Fort Worth, TX, March 18, 2025—The Amon Carter Museum of American Art (the Carter) today announced the appointment of Charles Wylie as the Museum’s Curator of Photography. Wylie joins the Carter from the Santa Barbara Museum of Art (SBMA), where he has served as the inaugural Curator of Photography and New Media since June 2016; his first day at the Carter will be May 14, 2025. As Curator of Photography, he will become the primary steward of one of the most significant repositories of American photography in the world, furthering its development through key acquisitions and expanding public engagement through the curation of meaningful exhibitions and education projects. Wylie succeeds John Rohrbach, who retired from the Carter in 2023 after 31 years of cultivating and expanding the photography program.

“Given Charles’s experience, depth of knowledge, and enthusiasm to explore all facets of the medium, we are thrilled to welcome him on as the Carter’s Curator of Photography,” said Andrew J. Walker, Executive Director of the Carter. “Not only does he bring a formidable roster of past curatorial work, but also a keen ability to form partnerships with neighboring institutions and connect with the community in new and productive ways.”

“I am deeply honored to be named Curator of Photography at the Amon Carter Museum of American Art and follow John Rohrbach’s great career,” said Charles Wylie. “The Carter’s internationally renowned collection of photographs presents a rich springboard for intriguing exhibitions, installations, and collection growth in new and varied directions. To immerse myself and then expand it into the future is a truly once-in-a-lifetime privilege. I am also looking forward to joining such stellar colleagues at the Carter and Fort Worth’s superb museums, and to re-engage with the artistic and broader cultural communities of North Texas.”

During his time at the SBMA, Wylie curated 30 exhibitions spanning the inception of the photographic medium up to the present day. He recently curated Janna Ireland: True Story Index (with the Museum of Contemporary Art Santa Barbara), the largest and most significant solo exhibition of this emerging Los Angeles-based artist’s work, which includes poignant investigations into issues of identity, race, class, home, and the Black experience. Just prior, Wylie organized Shape, Ground, Shadow: The Photographs of Ellsworth Kelly (2023), the first museum exhibition solely dedicated to this lesser-known aspect of Kelly’s celebrated life’s work, along with its catalogue, the only museum monograph on Kelly’s photographs. Wylie's other SBMA exhibitions include the current Sea of Ice: Echoes of the European Romantic Era; Moving Pictures: Videos by Liliana Porter/Ana Tiscornia and Christian Marclay (2024); The Lens of Architecture: Photography, Buildings and Meaning (2022); and the coordination of Salt and Silver: Early Photography, 1840-1860, from the Wilson Centre for Photography, Tate Britain and the Yale Center for British Art. Wylie also made significant strides in expanding SBMA’s photography collection, acquiring over 1,000 works, including those by artists of color, women, and historically marginalized groups, to diversify and deepen the collection’s artistic representation.

Prior to the SBMA, Wylie served as the Dallas Museum of Art’s (DMA) Lupe Murchison Curator of Contemporary Art for fifteen years. In this position, he was responsible for all post-World War II art, including photography, and with his colleagues launched the DMA’s collection of media art, which has since become a celebrated component of the museum’s programming. While in Texas, he also worked as an independent curator, writer, and consultant for private collections of modern and contemporary art in Dallas and advised collectors in Texas and New York. Wylie also was Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art at the Saint Louis Art Museum and was selected as a Graduate Intern in the Department of Photographs at the J. Paul Getty Museum, working under Weston Naef and Judy Keller. He holds a BA in American Studies from the University of Notre Dame and an MA in the History of Art from Williams College in collaboration with the Clark Art Institute.

About the Carter’s Photography Collection

The Carter houses over 45,000 exhibition-quality photographic prints and 250,000 photographic objects, making the Museum one of the world’s major repositories of American photography. The holdings span the history of the photographic medium, from one of the earliest daguerreotypes made in this country to inkjet prints being made today. The Carter’s collection reflects photography’s central role in documenting America’s 19th-century culture and history and the medium’s development as a significant and influential art form in the twentieth century to the present. Throughout its history, the Carter has supported the work of contemporary photographers. In 1979, the Museum commissioned Richard Avedon to create his acclaimed series In the American West, and the collection now holds a complete set of prints from that project. A collaboration in 2013 brought Chicago-based photographer Terry Evans to Fort Worth to document the city’s Trinity River. The Museum is also home to the archives and monographic collections of photographers Carlotta Corpron, Nell Dorr, Laura Gilpin, Eliot Porter, Helen Post, Clara Sipprell, Erwin E. Smith, and Karl Struss.

About the Amon Carter Museum of American Art

Located in the heart of Fort Worth’s Cultural District, the Amon Carter Museum of American Art (the Carter) is a dynamic cultural resource that provides unique access and insight into the history and future of American creativity through its expansive exhibitions and programming. The Carter’s preeminent collection includes masterworks by legendary American artists such as Ruth Asawa, Alexander Calder, Frederic Church, Stuart Davis, Robert Duncanson, Thomas Eakins, Georgia O’Keeffe, Jacob Lawrence, and John Singer Sargent, as well as one of the country’s foremost repositories of American photography. In addition to its innovative exhibition program and engagement with artists working today, the Museum’s premier primary research collection and leading conservation program make it a must-see destination for art lovers and scholars of all ages nationwide. Admission is always free. To learn more about the Carter, visit cartermuseum.org.

Photo: Patrick Lorenz