Dr. Sylvia Yount

Louise B. and J. Harwood Cochrane Curator of American Art

Chief Curator and Louise B. and J. Harwood Cochrane Curator of American Art, joined the staff of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in June 2007. Previously, she served six years as the Margaret and Terry Stent Curator of American Art and department head at the High Museum of Art. Before moving to the High, she spent eight years as Curator at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, and as Chief Curator from 1999. In addition to completing pivotal collection reinstallations at all three institutions, Yount has organized major exhibitions (with accompanying catalogues) on Cecilia Beaux, Maxfield Parrish, and American modernism, among other topics. She received a PhD and a MA in the history of art from the University of Pennsylvania, and a BA in Italian from New York University. Yount has lectured and published widely on late 19th- and 20th-century American art and culture as well as on issues of curatorial responsibility and current museum practice. In addition to strengthening VMFA’s American holdings and providing leadership for the museum’s nine collecting areas, she is presently organizing a major traveling exhibition on the Colonial Revival, America’s most enduring cultural phenomenon.