Shamim M. Momin will start her tenure as director and chief curator of the Bronx Museum. (picture by Sue de Beer, courtesy Bronx Museum)
Shamim M. Momin, cofounder of the general public artwork nonprofit Los Angeles Nomadic Division (LAND), will lead the Bronx Museum starting this September.
The museum introduced Momin’s appointment as director and chief curator on Thursday, July 8, because the establishment prepares to open its newly expanded and renovated $43.9 million South Wing within the fall of 2026. The improved wing will broaden exhibition house and add a brand new foyer and foremost entrance. Momin, who was born in Manhattan and raised in New York state by immigrant dad and mom from India and France, was chosen by means of a nationwide search following predecessor Klaudio Rodriguez’s departure for the Museum of High quality Arts in St. Petersburg, Florida, final 12 months.
The longtime curator, who has beforehand held roles at New York’s Whitney Museum of American Artwork and Seattle’s Henry Artwork Gallery, takes the helm of the Bronx Museum within the wake of ideologically fueled funding cuts to the humanities made by the Trump administration. The Nationwide Endowment for the Arts (NEA) rescinded grants for the museum’s Ok–12 and older grownup instructional packages and for a 20-artist exhibition inspecting race and gender earlier this 12 months, amounting to a mixed $110,000, a museum spokesperson informed Hyperallergic. The Trump administration started revoking NEA awards en masse in Might, citing divergence from the president’s coverage priorities. For a nonprofit establishment of its measurement, the museum stated in an announcement shared with Hyperallergic, these cuts had been “devastating.”
In an interview with Hyperallergic, Shamim approached the political second with extra optimism.
“I don’t imagine it’s going to be easy and not without its challenges,” she stated, including that now could be the time when “your responsibility really takes hold to do what you can do.”
Shamim added that although the NEA cuts did have an effect, the museum wasn’t as affected as different arts establishments as a result of it receives public funds as a part of New York’s Cultural Establishments Group. Town footed the overwhelming majority of the prices related to the museum’s renovation and growth, which broke floor final 12 months. The museum has not but introduced a selected date for the 2026 opening.
“I hope that we’ll continue to be able to build our community with folks who care about it on the ground and want to keep things moving forward,” Shamim stated.
After graduating from Williams School with a level in artwork historical past in 1995, Momin started her curatorial profession on the Whitney Museum, the place she co-curated the establishment’s 2004 and 2008 biennials. She based LAND in 2009 after 13 years as assistant curator on the Whitney, a dangerous transfer following the 2008 monetary crash, Momin informed Hyperallergic. On the time, she sought to create “opportunities for artists who don’t always fit so comfortably in the institution” to convey their work into the day-to-day lifetime of the general public.
She stated she selected to discovered the nonprofit in Los Angeles due to town’s dearth of public arts organizations as in comparison with New York. Momin then served because the senior curator of the Henry Artwork Gallery in Seattle, Washington, from 2018 to 2024. Previous to her Bronx Museum appointment, Momin labored as an unbiased curator and artwork advisor.
Momin informed Hyperallergic that her priorities for her submit embrace bringing her experiences linking artwork and social justice to the museum, enthusiastic about accessibility each bodily and “conceptually,” and listening to every particular person workers member’s perspective on the state of the establishment.
“One of the things I love about the Bronx Museum is it is always a champion of diverse voices, underrepresented artists, the coincidence of art and social practice, social justice work,” Momin stated, “and that really aligns so beautifully with everything that I care most about too.”
