AFTER 16 years, thousands of visitors and overseeing a £16m extension, the Ashmolean’s director is stepping down.

The Ashmolean has announced Professor Christopher Brown will retire on September 30, 2014.

The 65-year-old took up the post at the oldest public museum in the UK in 1998 and supervised its transformation.

Visitor figures have risen from 100,000 to more than a million during these years.

Professor Brown said: “I feel this is the moment to hand on the baton. The Ashmolean has been the centre of my life for the last 16 years so it will be a great change and I will be sad to leave.

“I came with the hope of bringing about a major change at the Ashmolean because I felt very strongly at that time that the collections were superb but they didn’t really punch their weight.

“This is now the most visited museum in the country outside London and we show the collections very well indeed.

“My successor will also take this forward. I am very pleased with what we have done; I have done what I set out to do when I joined in 1998.”

Professor Brown said the museum’s successful campaign in August last year to raise £7.83m saving an Impressionist masterpiece from being sold abroad was one of his highlights.

Donations from the public and grants meant the Portrait of Mademoiselle Claus by Manet could be bought by the museum to keep in the Ashmolean for the nation rather than being sold abroad.

The museum’s board will now look into finding a successor for Professor Brown before he steps down.

The Ashmolean also announced they will be launching a campaign to create The Professor Christopher Brown Fund.

It will be used to establish curatorial fellowships at the Ashmolean.

Professor Brown worked at the National Gallery in London from 1971 and rose to Chief Curator in 1989 before moving to the Ashmolean in 1998. Andrew Hamilton, Vice Chancellor of the University of Oxford, said: “The University, the City of Oxford, and indeed the entire country have much cause to be grateful for all that Christopher has done for the Ashmolean.”

After a sabbatical year at the museum he will take up a position as a research professor at the University for three years until 2018.

His work will be on Van Dyck and Rembrandt, the latter of which will be the focus of an exhibition in the Ashmolean in 2016.

Bernard Taylor, Chairman of the Visitors of The Ashmolean, paid tribute to Professor Brown: “Christopher has been tireless in successfully seeking financial support for the Ashmolean on an international scale. I am delighted that following his retirement, he will remain in Oxford doing his research.”

 

CREATING A MUSEUM FIT FOR THE 21ST CENTURY

  • A £61m refurbishment of the Ashmolean was opened by Her Majesty The Queen in November 2009.
  • The new facilities gave the Ashmolean 39 new galleries, 100 per cent more display space, four temporary exhibition galleries, a new education centre, conservation studios, and Oxford's first rooftop restaurant.
  • The millionth visitor came through the doors in September, 2010.
  • A £5m renovation showcasing the museum’s world famous Egyptian collection was unveiled in December 2010.
  • In August, 2012 the museum’s campaign to raise £7.83m to save Impressionist Manet’s masterpiece Portrait of Mademoiselle Claus from being sold abroad succeeded.