Premier art gallery seeks new director

NORFOLK'S premier art gallery is looking for a new director as its current leader prepares to retire.

Nichola Johnson has been director of the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts at the University of East Anglia since 1997. She is due to retire this summer and the centre is looking for someone to take over.

As director, Ms Johnson has over-seen a major �10m revamp lasting nearly two years, and abolished admission charges for the permanent collections. She also runs the university's museology programme and is a past chairman of the national University Museums Group.

She grew up in Suffolk and came to Norfolk to work at UEA in 1993.

The Sainsbury Centre opened in 1978 following the donation by Sir Robert and Lady Lisa Sainsbury of their collection of world art to the UEA. The collection includes works by Henry Moore, Alberto Giacometti and Francis Bacon.

There is also a programme of temporary exhibitions, which currently include a display of artists' studios and the Anderson collection of art nouveau.

The vacancy offers “a remuneration package fully commensurate both with the significance of this appointment and the calibre of the successful candidate”.

The university is looking for someone who can “maintain and extend the centre's funding base and increase earned income”, while furthering its position “as one of the UK's leading university museums”.

It says it wants “to enhance the range and quality” of its work with the public, including temporary exhibitions, education programmes, outreach and events. “Intellectual and physical access” to the collections should be extended and the centre's events and exhibitions made more popular.

The new director will have to lead the 31 staff and the team of voluntary guides.

Interviews are due to take place in May and the new director will start work on September 1.