John Elderfield (born 25 April 1943) was Chief Curator of Painting and Sculpture at the

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

, from 2003 to 2008.''Who’s Who 2011'', A&C Black, 2011 He served as the Allen R. Adler, Class of 1967, Distinguished Curator at the

Princeton University Art Museum The Princeton University Art Museum (PUAM) is the Princeton University gallery of art, located in Princeton, New Jersey. With a collecting history that began in 1755, the museum was formally established in 1882, and now houses over 113,000 works o ...

and Lecturer in the

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

Department of Art and Archaeology from 2012 to 2019.

Career

Elderfield studied the history of art at the

University of Manchester , mottoeng = Knowledge, Wisdom, Humanity , established = 2004 – University of Manchester Predecessor institutions: 1956 – UMIST (as university college; university 1994) 1904 – Victoria University of Manchester 1880 – Victoria Univer ...

and the

University of Leeds , mottoeng = And knowledge will be increased , established = 1831 – Leeds School of Medicine1874 – Yorkshire College of Science1884 - Yorkshire College1887 – affiliated to the federal Victoria University1904 – University of Leeds , ...

. He received his PhD from the Courtauld Institute of Art in 1975. In 1974, Elderfield edited and introduced the diary of the Zurich Dada artist

Hugo Ball Hugo Ball (; 22 February 1886 – 14 September 1927) was a German author, poet, and essentially the founder of the Dada movement in European art in Zürich in 1916. Among other accomplishments, he was a pioneer in the development of sound poetry. ...

, ''Hugo Ball: the flight out of time''. This publications was revised in 1996. Elderfield joined the Museum of Modern Art, New York, as Curator of Painting and Sculpture in 1975. He served the Museum as Chief Curator at Large from 1993 to 2003. As Chief Curator of Painting and Sculpture at the Museum, he reinstalled that collection in 2004 in its newly rebuilt premises. Elderfield had published studies of

Henri Matisse Henri Émile Benoît Matisse (; 31 December 1869 – 3 November 1954) was a French visual artist, known for both his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known prima ...

Kurt Schwitters Kurt Hermann Eduard Karl Julius Schwitters (20 June 1887 – 8 January 1948) was a German artist who was born in Hanover, Germany. Schwitters worked in several genres and media, including dadaism, constructivism, surrealism, poetry, sound, pain ...

Helen Frankenthaler Helen Frankenthaler (December 12, 1928 – December 27, 2011) was an American abstract expressionist painter. She was a major contributor to the history of postwar American painting. Having exhibited her work for over six decades (early 1950s u ...

, Richard Diebenkorn,

Howard Hodgkin Sir Gordon Howard Eliott Hodgkin (6 August 1932 – 9 March 2017) was a British Painting, painter and printmaker. His work is most often associated with Abstract art, abstraction. Early life Gordon Howard Eliot Hodgkin was born on 6 August 1 ...

, and

Pierre-Paul Prud'hon Pierre-Paul Prud'hon (, 4 April 1758 – 16 February 16, 1823) was a French Romantic Painting, painter and drawing, draughtsman best known for his allegorical paintings and portraits such as ''Madame Georges Anthony and Her Two Sons'' (1796). He ...

. In 1986, Elderfield received the Eric Mitchell Prize for his book on Schwitters. Elderfield contributed a catalog essay to the exhibition of Bob Dylan's paintings at the

National Gallery of Denmark The National Gallery of Denmark ( da, Statens Museum for Kunst, also known as "SMK", literally State Museum for Art) is the Danish national gallery, located in the centre of Copenhagen. The museum collects, registers, maintains, researches and han ...

from September 2010 until April 2011 He served on the board of the

Dedalus Foundation Dedalus may refer to: * Dedalus (band), an Italian jazz-rock band * Dedalus Books, a British publishing company * Dedalus Diggle, a ''Harry Potter'' character * Dedalus (medical software company), a provider of healthcare information systems, fine ...

, the Members’ Board of the Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C, the American Advisory Committee of the Courtauld Institute of Art, the American Committee of the Praemium Imperiale, and the Advisory Committee of the Kate Weare Dance Company; was a Member of the

Association of Literary Scholars, Critics, and Writers The Association of Literary Scholars, Critics, and Writers (ALSCW) was organized in 1994 as the Association of Literary Scholars and Critics by a group of over 400 scholars troubled by what they saw as an over reliance on post-modern theory in the a ...

, and an Honorary Member of Proyecto Armando Reverón, Caracas.John Elderfield
Dedalus Foundation, New York.

Recognition

Elderfield received the award of Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres from the French Government. In 2005,

Time Magazine ''Time'' (stylized in all caps) is an American news magazine based in New York City. For nearly a century, it was published weekly, but starting in March 2020 it transitioned to every other week. It was first published in New York City on Mar ...

included Elderfield on their list of the 100 most influential people of 2005.

Bibliography

*''Flight Out of Time: A Dada Diary'', by Hugo Ball, edited with an introduction and notes by John Elderfield (University of California Press, 1974; revised 1996). *''Kurt Schwitters'' (New edition 1987), Thames & Hudson. *''Modern Painting And Sculpture: 1880 to Present at the Museum of Modern Art'', New York: Museum of Modern Art, 2004. *''Henri Matisse: A Retrospective'', New York: Museum of Modern Art, 1992. *''Helen Frankenthaler'', Harry N. Abrams, 1987. *''Language of the Body: Drawings by Pierre-Paul Prud'hon'', Harry N. Abrams, 1996. *''Manet and the Execution of Emperor Maximilian'', New York: Museum of Modern Art, 2006. *''Cézanne Portraits'', Princeton University Press, 2017.

References

American art historians American art curators Living people People associated with the Museum of Modern Art (New York City) 1943 births {{US-art-historian-stub