MOMA Creates New Position

John Elderfield, director of the Museum of Modern Art’s department of drawings and also a curator of painting and sculpture, has been appointed to the newly created position of chief curator at large.

The museum formally announced Wednesday that Elderfield, the only curator on the museum’s staff who wears hats in two departments, assumes his new position immediately. The job will allow him to achieve a long-desired goal: to shed some administrative responsibility and devote more time to curatorial writing and organizing exhibitions.

“Inevitably what seems to happen is that as one becomes more senior more administration accrues to the position,” said Elderfield, 49, a native of Yorkshire, England, who has worked at the museum for 17 years. He organized the recent successful Matisse retrospective and as a result has become a highly sought curator.