Brett Littman / Shakkei Consulting
Bio
30+ years of experience leading and financially strengthening museums, cultural institutions and galleries with a proven track record driving fundraising, capital projects, entrepreneurial initiatives, board evolution, and exhibitions and programs that engage diverse artists, patrons and audiences.
Brett Littman is the Director of Shakkei Consulting (“borrowed landscape” in Japanese) a consulting firm that develops organizational specific strategy and solutions to complex curatorial, management, programmatic, operational, entrepreneurial and legacy issues.
He was the Senior Director, US of Carpenters Workshop Gallery from 2024 - 2025, Director of the Isamu Noguchi Foundation and Garden Museum in Long Island City, New York from 2018 – 2023; Executive Director of The Drawing Center from 2007–2018; Deputy Director of MoMA PS1 from 2003–2007; Co-Director of Dieu Donné Papermill from 2001–2003 and Associate Director of Urban Glass from 1996–2001.
Littman’s interests are multi-disciplinary and he has personally curated more than thirty-five exhibitions focusing on visual art, outsider art, craft, design, architecture, poetry, music, science, and literature. He was named the curator of Frieze Sculpture at Rockefeller Center for 2019 and 2020. He is also an art critic, lecturer, active essayist for museum and gallery catalogues and writes for a wide range of U.S. and international art, fashion, and design magazines.
A native New Yorker, Brett Littman received a Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters from France in 2017 and his B.A. in Philosophy from the University of California, San Diego.
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Curatorial
- The Art of Paper: Selections of Handmade Paper works from the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation, , Zuckerman Museum of Art, GA, Jan – May 2026; Asheville Art Museum, NC, June – Nov, 2026; The Chazen Museum of Art, WI, Feb – May 2027; The Parrish Museum of Art, NY, Sept 2027 – Jan 2028
- Caldas: I Learned Wood had Two Lives, Carpenters Workshop Gallery, LA, Feb – June 2025
- Trash to Beauty: A Case Study of Peccioli, Italy, Italian Cultural Center, NY, February – May 2023,
- Frieze Sculpture at Rockefeller Center 2019 and 2020
- The Hummingbird Paints Fragrant Songs: Sara Flores and Celia Vasquez Yui, Outsider Art Fair, NY, January 2020
- Neo Rauch: Aus dem Boden, Des Moines Art Center, Sept 2018 – January 2019; The Drawing Center, NY, April – August 2019
- Inka Essenhigh: Manhattanhenge, The Drawing Center, NY, Feb 2018 – September 2019
- Good Kids: Underground Comics from China, Outsider Art Fair, NY, Jan 2019
- Hipkiss: Bulwark, The Drawing Center, NY, April – August 2018
- Eduardo Navarra: Into Ourselves, The Drawing Center, NY, April 2018
- Ellen Berkenblit: Lines Roar, The Drawing Center, NY, April – August 2018
- The Projective Drawing, Austrian Cultural Forum, NY, February – May 2018; Drawing Lab, Paris, June – September 2019
- Judith Bernstein: Cabinet of Horrors, The Drawing Center, NY, October 2017 – February 2018
- Daniel Senise, Nara Roesler Gallery, Sao Paulo, Brazil, April – June 2017
- Jackson Mac Low: Lines – Letter – Words, The Drawing Center, NY, January – March 2017
- Gabriel De La Mora: Sound Inscriptions in Fabric, The Drawing Center, NY, July – September 2016
- Louise Despont: Energy Scaffolds & Information Architecture, The Drawing Center, NY, January – March 2016
- Jennifer Bartlett: Hospital, The Drawing Center, NY, January – March 2016
- The Basement Performances, curated by John Zorn, The Drawing Center, NY, January – February 2016
- Richard Pousette-Dart: 1930s, October – December 2015, The Drawing Center, NY
- Drawing Sound I and II (with Billy Martin and String Noise), The Drawing Center, NY, July and September 2015
- Inci Eviner: Runaway Girls, The Drawing Center, NY, May – June 2015
- Portraits from the Ecole des Beaux Arts Paris, The Drawing Center, NY, April – June 2015
- Xanti Schawinsky: Head Drawings and Faces of War, The Drawing Center, NY, September – December 2014; Bergen Kunsthalle, Norway, January – February 2016
- Ferran Adria: Notes on Creativity, The Drawing Center, NY, January – February 2014; MOCA Cleveland, September 2014 – January 2015; Nelson-Atkins Museum, Kansas City, MI, February – June 2015; Minneapolis Institute of the Arts, September 2015 – January 2016; Marres House for Contemporary Culture, Maastricht, Netherlands, February 2016 – April 2016
- David Lynch Naming, Kayne Griffin Corcoran Gallery, Los Angeles CA, November 2013 –January 2014; MIMA, Middlesbrough, UK, Dec 2014 – March 2015
- Mariko Mori: Rebirth, (selection of drawings) The Japan Society, NY, October 2013 – January 2014
- Alexis Rockman: Drawings from Life of Pi, The Drawing Center, NY, September – November 2013; NOMA, New Orleans, LA, June – November 2014
- Susan Hefuna/Luca Vegetti NOTIONOTATIONS, The Drawing Center, NY, September 16- 20, 2013
- Guillermo Kuitca: Diarios, , The Drawing Center, New York, September–November 2012; Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum, Michigan State University, January 2013 – April 2013; MCA Denver, Denver CO, June – September 2013
- Sean Scully: Change and Horizontals, co-curated with Joanna Kleinberg, Tim Taylor Gallery, London, UK, December 2011–January 2012;, Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art, Middlesbrough, UK, April–July 2012; Walter Storms Gallery, Munich, Germany, January – February 2013; Galleria Nazionale D'Arte Moderna, Rome, Italy, March– June 2013; The Drawing Center, New York, September–October 2013
- Drawing and its Double: Selections from the Istituto Nazionale per la Grafica, Rome, co-curated with Ginerva Mariani and Antonella Renzitti, The Drawing Center, New York, April–June 2011
- Drawing in Progress, co-curated with Gavin Delahunty, Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art, Middlesbrough, UK, November 2010–January 2011
- Eugene Von Bruenchenhein, American Folk Art Museum, New York, November 2010–June 2011
- Leon Golub: Live & Die Like a Lion?, , The Drawing Center, New York, April–July 2010; Block Museum, Evanston, IL, September–December 2010; Het Domein, Sittard, the Netherlands, January–March 2011 (Winner of 2010 AICA Award for Best Show in Non-profit Gallery)
- Greta Magnuson Grossman: Furniture and Lighting, The Drawing Center, New York, October – November 2008
- Yüksel Arslan: Visual Interpretations, The Drawing Center, New York, April – May 2008
- Civic Matters, co-curated with Irene Tsatsos, Veronica Wiman, and Zandra Ahl, January 2006, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, Los Angeles