Julia Alexander, former museum curator and art historian at Yale University, died unexpectedly on May 4 of a heart attack. She was 57 years old.
In 1997, Dr. Alexander joined the Yale Center for British Art as the assistant curator of paintings and sculpture. She was promoted to associate director of programmatic affairs in 2002, followed by a transition to associate director for exhibitions and publications in 2006. Her work contributed to the development of several important museum projects, installations, and collections. In addition to her curatorial endeavors at Yale, she taught numerous art history courses throughout her tenure.
After leaving Yale in 2008, Dr. Alexander went on to become deputy director for curatorial affairs at the San Diego Museum of Art. She later took a position at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, becoming the institution’s first woman executive director. In the fall of 2024, she assumed the presidency of the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, an organization dedicated to the study and preservation of European art and heritage in the United States.
Born in Memphis, Tennessee, and raised in Claremont, California, Dr. Alexander received her bachelor’s degree in art history and French from Wellesley College in Massachusetts and her master’s degree in French literature from New York University. She earned a second master’s degree and Ph.D. in art history from Yale Univerity.