Boston Art Commission

The Board of the Boston Art Commission

Ekua Holmes, discretionary appointment for distinguished service to the arts, Vice-Chair

Ekua Holmes is a Roxbury-based visual artist known for vibrant collages that depict urban life. Her work is collected locally and nationally. In addition to creating art, Ms. Holmes maintains a strong commitment to arts education and outreach. Since 2011, she has served as Community Coordinator for sparc! The ArtMobile, an initiative of the Center for Art and Community Partnerships at Massachusetts College for Art and Design.  In this capacity, Ms. Holmes works with community organizations, schools and businesses to design intergenerational programs and events that engage participants in hands-on art-making activities and spirited dialogue about the value of art in public life.

Prior to MassArt and sparc!, Ms. Holmes served in various capacities on the executive board of Discover Roxbury, an organization whose mission is to document significant cultural and historical contributions of Roxbury; promote appreciation for and participation in the cultural life of the community; and foster economic empowerment by increasing support for local merchants and institutions.  In collaboration with Discover Roxbury, Ms. Holmes published "Dreaming Big: Pioneers of Public Art in Roxbury" (2010), an overview of noteworthy Roxbury monuments and their visionary creators.

Holmes is a graduate of Massachusetts College of Art and Design and she is the 2013 recipient of the 2013 NAACP Image Award for Arts. She is a native of Roxbury and resides in her childhood neighborhood of Washington Park, near a 1969 mural, "Africa is the Beginning", created by artist, Gary Rickson and featured in "Dreaming Big."

« Back to Top

Lynne Kortenhaus, nominated by the Boston Public Library, Chair

Lynne Kortenhaus is president and CEO of Kortenhaus Communications, Boston’s leading luxury lifestyle public relations firm for twenty-five years. In this capacity, Ms. Kortenhaus works with a number of real estate developers, retailers and hospitality leaders to design signature programs to launch and build brands in Boston. Prior to establishing her firm, Ms. Kortenhaus was a corporate art consultant, appraiser and New England Director of Phillips International Fine Art Auctioneers. Educated in the visual arts at Rhode Island School of Design, Ms. Kortenhaus has both a BFA and MFA in printmaking which she continues to practice today. Through this work, Ms. Kortenhaus has advised clients on art installations, both new acquisitions and curating existing collections. She has been the fine arts curator for The Ritz-Carlton Hotels from 1984 to present. Ms. Kortenhaus is co-chair of the board of The Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, a director of the Citi Performing Arts Center, and a director of the Back Bay Association. She is a Director’s Circle member of the ICA. She lives in Charlestown in a historic c. 1853 Greek Revival mansion built by William Caban and once the home of Eugene L. Norton, a one-time state senator and the 10th Mayor of Charlestown during the late 1860’s.

« Back to Top

Mark Pasnik, nominated by the Boston Society of Architects

Mark Pasnik is an architect and principal of the multi-disciplinary firm over,under, where he has worked on urban, architectural, and design projects in the Middle East, Central America, and throughout the United States. Clients include civic, academic, and arts-related organizations ranging from deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum to MassArt to Mass MoCA to Qatar Foundation. He is a co-director of the pinkcomma gallery, which has produced more than three dozen exhibitions on architecture, design, publishing, and urbanism within the gallery and in conjunction with the Boston Society of Architects at BSA Space, the Boston Public Library, the Boston Architectural Center, the Carnegie Museum of Art, and the Chicago Art Institute. He co-founded and curates the Design Biennial Boston, a program that provides a public platform to emerging designers in New England. Mark has taught at the California College of the Arts, Carnegie Mellon University, Northeastern University, Rhode Island School of Design, and Wentworth Institute, where he is a professor. He co-authored the book Heroic: Concrete Architecture and the New Boston, published by Monacelli Press in 2015.Mark was educated at Cornell University and the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

