Adam Lerner
Encyclopedia
Adam Lerner is the Director of the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver and Chief Animator in the Department of Fabrications. He was the founder and Executive Director of The Laboratory of Art and Ideas at Belmar
until The Lab merged with the MCA Denver in March 2009.
from 2001 to 2003. Prior to his arrival in Colorado, Lerner served as Curator of the Contemporary Museum, Baltimore, where he curated several exhibitions, including new projects with Christian Marclay and Dennis Adams, and was the originating curator for the film installation Baltimore by Isaac Julien.
Lerner and Baie also worked with artist Melanie Smith (artist)
and Rafael Ortega
to develop a version of Mixed Taste called Huevos Revueltos for the Sala de Arte Público Siqueros, Mexico City.
In an article on Lerner in Surface Magazine, Aric Chen described one of his public events as follows: “A collision of highbrow and low, it presents odd-couple, head-to-head pairings between, say, a tequila connoisseur and an expert on dark energy in the Universe that tease out disparate approaches to knowledge with geeky brilliance.”[1] This style has precursors in the Dada art movement and is often compared with Cabinet Magazine and Machine Project, in Los Angeles.
Lerner has also curated for MCA Denver such unconventional exhibitions as Orphan Paintings: Unauthenticated Art of the Russian Avant-Garde, which presented a collection of unauthenticated paintings to explore the meaning of authenticity in art.
At The Lab at Belmar
, Lerner curated solo exhibitions of Liam Gillick
and Issac Julien as well as such non-traditional exhibitions as The Astounding Problem of Andrew Novick, featuring the obsessive collections of a former punk rock singer turned electrical engineer.
At the Contemporary Museum, Baltimore, Lerner curated several exhibitions, including new projects with Christian Marclay
and Dennis Adams
, and was the originating curator for the film installation Baltimore by Isaac Julien.
Lerner innovative work at The Lab at Belmar was the subject of an extensive discussion in the Canadian national bestseller The Geography of Hope: A Tour of the World We Need (Random House Canada, 2007), where Chris Turner wrote that “Lerner assembled the funkiest, most playful, most inviting arts and culture program suburbia had ever seen.”
, the sculptor of Mount Rushmore. His contribution to the Corcoran Gallery of Art’s 2002-03 biennial exhibition catalogue “The Museum and the Multiplex” was the subject of a symposium of the same name at the Corcoran in spring 2003.
from the Johns Hopkins University
and his Master's
from Cambridge University. He was a Fellow at the Smithsonian American Art Museum from 1997 to 1998.
The Laboratory of Art and Ideas at Belmar
The Laboratory of Art and Ideas at Belmar was a unique contemporary art institution located in Lakewood, a suburb on the western boundary of Denver, Colorado. Founded by Executive Director Adam Lerner, The Lab at Belmar was the cultural anchor of the Belmar district, a mixed-use residential and...
until The Lab merged with the MCA Denver in March 2009.
Career
Lerner was previously Master Teacher for Modern and Contemporary Art at the Denver Art MuseumDenver Art Museum
The Denver Art Museum is an art museum in Denver, Colorado located in Denver's Civic Center.It is known for its collection of American Indian art,and has a comprehensive collection numbering more than 68,000 works from across the world....
from 2001 to 2003. Prior to his arrival in Colorado, Lerner served as Curator of the Contemporary Museum, Baltimore, where he curated several exhibitions, including new projects with Christian Marclay and Dennis Adams, and was the originating curator for the film installation Baltimore by Isaac Julien.
Museum Public Programming
Lerner is known for a unique approach to museum programming that combines elements of curatorial and educational practice. Lerner’s approach is best exemplified by a program that he developed at The Lab at Belmar in 2004 Mixed Taste: Tag-Team Lectures on Unrelated Topics, which brings together randomly paired topics in the same night. In 2009, he brought the popular program to the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver, where it is produced by Sarah Kate Baie, the museum’s Director of Programing and Chief of Fictions, and presented weekly in the summer and winter seasons. Lerner has also presented Mixed Taste at public events and conferences hosted by the American Craft Council, Deitch Studio, in Long Island City, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the Museum of Modern Art, New York.Lerner and Baie also worked with artist Melanie Smith (artist)
Melanie Smith (artist)
Melanie Smith is the artist curated for the Mexican Pavilion at the 2011 Venice Biennale. Her work has been characterized by a certain re-reading of the formal and aesthetic categories of avant-gardes and post-avant-garde movements, problematized at the sites and within the horizons of heterotopias...
and Rafael Ortega
Rafael Ortega
Rafael Ortega is a former professional boxer. The highlight of his career came in 1977, when he won the WBA World featherweight title.-Professional career:...
to develop a version of Mixed Taste called Huevos Revueltos for the Sala de Arte Público Siqueros, Mexico City.
