Philippe De Montebello: Three Decades of Acquisitions February 1, 2009

Philippe de Montebello--whose long and storied career at The Metropolitan Museum of Art has spanned nearly a third of the institution's entire history--will retire after more than thirty-one years as director. Mr. de Montebello, who first joined the staff as a curatorial assistant in 1963, became director in 1977, and assumed the additional role of chief executive officer in 1998, plans to step down by December 31, 2008. To celebrate Philippe de Montebello's years as director of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum's Forum of Curators, Conservators, and Scientists has organized an exhibition of approximately three hundred works of art--from a total of more than eighty-four thousand--that were acquired during his tenure.