after much speculation
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston names Gary Tinterow new director
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston has selected Gary Tinterow as its new director after a nearly year-long search to replace the late Peter Marzio.
Tinterow, the Engelhard Chairman of the Department of Nineteenth-Century, Modern, and Contemporary Art at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, has been in Houston recently to talk over the job with officials and was introduced at a reception for Life Trustees hosted by Cornelia Long, chair of the MFAH Board of Trustees, and her husband, Meredith.
As previously reported by CultureMap last month, sources close to the museum suggested Tinterow as one of two final candidates chosen by the MFAH selection committee along with Kimerly Rorschach, director of Duke University’s Nasher Museum of Art.
A Houston native who grew up just off of Braeswood, Tinterow attended Shearn Elementary, Pershing Middle School and graduated from Bellaire High School in 1972. He told The Bellaire Buzz in 2007 that he recalled feeling a "a sense of wonder" during childhood visits to the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.
While the MFAH is evaluating submissions from three design firms — Morphosis, Snøhetta and Steven Holl Architects — for a new high-profile building devoted to modern and contemporary works, sources say officials wanted to have a new director in place to oversee the final selection of an architect in late January 2012.
Tinterow has been a leading candidate since May, when The New York Times mentioned his name with regard to the MFAH search.