The Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) has appointed Alexandra Letvin as Senior Curator and Department Head of European Painting and Sculpture.
She joins the BMA from the Princeton University Art Museum, where she currently serves as the Duane Wilder, Class of 1951, Curator of European Art.
Letvin brings extensive experience in developing exhibitions; reinstalling galleries; advancing collections and presenting European art within broader global narratives. She has a Ph.D. and a Master’s degree in art history from the Johns Hopkins University. She replaces Lara Yeager Crasselt and will begin Nov. 9.
A specialist in the art of early modern Spain, Letvin has organized exhibitions and installations spanning the medieval period to 1945.
“Alexandra is an exceptional curator and scholar whose work pushes European art history in exciting new directions,” said Asma Naeem, the BMA’s Dorothy Wagner Wallis Director, in a statement. “Her focus on early modern Spain illuminates a vital yet often underexplored chapter of the field, positioning the BMA to lead important new conversations about cultural exchange, empire, and artistic innovation. Combined with her deep familiarity with our collection and longstanding ties to Johns Hopkins, Alexandra brings the vision and momentum to help shape the future of European art scholarship at the BMA.”
At the Princeton University Art Museum, Letvin oversaw the museum’s European painting and sculpture program and served as curatorial lead for the installation of the European galleries in Princeton’s new museum building. The museum’s presentation in its new building emphasized themes of materiality, mobility and exchange, displaying European artworks as part of a global network of artistic production and cultural interaction.
Letvin has also spearheaded acquisitions that expand traditional understandings of European art, including cross-departmental acquisitions. Her current and forthcoming projects at Princeton include a major exhibition and publication exploring how 19th-century French ideas of race and identity shaped the making and reception of an important painting by Édouard Manet. Her scholarship has contributed to a growing conversation about the role museums can play in reinterpreting collections through more inclusive and interconnected frameworks.
At the BMA, “Letvin will lead the stewardship, presentation and growth of the museum’s renowned collection of 15th- through 19th-century European painting and sculpture and guide future gallery installations and exhibitions,” the BMA said in an announcement about her appointment, “She will also work collaboratively with curatorial staff across departments to reconceive the museum’s European collection, bringing new perspectives to collection research, interpretation, and display.
This will be the second time Letvin has been at the BMA. From 2011 to 2013, she served as a Carlson-Cowart Fellow in the museum’s Department of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs, while completing graduate studies at Hopkins.
Letvin is the author of numerous scholarly publications and has received fellowships and awards from organizations including the Fulbright Program; the Getty Conserving Canvas Connoisseurship Workshop, and the Villa Albertine.
Before Princeton, Letvin served as Assistant Curator of European and American Art at the Allen Memorial Art Museum at Oberlin College, where she organized exhibitions such as Mobility and Exchange, 1600–1800, and collection installations exploring questions of identity, belonging, interpretation, and historical narrative. Earlier appointments include positions at the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Meadows Museum. In addition to her degrees from Hopkins, she has a Bachelor’s degree in art history from Williams College.
“I am honored to return to Baltimore and join the BMA at such an exciting moment in its history,” Letvin said in a statement. “The museum’s commitment to scholarship, community engagement and expanding the stories that art can tell is deeply inspiring. I look forward to collaborating with colleagues across the institution to build on the strengths of the European collection, create exhibitions that invite new perspectives, and help audiences see European art as part of a larger global history.”
