Run in March

AP — SMITHSONIAN SECRETARY FOR ART ANNOUNCES APRIL RESIGNATION

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WASHINGTON, D.C. (AP) — Ned Rifkin, the Smithsonian Institution’s undersecretary for art, has announced that he will leave the post as the selection of a new leader for the museum complex concludes.

“My desire was to leave in front of the appointment of the new secretary so it wouldn’t appear as if I was commenting on their selection,” Rifkin said. He announced that he will leave in April.

Rifkin has been the top administrator overseeing eight art museums since 2004 — an appointment dating to former Secretary Lawrence Small, who resigned in March 2007 amid scrutiny of his spending and compensation.

The Smithsonian Board of Regents is searching for a new secretary, and a decision is expected sometime this month. Cristian Samper has been serving as acting secretary for the past year.

Several other top officials followed Small’s departure, and Rifkin, 58, is the only one of the Smithsonian’s top five officials who is not serving an interim appointment.

“I was prepared to leave a year ago when Cristian Samper was installed as acting secretary, but he asked me to stay,” Rifkin said.

Rifkin said he would like to take a “sabbatical” from administrative duties and take some time for personal writing. Previously, he had been director and chief curator at the Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum after stints as director of the Menil Collection and Foundation in Houston and the High Museum in Atlanta.

Supervision of the Smithsonian’s art museums will be transferred to Richard Kurin, the acting undersecretary for history and culture.

In 2007, a group of US museum directors analyzed the Smithsonian’s art museums and issued a report saying they had not lived up to their potential as national collections. The report said the museums were underfunded and some suffered from inadequate leadership.

“The review was somewhat controversial because it made certain people uncomfortable,” Rifkin said. “It was tabled, but it still exists and the new secretary will have a chance to review it.”

Under Rifkin’s leadership, the renovation of a historic building was completed for the American Art Museum and National Portrait Gallery, and attendance at nearly all the art museums has increased in the first months of 2008 over the previous year.