Dr. Lee Anne Chesterfield became director of the Samuel P. Harn Museum of Art at the University of Florida on July 1, 2018. Previously, Chesterfield was the Senior Advisor for Museum Planning and Board Relations and Assistant Curator of Ancient American Art at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (VMFA) in Richmond, Virginia. She became the Virginia Museum’s first curator of Ancient American Art in 2006 and opened the museum’s first permanent galleries for Pre-Columbian and Native American art in 2010. She also managed the VMFA membership department, capital campaign fundraising efforts, and led the successful American Alliance of Museums’ reaccreditation. In addition to her accomplishments at VMFA, Dr. Chesterfield also taught art history at several Virginia schools including the College of William & Mary, Virginia Commonwealth University and Christopher Newport University. Chesterfield received a Ph.D. in art history from Virginia Commonwealth University and a BBA in marketing from James Madison University. She is a specialist in ancient South American art and architecture and her dissertation, entitled The Huacas of Machu Picchu: Inca Stations for the Communion Between Humanity and Nature, argues that huacas, or sacred places, defined the relationship between nature and human ritual practice.
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