« Back to Top

Edward Saywell, nominated by the Museum of Fine Arts

Edward Saywell is the Director of Exhibitions Strategy and Gallery Displays at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. In this capacity, Edward oversees the contemporary art, film, concert and lecture and course programs at the Museum. He joined the MFA in September, 2006 as Assistant Curator of Prints and Drawings and became in September, 2007 Director of the West Wing. Under this new initiative, he began overseeing the transformation of the now-named Linde Family Wing into a vibrant space for the contemporary arts at the MFA and the dedication of the Wing’s entrance to school and community groups. A year following this appointment, he became Chair of the new department of Contemporary Art and MFA Programs with the express aim to explore exciting opportunities for creative and cross-disciplinary planning within the MFA, the School of the Museum of Fine Arts and the Museum’s many external programming partners. Educated at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland, Harvard and the University of London, he worked for nine years in the Department of Drawings at the Fogg Art Museum, Harvard where besides curating six exhibitions and publishing a number of catalogues and articles, he played an active role in teaching students from throughout the New England area. An exhibition that he organized for the Nielsen Gallery, Boston, was awarded by the International Association of Art Critics first place for the best exhibition in 2004 in a United States commercial gallery.

« Back to Top

Lisa Tung, nominated by the Massachusetts College of Art and Design

Lisa Tung is the Director and Curator for the Bakalar & Paine Galleries at Massachusetts College of Art and Design, the nation's first independent public college of art and design. Through her vision and talents, the Bakalar & Paine Galleries have been recognized as a significant contemporary venue for thought-provoking exhibitions and for debuting installations created specifically for and at MassArt. She has championed the expanding impact of MassArt’s premier exhibition space as a vital cultural resource for the college, Boston, and beyond. Ms. Tung and her exhibitions have received numerous awards including Boston Magazine’s Best of Boston 2012: Best Curator. She received her B.A. in Art History from Northwestern University and an M.A. in Feminist History, Theory, and Criticism from the University of Leeds, UK

« Back to Top

 

---

George Fifield, nominated by the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

Fifield is a media arts curator, writer, teacher, and artist. He is the founder and director of Boston Cyberarts, Inc. (http://bostoncyberarts.org), a nonprofit arts organization, which produced the biennial Boston Cyberarts Festival and currently manages The Boston Cyberarts Gallery inside the Green Street MBTA station on the Orange line. Fifield is a long-time Jamaica Plain resident. From 1993 to 2006, Fifield was curator of new media at the DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park in Lincoln, MA. 

The Boston Cyberarts Festival celebrated a long tradition of technological and artistic innovation throughout Massachusetts from 1999 through 2011. The festival showcased artists and high-technology professionals from around the world who use new technology to advance traditional visual and performing arts disciplines. Boston Cyberarts also works on a variety of special projects in Boston, including Art on the Marquee (http://www.artonthemarquee.com) in partnership with the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority. Boston Cyberarts, the National Park Service, and Boston Harbor Islands Alliance are also collaborating on an ongoing project to commission public algorithmic art for display on the LED screens at the park Welcome Center on the Greenway between Faneuil Hall and the Ferry Ticket Center on Long Wharf. 

« Back to Top

David Carlson, ex officio.

David Carlson is the Deputy Director of Urban Design at the Boston Redevelopment Authority, a position held since July of 2015.  This is an arc that started 32 years earlier as a student intern from the Harvard Graduate School of Design, and has included involvement with BRA teams in shaping the skyline and growth of Boston in all sectors and most neighborhoods.  In partnership with communities, the BRA plans Boston’s future while respecting its past. By guiding physical, social, and economic change in Boston’s neighborhoods and its downtown, the BRA seeks to shape a more prosperous, resilient and vibrant city for all.  The Urban Design Department participates in this mission through design review on projects from signage and modest improvements, to historic areas, to major multi-building projects and campuses; the Department provides unique insight in planning and process improvements.   The Urban Design Department has been honored by the BSA and AIA, as have many of the Projects reviewed and Plans promulgated throughout the City.  David has also been Executive Director of the Boston Civic Commission (‘BCDC’), which advises the BRA on the public realm impacts of major developments, since 1998.    He directs the BRA’s Model Shop, which maintains a 1:480 scale model of Boston’s downtown area for public viewing.  Mr. Carlson was one of the Municipal Research Bureau’s 2015 Shattuck Award winners, given to a group of the City’s ‘unsung heroes’ each year in honor of dedicated service above and beyond the norm.

