Lauren Haynes is an American curator who is head curator ofGovernors Island, in New York City.
Before assuming her current position in 2024, she was director of artist initiatives and curator of contemporary art at theCrystal Bridges Museum of American Art andthe Momentary inArkansas; senior curator ofcontemporary art at theNasher Museum of Art; and director of curatorial affairs and programs at theQueens Museum.
Haynes was born inTennessee, and moved tothe Bronx, New York City when she was about twelve years old.[1] She studied atOberlin College, where she received abachelor's degree in art history.[2] At Oberlin, she worked at theAllen Memorial Art Museum, which was then directed by American art historianSharon Patton. Haynes recalled seeing Patton – an African-American woman and scholar inAfrican-American art history – as an inspiration for her to take an art class and eventually study art history.[3]
After graduating, Haynes worked temporary office positions and considered a job in the legal department of a real estate company before she received an offer to become a departmental assistant at theBrooklyn Museum. Less than a year into her work at the Brooklyn Museum she was offered a job at theStudio Museum in Harlem.[3] She joined the Studio Museum in 2006, where she would work for a decade starting as a curatorial assistant and later as associate curator of the museum's permanent collection. She curated dozens of exhibitions both at the Studio Museum and at other institutions in New York City, including shows on the works ofRomare Bearden andCarrie Mae Weems at the Studio Museum.[3][4] Her work on the museum'sartist-in-residence program was reported to have "impacted the career trajectories of numerous artists who have gone on to have great successes worldwide."[5]
In 2016, Haynes became curator ofcontemporary art at theCrystal Bridges Museum of American Art and the curator of visual arts at the Momentary. Exhibitions she has curated at Crystal Bridges includeThe Beyond: Georgia O'Keeffe and Contemporary Art (2018),Crystals in Art: Ancient to Today (2019), as well as theFocus section of the 2019Armory Show.[6][7] She also coordinated the first exhibition ofSoul of a Nation: Art in the Age of Black Power (2018) in the United States and led the curatorial team onState of the Art (2020).[8] In 2019, it was announced that Haynes and independent curatorTeka Selman would curate the inaugural edition of the Tennessee Triennial for Contemporary Art in 2021;[6][3] the event was later postponed from its original date to 2023 without Haynes or Selman.[9]
In 2020, Haynes was named director of artist initiatives and curator ofcontemporary art at Crystal Bridges and the Momentary.[10] In 2021, she was appointed the Patsy R. and Raymond D. Nasher Senior Curator of Contemporary Art at theNasher Museum of Art atDuke University,[8] then director of Curatorial Affairs and Programs at theQueens Museum in 2022,[11] and then head curator and vice-president for arts and culture atGovernors Island in 2024.[12]
In 2018, Haynes was a member of the jury that selectedRodney McMillian for the inauguralSuzanne Deal Booth Art Prize.[13]
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