Sylvia Williams

File:Sylvia H. Williams, director of the National Museum of African Art (NMAfA).jpg

Sylvia H. Williams, director of the National Museum of African Art (NMAfA), (2/1983-1996), stands in front of two objects from the collection

Sylvia Williams née Sylvia Louise Hill (February 10, 1936 in Lincoln, Pennsylvania - February 28, 1996 in Washington DC) was a museum director, curator, art historian and scholar of African art. She helped make the study and appreciation of African art a significant aesthetic and intellectual pursuit in the United States.

Life and work

Williams grew up in Lincoln, Pennsylvania, her father was a professor of English and dean at Lincoln University. She married Charlton Williams and the couple never had children. Williams held art history degrees from Oberlin College in 1957 and New York University's Institute of Fine Arts in 1975.  Williams served as a curator in the Department of African, Oceanic and New World Cultures at the Brooklyn Museum in 1973.

In February 1983 Williams joined the National Museum of African Art at the Smithsonian Institution and in 1987 oversaw the move of the museum to its current Washington DC Mall location. During her time at this museum she was dedicated to elevating the museum's reputation, and she helped the museum acquired more than 845 works and exhibited both traditional and modern African art, including sculpture, photography and textiles. She emphasize the importance of connoisseurship in the appreciation and display of African art.

In 1989, Sylvia Williams was awarded an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters by Amherst College and, the following year (1990) she received an honorary degree of Doctor of Fine Arts by Oberlin College.

She served as president of the Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD) from 1994-1995.

She died at age 60 from complications of a brain aneurysm.

Exhibitions

• 1973: African Art of the Dogon
• 1976: Black South Africa, Contemporary Graphics
• 1981: African Furniture and Household Objects
• 1981: Art of the Archaic Indonesians
• 1989: Icons, Ideals and Power in the Art of Africa
• 1991: The Art of the Personal Object (aesthetic value of utilitarian objects in African cultures)
• 1993: Astonishment and Power: the Eyes of Understanding Kongo Minkisi

Publications

• 1974: Contemporary Graphics; an essay for African Art as Philosophy
• 1976: Black South Africa

See also

• Women in the art history field