Consey to Head Chicago Institution : Newport Harbor Museum Director Quits

Kevin E. Consey, director of the Newport Harbor Art Museum in Newport Beach, has been named to head the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, it was announced Friday. Consey will assume the new post Nov. 15.

Consey’s replacement will be the Newport museum’s fourth director in a decade. A search committee has been named and will begin work immediately, according to Thomas H. Nielsen, president of the museum board.

The Newport Beach museum is in the midst of a $50-million campaign to establish an endowment and build a new facility. Preliminary designs by architect Renzo Piano building have been approved, land at Coast Highway and MacArthur Boulevard has been obtained and fund raising is under way. Officials have not revealed how much they have raised, though the amount so far is believed to be at least $20 million.

“I foresee no alteration, either in our plans or the timetable of our plans,” said David S. Tappan Jr., chairman of the museum’s campaign leadership committee.

In any case, Consey will not escape the fund-raising treadmill. In Chicago, he will be heading a similar campaign, also for $50 million, according to Paul Olivier-Hoffman, chairman of the board.

Consey, 37, has led the Newport Harbor museum for six years and received an annual salary of $85,000.

In announcing Consey’s new appointment, Olivier-Hoffman said that he “represents the new generation of museum directors, combining uncompromising artistic vision with strong management skills and capital campaign experience.”

Consey called the Chicago job “one of the most coveted museum directorships to open in the last decade.”

The Chicago museum is a rather small, offbeat and fairly avant-garde institution that is considered important in art circles, though it is not generally ranked among the world’s premiere museums. It is one of the country’s oldest museums devoted to contemporary art.

Consey said the appointment “is certainly one that meets my career aspirations. However, I will be leaving a staff with outstanding talents and an excellent institution with exciting plans for expansion. I will be watching the museum’s future with interest and fondness.”

Newport chairman Nielson said in a statement: “Under Kevin’s capable and creative leadership, the museum has grown from a regionally known museum with a yearly operating budget of $650,000 to an internationally recognized center for the collection, preservation, display and interpretation of modern and contemporary art.”

The budget of the 23,000-square-foot museum is $1.8 million, Nielsen said, and the staff has grown to 50. Nielsen said that Consey “leaves the museum fiscally sound and with a distinguished exhibition and educational program.”

In Chicago, Consey will oversee a staff of about 65, a museum spokeswoman said. The most recent budget there was $2.9 million.

The circumstances Consey will confront in Chicago will be remarkably similar to those he is leaving in Orange County. Within five years, the private, nonprofit museum plans to build a new facility and sculpture garden not far from its current location just north of Chicago’s downtown Loop. About half the $50-million campaign is earmarked for construction, the spokeswoman said, with the remainder for endowment. No architect has been selected.

Olivier-Hoffman’s announcement cited a number of exhibitions and tours that Consey has helped organize at Newport Harbor in collaboration with the museum’s curator, Paul Schimmel. These include “Chris Burden: A Twenty Year Survey,” “Gunter Forg,” “L.A. Pop in the Sixties” and “Robert Morris: Works of the Eighties”--which was organized in conjunction with the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art.

The announcement also cited a recent recommendation by the California Arts Council to double the Newport Harbor’s grant next season, from $28,249 to $59,386, for community and minority audience outreach. The council’s peer review panel gave the museum scores (on a 1-to-4 point scale) of 4-minus for artistic achievement and 3-plus for community outreach, an improvement over last year’s rating.

Among Consey’s other coups have been a 10-year, $1-million exhibition grant from the Irvine Co. in 1985 and a gift of 38 contemporary artworks from the San Francisco-based Wells Fargo Bank in 1987. The works, including pieces by such widely known artists as Elmer Bishoff and Joseph Albers, were valued at between $250,000 and $500,000.

Consey has a bachelor’s degree from Hofstra University on Long Island and a master’s degree from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. He has been awarded a Guggenheim Museum Fellowship and a National Endowment for the Arts grant and has served as a panelist for the NEA.

He has taught 20th Century art history at the University of Texas and the University of Virgina and has lectured on not-for-profit management to business students at UCLA and UC Irvine.

Consey came to the Newport Harbor after stints at the San Antonio Museum of Art and the Emily Lowe Gallery at Hofstra. He succeeded Cathleen Gallander, who left in 1983 to become an exhibition consultant in New York. Thomas Garver had quit in 1980, after several years with the museum.

A LOOK AT THE CONSEY ERA Sept. 1, 1983--Kevin E. Consey becomes director of the Newport Harbor Art Museum.

August, 1985--Deciding they needed more space and a more prominent image, directors of the museum consider expansion. Officials look at 50 sites from San Clemente to Santa Ana and rule out building “on top” of the current structure.

December, 1985--Irvine Co. announces that it will give museum $1 million over the next 10 years.

February, 1987--Museum embarks on drive to raise $10.5 million to purchase site in Newport Beach at Coast Highway and MacArthur Boulevard. The plan is to build an expanded museum that would house more galleries plus offices, storage, an auditorium, a sculpture garden, a restaurant and educational facilities.

November, 1987--A 14-month search ends when Renzo Piano is chosen over 100 candidates to design the new $20-million Newport Harbor Art Museum.

August, 1989--Piano’s plans are unveiled, showing a low-slung, massive structure with an undulating roof. Architect says building is an invitation to visitors to “wander and explore . . . a place of discovery, away from the noise of the traffic.”

Aug. 25, 1989--Museum announces that Consey has taken the post of director at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago.

ANALYSIS--Kevin Consey gave Newport Harbor Art Museum a strong personality by taking chances. Calendar, Page 1.