BARD GRADUATE CENTER ANNOUNCES RECIPIENTS OF TWENTIETH ANNUAL IRIS FOUNDATION AWARDS

New York, January 21, 2016—Dr. Susan Weber, founder and director of Bard Graduate Center, has announced the recipients of the Twentieth Annual Iris Foundation Awards for Outstanding Contributions to the Decorative Arts. This year’s awardees are Sir Paul Ruddock, Harold Koda, Giorgio Riello, and Michele Beiny Harkins. The awards will be presented at a luncheon at the Colony Club, New York City, on April 6, 2016. In announcing the awards Dr. Weber said: “We are proud to mark the twentieth anniversary by celebrating four remarkable individuals whose achievements embody the spirit of the Iris Foundation Awards. Sir Paul Ruddock’s generous patronage of the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Oxford University, among others, has had a profound effect on the study and appreciation of the decorative arts and design; Harold Koda and Giorgio Riello have made transformative contributions to scholarship in costumes and textiles; and Michele Beiny Harkins’ dedication and professionalism are widely and justly admired as a dealer of fine European porcelain and faience. We look forward to honoring them this spring.” Past Iris Foundation Award recipients include many of the most influential patrons, scholars, and dealers in the field of decorative arts. Patrons such as Jayne Wrightsman, Lord Rothschild, Patricia Phelps de Cisneros, Richard Jenrette, and Iris Cantor have received the award for their visionary support of museums, galleries, and educational institutions. Among the distinguished scholars who have been honored are Thomas P. Campbell, Paola Antonelli, Morrison H. Heckscher, and Dame Rosalind J. Savill. Outstanding dealer honorees include Alexis Kugel, Nicolas Kugel, Adrian Sassoon, Martin Levy, and Deedee Wigmore.

2016 Honorees

Sir Paul Ruddock, Outstanding Patron

Sir Paul Ruddock cofounded the investment management firm Lansdowne Partners, from which he retired as chief executive officer in 2013. After joining the board of the Victoria and Albert Museum in 2002, he served as chairman from 2007 until November 2015. Sir Paul chairs the boards of the Gilbert Trust for the Arts and Oxford University Endowment Management Limited. He also serves as a trustee of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, is a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, and is a member of the International Advisory Board of the Walters Art Museum. In May 2015, he joined Bard Graduate Center’s Executive Planning Committee. He was knighted in 2011 for his services to art and philanthropy.

Harold Koda, Lifetime Achievement in Scholarship

Harold Koda retired from his position as curator in charge at the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in January 2016 after leading the department for fifteen years. Mr. Koda curated numerous exhibitions during his tenure including Goddess (2003), Dangerous Liaisons (2004), Poiret: King of Fashion (2007), The Model as Muse: Embodying Fashion (2009), Schiaparelli and Prada: Impossible Conversations (2012), and Charles James: Beyond Fashion (2014). Under his leadership the Brooklyn Museum’s costume collection was transferred to the Met in 2009, and in May 2014 the Costume Institute reopened as the Anna Wintour Costume Center. Mr. Koda lectures widely in the field, has coauthored twenty books, and has contributed scholarly articles to a wide range of publications. Giorgio Riello, Mid-Career Scholar Giorgio Riello joined the department of history at the University of Warwick in 2007 and was appointed director of its Institute of Advanced Study in 2014. A professor of Global History and Culture, he has published widely on topics including the economic divergence between Asia and Europe, the relationship between material life and economic development, and preindustrial manufacturing. His current research focuses on the global trade of commodities in the period before 1800. His book Cotton: The Fibre that Made the Modern World received the prestigious World History Association Bentley Book Prize in 2014. Since 2010 he has also been the director of the Pasold Research Fund, a charity established in 1964 for the promotion of research in textiles, dress, and fashion.

Michele Beiny Harkins, Outstanding Dealer

A third-generation antiques dealer, Michele Beiny Harkins started her own gallery in 1987 in New York City specializing in eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century English and Continental porcelain and European faience, as well as French furniture and decorations, objets de vertu, and Renaissance jewels. She has exhibited at antiques shows including TEFAF Maastricht in Holland; the Grosvenor House Art & Antiques Fair; the International Ceramics Fair and Seminar in London; the Winter Antiques Show in New York; and the Paris Bienalle. The founder and president of the Board of the American Friends of the Wallace Collection, she is also a member of the National Antique & Art Dealers Association of America, Inc. and Confédération Internationale des Négociants en Oeuvres d’Art.

About the Awards

The Iris Foundation Awards are presented annually to patrons, scholars, and professionals who have made outstanding contributions to the study and appreciation of the decorative arts. Proceeds from the awards luncheon benefit Bard Graduate Center’s Scholarship Fund, enabling promising students from all backgrounds to pursue graduate studies, and ultimately careers, in the field. For more information or to make a reservation, call Liz Abrahamsen at 212-501-3058.

About Bard Graduate Center

Founded in 1993, Bard Graduate Center is a graduate research institute in New York City. Its Gallery exhibitions and publications, MA and PhD programs, and research initiatives explore new ways of thinking about decorative arts, design history, and material culture. A member of the Association of Research Institutes in Art History (ARIAH), the Center is an academic unit of Bard College. For more information, visit www.bgc.bard.edu.