In an article on Lerner in Surface Magazine, Aric Chen described one of his public events as follows: “A collision of highbrow and low, it presents odd-couple, head-to-head pairings between, say, a tequila connoisseur and an expert on dark energy in the Universe that tease out disparate approaches to knowledge with geeky brilliance.”[1] This style has precursors in the Dada art movement and is often compared with Cabinet Magazine and Machine Project, in Los Angeles.
Exhibitions
For MCA Denver, Lerner co-curated (with Elissa Auther) the major group exhibition West of Center: Art and the Counterculture Experiment in America, 1965–1977, traveling to the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, at the University of Oregon, Eugene, and Mills College Art Museum, Oakland, California. To accompany the exhibition, the curators co-edited a major publication, published by the University of Minnesota Press.Lerner has also curated for MCA Denver such unconventional exhibitions as Orphan Paintings: Unauthenticated Art of the Russian Avant-Garde, which presented a collection of unauthenticated paintings to explore the meaning of authenticity in art.
At The Lab at Belmar
The Laboratory of Art and Ideas at Belmar
The Laboratory of Art and Ideas at Belmar was a unique contemporary art institution located in Lakewood, a suburb on the western boundary of Denver, Colorado. Founded by Executive Director Adam Lerner, The Lab at Belmar was the cultural anchor of the Belmar district, a mixed-use residential and...
, Lerner curated solo exhibitions of Liam Gillick
Liam Gillick
Liam Gillick is a British conceptual artist who lives in New York City. He is often associated with the artists included the 1996 exhibit Traffic, which first introduced the term Relational Art.-Life and career:...
and Issac Julien as well as such non-traditional exhibitions as The Astounding Problem of Andrew Novick, featuring the obsessive collections of a former punk rock singer turned electrical engineer.
At the Contemporary Museum, Baltimore, Lerner curated several exhibitions, including new projects with Christian Marclay
Christian Marclay
Christian Marclay is a Swiss-American visual artist and composer.Marclay's work explores connections between sound, noise, photography, video, and film...
and Dennis Adams
Dennis Adams
Dennis Adams is an American artist internationally recognized for his urban interventions and museum installations that reveal historical and political undercurrents in photography, cinema, public space and architecture. Over the last three decades, he has realized over fifty urban projects in...
, and was the originating curator for the film installation Baltimore by Isaac Julien.
Recognition
Nina Simon, one of the leading voices of museum reform in America, wrote in her blog, Museum 2.0, that under Lerner’s leadership MCA Denver “is a small, focused fount of creative expression and ingenuity.Lerner innovative work at The Lab at Belmar was the subject of an extensive discussion in the Canadian national bestseller The Geography of Hope: A Tour of the World We Need (Random House Canada, 2007), where Chris Turner wrote that “Lerner assembled the funkiest, most playful, most inviting arts and culture program suburbia had ever seen.”
Academic Focus
Since the early 1990s, Lerner’s scholarship has focused on the relationship between art and public life. Lerner co-edited the book "Reimagining the Nation," published by Open University Press (1993), including his own essay on nineteenth-century sculpture and French nationalism. He wrote his dissertation on early twentieth-century American monuments, emphasizing the career of Gutzon BorglumGutzon Borglum
Gutzon de la Mothe Borglum was an American artist and sculptor famous for creating the monumental presidents' heads at Mount Rushmore, South Dakota, the famous carving on Stone Mountain near Atlanta, as well as other public works of art.- Background :The son of Mormon Danish immigrants, Gutzon...
, the sculptor of Mount Rushmore. His contribution to the Corcoran Gallery of Art’s 2002-03 biennial exhibition catalogue “The Museum and the Multiplex” was the subject of a symposium of the same name at the Corcoran in spring 2003.
Education
Lerner received his Ph.D.Ph.D.
A Ph.D. is a Doctor of Philosophy, an academic degree.Ph.D. may also refer to:* Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*Piled Higher and Deeper, a web comic strip*PhD: Phantasy Degree, a Korean comic series* PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...
from the Johns Hopkins University
Johns Hopkins University
The Johns Hopkins University, commonly referred to as Johns Hopkins, JHU, or simply Hopkins, is a private research university based in Baltimore, Maryland, United States...
and his Master's
Master's degree
A master's is an academic degree granted to individuals who have undergone study demonstrating a mastery or high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice...
from Cambridge University. He was a Fellow at the Smithsonian American Art Museum from 1997 to 1998.