2009 Annual Meeting
Award Announcement
Heritage Preservation is pleased to announce that its highest honor, the Heritage Defender Award, has been given to Angelica Rudenstine, Program Officer for Museums and Art Conservation at the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and Anne-Imelda Radice, Director of the Institute of Museum and Library Services.
The award was presented to Rudenstine at Heritage Preservation’s Annual Meeting, held at the National Archives on November 17, 2009. Click here to read Rudenstine’s remarks. Radice was presented the award in a ceremony at IMLS on January 7, 2010.
The Heritage Defender Award is presented to individuals whose nationally significant contributions to preserving cultural heritage are extraordinary. It is not an annual award, but one that is presented only when merited. It is the first time in three years that it has been bestowed. In March of 2010, both recipients will be leaving the positions where they have done so much good for our nation’s heritage.
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NEH Chairman, Jim Leach; Chairperson of the Heritage Preservation Board of Directors and Chief of Conservation at the National Gallery of Art, Mervin Richard; Angelica Rudenstine; |
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Vice Provost for Graduate and Professional Education & Chairperson, Art Conservation Department at the University of Delaware, Debra Hess Norris; Anne-Imelda Radice; and Heritage Preservation President, Larry Reger |
Angelica Zander Rudenstine
Ms. Rudenstine retired in March, 2010 from her position as Program Officer for Museums and Art Conservation at the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. During her tenure, that program awarded 358 grants totaling more than $250,000,000. Some more figures will show concretely her impact on the field:
- 105 of those grants were endowment challenge grants that required matching funds.
- Since 1997, 10 grants totaling approximately $8.8 million were awarded for the advancement of training in photograph conservation
- In an effort to strengthen the role of science within conservation, almost $44 million has been provided to institutions.
- Since 1991, challenge grants provided funding for 6 museums to hire mid-level curators, deepening the scholarly ranks within those institutions.
As Don Randel, President of the Foundation said recently in a letter to directors of major art museums and leaders in the fields of art history and art conservation:
"She has already left a series of indelible marks on the world of museums and art conservation, among them the strengthening of curatorial and scholarly capacity at both senior and junior levels; the deepening of the academic engagement of college and university art museums; the identification of needs in the field of photographic conservation and the creation of programs to meet those needs; the development of science within art conservation, bringing to bear the highest level of scientific expertise; the strengthening of advanced conservation training programs, and the creation and support of positions for conservators in a wide range of institutions."
Angelica began her professional career at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in 1961. In 1969, she was commissioned by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum to catalogue the Museum’s permanent collection and served as research curator until 1982. In 1983 she was awarded a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship and, from 1985 to 1986, she was an adjunct professor at the Institute of Fine Arts - New York University. She joined the Mellon Foundation in 1993.
Anne-Imelda Radice
Since Anne-Imelda Radice became the Director of the Institute of Museum and Library Services, in 2005, she has accomplished a host of remarkable feats in the interest of addressing the recommendations of the Heritage Preservation study, the Heritage Health Index, which she announced to the White House would be her priority as IMLS director. Under the auspices of the Connecting to Collections national initiative these accomplishments include:
- Developing the idea of the Connecting to Collections Bookshelf. Now almost 3,000 museums, libraries, and archives in every state have sets of these essential resources for collections care.
- Launching the American Heritage Preservation Grants, and solicited a private sector partner, the Bank of America. 53 grants have been made to preserve significant objects of cultural heritage, and more are to come over the next two years.
- Starting a new program of statewide planning grants to address the issues raised in the Heritage Health Index.
- Involving representatives of 1,300 smaller museums and libraries in every state in a national discussion through the national summit and four Connecting to Collections forums,
- Taking Connecting to Collections abroad, hosting a seminar in Salzburg that included representatives of 32 countries.
Prior to joining the IMLS, Radice was the Acting Assistant Chairman for Programs at the National Endowment for the Humanities. She assisted the Chairman in the overall program administration of this federal agency dedicated to supporting research, education, preservation, and public programs in the humanities. Her efforts in other phases of her career have consistently championed the cause of preserving our culture treasures, including her years as Acting Chairman and Senior Deputy Chairman at the National Endowment for the Arts, Executive Director of the Friends of Dresden, Inc., Chief of the Creative Arts Division of the United States Information Agency, and as the first Director of the National Museum of Women in the Arts.