Curator of Last Year

Edward hasn't made any Curator of the Month posts in a while... so I will post on the Curator of Last Year.


This is Ian Berry.

Ian was the co-curator (along with Michael Duncan) of the Richard Pettibone show I saw last November at the Tang Museum. The Tang usually has three different shows up at a time, one in each of the two main galleries and a third in the small mezzanine gallery (sometimes they have a forth or fifth something happening in the lobby). Ian, as the "main" curator at the Tang, was also responsible for the two exhibitions running concurrent with Pettibone's - the co-curated (with Bill Arning) Kate Ericson and Mel Ziegler show in the other big gallery and Kathy Butterly's exhibition in the mezzanine space. Each show was excellent, but it was on my second or third visit that I started to get how brilliantly they all fit together.

My notes are long gone... but I am remembering the miniaturizing and care of Pettibone with the very small and detailed Butterly sculptures with the tiny Rushmore "copy" and dollhouses of Ericson/Ziegler... the repetition of Pettibone with Butterly's pieces all lined up in one long row with Ericson/Ziegler's bars of soap, rows of jars, and small trains (which bring me back again to Pettibone's trains)... Pettibone's Shaker stuff with Ericson/Ziegler's cupboards and chests with Butterly's "teapots". Much much more.. I can't remember it all

So, Ian Berry is Curator of Last Year.