« Back to Top

Julie Burros , ex officio

Julie Burros is the Chief of Arts and Culture for the city of Boston, a cabinet level position reporting directly to Mayor Martin J. Walsh. She oversees the office of Arts and Culture which houses the Boston Cultural Council and the Boston Art Commission. Her duties include heading up the creation of a Cultural Plan for Boston, oversight of grant making, grant seeking, public art, exhibitions and selected public programs and events. Formerly Burros was the director of Cultural Planning at the city of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events, where she directed the creation of the 2012 Chicago Cultural Plan. Burros is adjunct researcher at the University of International Business and Economics (UIBE) School of Public Administration in Beijing China, and adjunct faculty at The Theater School at DePaul University in Chicago.

« Back to Top

Staff

Karin Goodfellow, Director 

Karin Goodfellow drives all public art initiatives and policies for the City of Boston. As a leader in the arts in the Greater Boston Area, she is a relationship builder, connector, fundraiser, and arts advocate. Ms. Goodfellow leads the Boston Art Commission, housed in the Mayor's Office of Arts and Culture, to commission and approve innovative and transformative art and promote its accessibility to enrich the lives of Boston’s diverse citizens and visitors. She has reinvigorated the City’s portfolio of artworks to engage in contemporary trends and dialogues with an emphasis on artistic excellence that reflects the diversity and values of Boston’s neighborhoods. An artist herself, Ms. Goodfellow fosters involvement of Boston’s arts influencers, cultivates collaboration, curates projects, leads community engagement, and manages all aspects of operations. Since 2008, she has succeeded in increasing transparency and procedural clarity by removing obstacles to improve artistic performance and experience. In 2016, she grew that work to include projects funded through the City’s capital budget with the creation of the City’s first Percent-for-Art program. She also spearheaded the City of Boston’s first Artist-In-Residency program, Boston AIR, now entering its third year. Through this expanding program, Ms. Goodfellow cultivates new approaches to familiar challenges in city government by supporting local artists as agents of reflection, collaboration, and activism.

A graduate of Dartmouth College, Harvard University, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Ms. Goodfellow has a background in project planning and design, policy and implementation, and visual arts and social practice.

« Back to Top

Christian Guerra, Art Collection and Program Manager

Christian Guerra oversees the physical and intellectual care, custody, and maintenance of over 500 works of public art owned by the City of Boston. Ms. Guerra advises the Director and the Board of the Boston Art Commission on procedures and policy development necessary to ensure proper Collections management. Ms. Guerra also supervises the BAC submission and approval process of public art projects and guides the development of City-commissioned projects e.g. Boston AIR, Percent-for-Art, and special projects. An important part of her position is to advocate on behalf of the collection for resources, act as the liaison to the community, works to safeguard artist’s rights, and prioritize cultural equity in relation to City’s public art program. 

A graduate of The University of Texas, she was an Intelligence Community Center of Academic Excellence (ICCAE) fellow and scholar, where she developed her professional passion in global perspective, human rights, advocacy, & cultural narrative. Before she attended graduate school, she interned at the Rubin Center of Contemporary Art working with artists such as Mark Bradford, Sean Caulfield, youth artists from El Paso, Texas, and C.D. Juarez where she first experienced art as a powerful tool for dialogue and social change. She earned her Master's of Science degree in Library and Information Sciences, with a focus on Archives and Cultural Institutions from Simmons College; her research focused on social historical narrative reflected in publicly commissioned art.

« Back to Top