Glenn D. Lowry became the sixth director of The Museum of Modern Art in 1995. He has overseen the physical transformation of the Museum’s campus through two building campaigns that have more than doubled the size of MoMA’s galleries, quintupled its endowment, created an education and research center, and inspired a new model for the presentation of modern and contemporary art. Lowry has championed innovation, both onsite and online, to grow MoMA’s annual visitation to nearly three million in the galleries and 35 million across moma.org. He expanded the Museum’s curatorial departments, with the addition of Media and Performance, and supported MoMA’s intellectual growth by creating new research programs like Contemporary and Modern Art Perspectives (CMAP).
In 2000 Lowry led the merger of MoMA with the contemporary art center PS1, and in 2015 he worked with Thelma Golden to introduce a joint fellowship program with the Studio Museum in Harlem for rising professionals in the arts. He is a strong advocate of contemporary artists and their work and he has lectured and written extensively in support of contemporary art, on the role of museums in society, and on other topics related to his research interests.
Lowry currently serves on the boards of the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, the Clark Art Institute, the Art Bridges Foundation, and the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, and on the advisory boards of the Istanbul Modern and the Mori Art Museum. Lowry is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a resident member of the American Philosophical Society. He has been honored by the French government with the titles of Officier de L’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, Chevalier de l’Ordre de Mérite, and Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. In 2019 the Japanese government honored Lowry with the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Neck Ribbon.
Born in 1954 in New York City and raised in Williamstown, Massachusetts, Lowry is married to the former Susan Chambers, with whom he has three children. He received a BA (1976) magna cum laude from Williams College, an MA (1978) and a PhD (1982) in the history of art from Harvard University, and honorary degrees from the College of William and Mary and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.