Plains Art Museum names new director
FARGO – After the Plains Art Museum posted the opening for a new director and CEO earlier this year, applications came in from across the country and beyond. The museum decided to go with someone closer to home.
Andrew Maus, a former Plains’ employee, was named the new director and CEO, according to a news release Monday. He will start the position on Jan. 25.
Maus, 36, most recently worked at the Plains from 2006 to 2010 as director of education, curator of public programming and curator. The Dickinson, N.D., native is currently the executive director at the Minnesota Marine Art Museum in Winona, Minn., where he’s worked since 2010.
A Minnesota State University Moorhead alum, he earned his bachelor of arts degree in studio art in 2002 and a master of science in public administration/nonprofit management in 2011.
“We can’t wait to get back to Fargo, and I can’t wait to work at the Plains again and get ingrained in the city,” says Maus, adding that he and his wife have family in town.
His first stint at the Plains was in 2000, working in visitor services, which would become a life-changing experience.
“My time at the Plains inspired me to work for something bigger,” Maus says. “It was really just looking at museums as places that have great things but that can do great things for the community. The Plains epitomizes that and that’s what I love about it. The organization’s values are perfectly aligned with my own.”
Before he left the Plains in 2010, Maus was a key player in planning for the Katherine Kilbourne Burgum Center for Creativity, which opened in 2012.
Mark Henze, chief financial officer and interim director at the Plains, said about 20 people applied for the job with three selected as finalists.
The search committee was made of board members and members of the local arts community.
Henze was not part of the interviewing process, but said Maus’ background in education and fundraising, his ties and connections in the community and his track record at the Minnesota Marine Art Museum made him an appealing candidate.
“There’s value to him knowing the community and the community knowing him,” Henze said.
In five years at Minnesota Marine Art Museum, Maus acquired funding for two major gallery expansions, helped bring in more than $330,000 in grant support for artist programs, education and exhibitions and saw the number of visitors increase by 32 percent.
The director and CEO position at the Plains has been open since Colleen Sheehy left this fall to work for Public Art St. Paul. She’d been the head of the Plains since 2008.
Maus says his objectives for the Plains will be to continue to work with living artists, continue to develop civically engaged public art projects like the Defiant Gardens project and to “raise the profile and dynamism of the Katherine Kilbourne Burgum Center for Creativity.”
One of the most immediate challenges will be filling some key jobs, as both the curator and director of development positions are open.
“I get to put together my dream team and that will be a lot of fun,” Maus said, adding that he does have some people in mind that he may encourage to apply.
A more pressing concern is selling his house in Winona and moving his family back to the Fargo-Moorhead area.
“It’s a great community. The city is growing in really nice ways, and I’m just happy to be a part of it,” he says, noting that the area is seen as an entrepreneurial market on the grow.
“I’m really keen to leverage the arts, not just for the purposes of advancing the museum but for the city,” he says, adding that the Plains can contribute to the quality of life for the whole community.