The Contemporary Arts Museum Houston (CAMH) announced on April 25 the appointment of Ryan N. Dennis as Senior Curator and Director of Public Initiatives, effective June. Houston-born Dennis is co-curator, with Jessica Bell Brown, of the traveling exhibition “A Movement in Every Direction: Legacies of the Great Migration,” currently on view at the Baltimore Museum of Art. She comes to CAMH from the Center for Art & Public Exchange at the Mississippi Museum of Art, where she served as Chief Curator and Artistic Director for the past three years. From 2017 to 2020, she served as Curator and Director of Programs at Project Row Houses in Houston, having joined that institution as Curator and Director of Public Art in 2012. Dennis began her career at the Menil Collection in Houston, where she was a curatorial assistant from 2007 to 2009. She specializes in contemporary African American art, focusing on site-specific projects and community engagement.
“Ryan Dennis’ ten-year tenure in Houston at Project Row Houses and the Menil Collection is legendary, and it’s an honor to welcome him back to the city through this role,” said Hesse McGraw, Director General of CAMH. “Ryan is a leading national curatorial voice whose work uniquely connects artists and communities to institutions.”
CAMH also announced the promotions of Rebecca Matalon to Senior Curator and Patricia Restrepo to Curator. Among the exhibitions Matalon has curated in recent years are solo shows of the work of Garrett Bradley (2019-20), Mariah Garnett (2022), Diane Severin Nguyen (2022) and Cauleen Smith (2021), as well as the exhibition duet “Wild Life: Elizabeth Murray & Jessi Reaves” (2021). Restrepo, who like Dennis is originally from Houston, has worked for CAMH since 2014. She recently co-curated the interdisciplinary exhibition Slowed and Throwed: Records of the City through Mutated Lenses (2020-21).
