Earlier this year, Middlebury College Museum of Art hired a new permanent director, Deborah Barkun, who succeeds interim director Katy Smith Abbott. In its April announcement, search committee chair Erin Sassin lauded Barkun’s “experience developing innovative and collaborative exhibitions and programming with students and faculty.” For an academic museum with a strong interdisciplinary focus, this might have sealed the deal. But Sassin, who is an associate professor in the history of art and architecture, further emphasized Barkun’s commitment to “the transformative power of art in a liberal arts education.”
In an interview with Seven Days at her new office last week, Barkun, who is in her fifties, said an academic museum is her “happy place.” It seems like she’ll fit right in.
Born in Syracuse, N.Y., Barkun acknowledged that on paper she looks like a Pennsylvanian: undergrad at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh; master’s and doctorate at Bryn Mawr College; associate professor at Ursinus College and creative director of its Berman Museum of Art in Collegeville, outside of Philadelphia. Now she’s a freshly minted Vermonter — but no stranger to the Green Mountain State; her family vacationed here every summer as she was growing up. “We would come to a different part of the state each year,” she said.
Barkun noted that her partner, documentary filmmaker Bernardo Morillo, will soon join her, along with the couple’s greyhound. This year, they’ll rent a place from the college. “The [Vermont] housing situation was a surprise,” she observed.
Having only seen Vermont at its most verdant, Barkun is eager to experience the fall foliage. Meantime, she’s been settling into her position, meeting staff and faculty members, and beginning to study the museum’s 7,000-object archives. If that were not daunting enough, Barkun has arrived just in time for a museum sea change: a brand-new facility in a new location.
The Marna O. Davis Museum is scheduled to open on the main campus, adjacent to the Johnson Memorial Building, in 2029. The 35,000-square-foot museum — anchored by a $20 million gift from former Midd student Charles A. Davis and his wife, Marna — will provide ample quarters for exhibitions, events, performances and the growing collection.
Though the new construction was conceived before she got here, Barkun said there’s “still a lot of work to be done, tinkering about how to use the galleries.” Before walking Seven Days through the recently opened Michelangelo Lovelace exhibit, she talked about museums, liberal arts and the importance of both.
At Ursinus, you had both faculty and curatorial roles. Will you be teaching here, too?
Not teaching currently, but I’m directing and helping to develop the kinds of programs in collaboration with the team and working to engage as deeply as I can with faculty and students. I’d like to engage the departments that might not habitually use the museum.
What was your art focus in school?
As an undergrad, painting and printmaking. I was raised by a mother who was blind since birth. I grew up having to translate the visible world, with my sister. In retrospect, I think that fed into my focus on the visual world, maybe a little earlier than my peers. My parents were from Chicago, and we went there often [visiting museums]. I found my voice most effective describing other people’s art, so over time I gravitated in that direction. When I got to grad school, my comfort level was with living artists. My dissertation was on a contemporary art topic [at the National Gallery of Canada]. I’m interested in global contemporary art, with a heavy emphasis on North American, Canadian and Mexican.
Do you still make art?
No, there’s not enough time. Now I do studio visits. At Ursinus, I learned how uniquely transformative an academic museum can be. My two passions are museums and pedagogy.
So what drew you to the position at Middlebury?
When I read the job description, I was struck by the way it was described in creative terms as much as administrative. And when I read about the new museum and strategic plan for the college, I [realized] how Middlebury is doubling down on liberal arts. This is a challenging time for higher education, and many schools are allowing the arts to erode. Coming for my interview, I found I fit with the teams here.
Why is the college building a new museum? Is this one too small?
This is a challenging time for higher education, and many schools are allowing the arts to erode.
Deborah Barkun
It was the vision of the former president, Laurie Patton. I think there is a desire of the faculty and board to present art as an asset and pivotal component of a liberal education. And it will better serve everyone for it to be in the center, where students are traversing around campus. There will be a café space, a media gallery, more visible operations — more opportunities for social engagement as well as learning. And, yes, it is a perpetual problem for museums: outgrowing the facility, storage.
Did you have teaching or curatorial positions at other institutions prior to Ursinus?
Yes, I did some work at independent-run galleries in Philadelphia. I was involved in a longtime environmental project that originated in Cork, Ireland. [Barkun was also a visiting scholar in Hong Kong in 2015.]
How would you describe your curatorial approach?
[It] has always been interdisciplinary — what affects us globally. Students are asking questions about this. We can present topical issues at the museum using visual and sonic materials. Art and artists can be catalysts for addressing difference. The problems now are so vast, a single discipline alone can no longer answer the questions. Art [provides] an opportunity to have that kind of discourse.
Ideally, what I’d like to do is disarm people as to what a museum can offer. I want people in the Middlebury area — even if they’ve never been to a museum, known any artists or ever took an art class — to feel comfortable and welcome. ➆
This interview was edited for clarity and length.
Middlebury College Museum of Art is currently showing “Michelangelo Lovelace: Art Saved My Life” through January 10.
The original print version of this article was headlined “A Happy Place | Seven questions for Middlebury College Museum of Art’s new director”
This article appears in September 23 • 2026.
Got something to say?
Send a letter to the editor and we'll publish your feedback in print!
