James D. Thornton Picked to Chair Baltimore Museum of Art Board
The Baltimore Museum of Artwork (BMA) on July 12 unveiled that it has named James D. Thornton to chair its board. Thornton, who is Black, is the 1st individual of color to presume the part given that the museum was set up in 1914. A board member given that 2004, he is the institution’s 20-sixth chair and succeeds Clair Zamoiski Segal, who held the publish for 7 several years and will continue being on the board.
“I am very honored to observe in the footsteps of so a lot of achieved board chairs who performed pivotal roles in setting up the Baltimore Museum of Artwork as a cultural anchor above the earlier 108 many years,” said Thornton in a statement.
Thornton is the managing director of Thorwood Serious Estate Group. He was earlier vice president of Sears & Co., in which he worked for 20-seven several years, and held several roles at MBNA Lender, like that of vice president. A life span member of the NAACP, Thornton is a noted philanthropist, getting served as chairman of Talladega College’s board of trustees and president of the Harford County Caucus of African-American Leaders, and as a member of the Harford County Arranging and Zoning Advisory Board and Judicial Organizing Fee.
Thornton’s appointment to the role of BMA board chair comes as the museum struggles to raise variety, equity, and inclusion inside of its walls. He is a member of the committee charged with discovering a substitution for former BMA director Chris Bedford, who departed in June to guide the San Francisco Museum of Modern Artwork. Bedford, who is white and a longtime winner of diversity, on his departure echoed the sentiments of many Baltimore artists, telling community information station WBAL, “A sure-hearth sign of good results would be that the incoming director did not look like me.”
Thornton in a assertion promised to go on pushing in the very same course. “My determination is to keep on to establish on both of those our powerful inventive plan and our social equity and variety operate across the establishment.”