Education Chief Named by Bowers

Janet Baker, former assistant professor of art history at Baruch College, City University of New York, has been hired as chief of education at the Bowers Museum. Baker, 37, holds a Ph.D. and M.A. in Asian Art from the University of Kansas, and a B.A. from the State University of New York College at New Palz.

Baker spent nearly three years in China, where she studied at Nanjing University and researched her dissertation on Buddhist cave temples of the late 6th and early 7th centuries at the Central Institute of Fine Arts in Beijing.

She lived in Laguna Beach in 1986 and ’87 while working as director of fine arts at Warren Imports in Laguna Beach, a dealer in Asian antiquities. Subsequently, she moved to New York to serve as gallery director at the China Institute in New York.

At the Bowers, Baker will develop education programs for adults and children. Programs will include tours of the museum, outreach instruction in the schools, lectures, symposiums and travel. Next spring, when the museum’s education complex is renovated, “hands-on” art classes will be offered. Eventually, Baker plans to add programs for area teachers at public and private schools and colleges.