Thursday, January 30General Society Library, 20 West 44th Street6:00pm: Reception6:30pm: Discussion
Join the 蜜桃传媒app and Newport Mansions for a discussion on treasures from Newport. We are pleased to welcome Leslie B. Jones, Director of Museum Affairs and Chief Curator for The Preservation Society of Newport County, and Ulysses Grant Dietz, Curator Emeritus of Decorative Arts at The Newark Museum for a conversation about specific accrued items found in these historic mansions. This conversation will be moderated by Tony Freund, Editorial Director of 1stDibs.
Leslie B. Jones serves as the Director of Museum Affairs and Chief Curator for The Preservation Society of Newport County. She joined the Society in 2019 to oversee curatorial, conservation, collections management, site stewardship, exhibitions, interpretation, and programmatic initiatives such as family programs and lectures. She directs the fellows program, which annually hosts four emerging scholars who focus a year of work on dedicated research opportunities.
Previously, Jones was the Vice President, Museum Affairs & Curator of Decorative Arts at Cheekwood Estate & Gardens, a 55-acre botanical garden, art museum, and historic house in Nashville, Tennessee.
Before joining Cheekwood, she was Curator and Director of Historical Resources & Programming for the White House Historical Association. Both roles included major preservation projects, including the revitalization of the White House Visitor Center (2014) and the restoration of Cheekwood鈥檚 c. 1930s domestic spaces (2017).
As an independent consultant, Jones has provided advice and leadership in all areas of museum administration to many clients, including Meadow Brook Hall in Rochester, Mich., the Green-Meldrim House in Savannah, Ga., Woodlawn Plantation in Alexandria, Va., and Powerhouse Museum in Sydney, Australia.
A native of St. Louis, Missouri, Jones received her Bachelor鈥檚 degree in the history of art and architecture from Miami University in Ohio, a Master鈥檚 degree in the history of decorative arts from the Smithsonian Institution鈥檚 joint program with the Corcoran College of Art + Design, and another Master鈥檚 in the appraisal of fine and decorative art from New York University.
Ulysses Grant Dietz served as curator of Decorative Arts at The Newark Museum from 1980 until 2017, and was appointed Chief Curator in 2012. He received his BA in French from Yale University in 1977, and his MA in American Material Culture from the University of Delaware鈥檚 Winterthur Program in 1980.
As the curator of 114 exhibitions covering all aspects of the decorative arts from colonial to contemporary, he studied and collected furniture, silver, base metals, glass, ceramics, textiles, and jewelry. He is particularly proud of his work on the Museum鈥檚 National Historic Landmark Ballantine House, built in1885. The Ballantine House was reinterpreted between 1992 and 1994 with a groundbreaking installation called House & Home.
Mr. Dietz has published numerous articles on decorative arts, drawn from the Newark Museum鈥檚 nationally known collections. His most recent publications are Masterpieces of Art Pottery, 1880-1930, from the Newark Museum in 2009, and Dream House: The White House as an American Home, released in September 2009 by Acanthus Press in New York. His last book as curator was Jewelry from Pearls to Platinum to Plastic, published in 2017.
Mr. Dietz is a great-great grandson of Ulysses and Julia Grant. His is a trustee of the Ulysses S. Grant Presidential Library at Mississippi State University, and of the Society of Presidential Descendants.
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