KU News Release

Director of Smithsonian American Art Museum returns to alma mater for lecture

LAWRENCE — Elizabeth Broun, the Margaret and Terry Stent Director of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, will give the 2008 Emily Taylor and Marilyn Stokstad Women’s Leadership Lecture, administered by the Hall Center for the Humanities at the University of Kansas.

Broun’s lecture, titled “America’s Art in a Global Age: New Directions in Leadership,” will take place at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, March 26, at the Alderson Auditorium in the Kansas Union. The event is free and open to the public.

Broun is responsible for the nation’s premier collection of American art, as well as major exhibition, research, publication, education and new-media programs. During her tenure at the Smithsonian, the museum has become a leader in providing electronic resources to schools and the public, and in developing a national education program.

Broun earned her doctorate in art history at KU for her work on American art exhibited at the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago. Before joining the Smithsonian in 1983, she spent seven years as a curator and interim director at KU’s Spencer Museum of Art.

The Emily Taylor and Marilyn Stokstad Women’s Leadership Lecture is named for two women who were prominent leaders at KU. The fund they established supports lectures by prominent women on women’s leadership issues. Contributions to the fund can be made through KU Endowment.

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