Brian T. Allen
Brian Allen is a senior fellow at National Review Institute and National Review’s art critic. He has a BA from Wesleyan University, an MA in art history from Williams College, and a PhD in art history from Yale University. He was the curator of American art and director of collections and exhibitions at the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, MA and director of the Addison Gallery, Phillips Academy, Andover, MA. There, he developed and oversaw the renovation of its distinguished Charles Platt building and a long-needed addition. Brian was also the director of the museum division at the New-York Historical Society. During his time there, he supervised twenty exhibitions and developed exhibitions on American art during the a First World War and computer design in America from the 1890s to the 1970s. He’s curated many exhibitions on American art but also German, Spanish, Austrian, English, and French prints and English silver.
Brian’s academic specialty in early 19th century American painting but, as a proud generalist, he knows American art from all eras as well as Spanish, Italian, and French Old Master art and French Impressionism. He’s written about various topics, among them Eastmann Johnson’s maple sugar making paintings from the 1860s, American Orientalism, English and American Romantic poetry, French Barbizon painting, and Norman Rockwell. Brian lives in Arlington, Vermont, Rockwell’s hometown during the zenith of his career.