side of the Hudson River in the U.S. state of New York. It is part of the New York metropolitan area. It is about from the Bronx at their closest points. The county's population, as of t ...

, N.Y. She is married to Jim Clearwater, who runs the art-book publishing company Grassfield Press.

References

External links

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also in Spanish
* (requires

RealPlayer RealPlayer, formerly RealAudio Player, RealOne Player and RealPlayer G2, is a cross-platform media player app, developed by RealNetworks. The media player is compatible with numerous container file formats of the multimedia realm, including MP3 ...

) * * (MP4 video) {{DEFAULTSORT:Clearwater, Bonnie 1957 births Living people American art historians American art curators American women curators American women historians Writers from Miami Directors of museums in the United States Women museum directors Historians from New York (state) Women art historians People from Rockland County, New York Columbia University alumni New York University alumni Historians from Florida 21st-century American women