A veteran of the world of Canadian museums, Victoria Dickenson, has been named as the new executive director and chief executive officer of the McMichael Canadian Art Collection, effective April 18.
Dickenson, 61, is coming to the McMichael, famous for its permanent collection of works by the Group of Seven and Tom Thomson at its galleries in Kleinburg, northwest of Toronto, from the Canadian Museum for Human Rights. She has been the Winnipeg-based museum's chief knowledge officer for the past 18 months, having joined the CMHR in September, 2009, after an 11-year career as head of Montreal's McCord Museum of Canadian History. (The CMHR, currently under construction, isn't scheduled to open until early 2013.)
A native of Toronto, Dickenson is succeeding Tom Smart, 54, who abruptly resigned in late July, 2010, after just over four years on the job. She also will be president of the McMichael Canadian Art Foundation, the gallery's fundraising arm - a sign that the institution, established as a Crown agency by the Ontario government in 1965, wants greater co-ordination among its administrative, exhibition and funding functions.
Dickenson is arriving at an auspicious moment in the McMichael's history. She will be the first director in its history not to have to operate under the watchful eyes of one or both of its founders, Robert and Signe McMichael, Robert having died in 2003 and Signe in 2007. The McMichaels raised a storm of controversy in 2000 when they convinced the provincial government of Mike Harris that the gallery had lost "the spirit of its original focus" and got themselves appointed as lifetime members of a five-person "art advisory committee."
"When a job like the McMichael comes up, they don't come up all that often," Dickenson said on Monday. With the CMHR, she said, "I basically came to help place the framework for the museum. I've put together a great team, hired some wonderful people and it's a great project."
Dickenson acknowledged that the McMichael has "a charged history but also a great history. ... It's always had a kind of special place in my heart."