Henry Geldzahler

Henry Geldzahler was an American art curator and critic who championed contemporary art as the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s first curator of twentieth-century art.

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Thomas Hoving: Thomas Hoving was director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art from 1967 to 1977. Hoving hired Geldzahler and backed his effort to bring contemporary art into the Met.
New York Painting and Sculpture: 1940–1970: A 1969 Metropolitan Museum exhibition surveying three decades of New York painting and sculpture. Geldzahler organized this influential survey to introduce recent art within the Met.
Contemporary art: Contemporary art is art produced in the present era, often engaging current social and cultural conditions. Geldzahler pressed a major encyclopedic museum to collect and exhibit living artists.
Alfred H. Barr Jr.: Alfred H. Barr Jr. was the founding director of the Museum of Modern Art and a leading organizer of modern art history. Barr built a dedicated modern-art institution, while Geldzahler pressed an encyclopedic museum to embrace the present.
Andy Warhol: Andy Warhol was an American artist associated with Pop art, film, and experimental publishing. Geldzahler championed Warhol and included him in the Met’s landmark 1969 exhibition.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art: The Metropolitan Museum of Art is a museum in New York City with collections spanning global cultures and periods. Geldzahler established the museum’s curatorial presence in twentieth-century art.
Pop art: Pop art is an art movement that draws on imagery and objects from popular and consumer culture. His exhibitions helped establish Pop artists as subjects for major museum collections.
Clement Greenberg: Clement Greenberg was an American art critic known for formalist accounts of modern painting. Greenberg’s critical framework differed from Geldzahler’s broader, artist-centered curatorial outlook.
David Hockney: David Hockney is a British artist known for painting, drawing, printmaking, and photography. Geldzahler supported Hockney and featured his work in the 1969 exhibition.
National Endowment for the Arts: The National Endowment for the Arts is a United States federal agency that supports artistic activity. Geldzahler later led the agency’s visual arts program.