Exhibition Lecture | An Investment in Pleasure: Fifty Years of the Dixon Gallery and Gardens Collection

Kevin Sharp, Linda W. and S. Herbert Rhea Director, Dixon Gallery and Gardens

Join Kevin Sharp, Linda W. and S. Herbert Rhea Director of the Dixon Gallery and Gardens, for the opening lecture for An Investment in Pleasure: Fifty Years of the Dixon Gallery and Gardens Collection. Sharp will explore the evolution of the Dixon’s permanent collection, from Margaret and Hugo Dixon’s original bequest to the museum’s newest acquisitions. Recently announcing his retirement after nearly twenty years as director, Sharp brings his distinctive perspective as an art historian, curator, author, and influential leader in the Dixon’s collecting history.

Kevin Sharp is the Linda W. and S. Herbert Rhea Director of the Dixon Gallery and Gardens in Memphis, a position he has held since 2007. Prior to that, he was Director of Visual Arts at Cedarhurst in Mt. Vernon, Illinois (2003-2007), Curator of American Art at the Norton Museum of Art, in West Palm Beach, Florida (1998-2003), and Research Curator at the Art Institute of Chicago (1988-1998). With expertise in nineteenth-century French and American art, Sharp has organized or co-organized more than fifty exhibitions during his long career, including international retrospectives, thematic shows, and collection-based projects. He is a contributing essayist or the sole author of more than twenty-five books and exhibition catalogues.