Ann Philbin
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Ann Philbin

Museum Director

b. 1952

“Humans need culture—not just art but the whole network of experiences that link us to one another.”

Ann Philbin is an acclaimed American museum director and AIDS activist. She led the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles for 25 years, growing it from a small local gallery into a vibrant international center for contemporary art.

The daughter of a Kennedy administration lawyer and an artist, Philbin earned a B.F.A. in art history and painting from the University of New Hampshire in 1976 and an M.A. in museum studies/arts administration from New York University in 1982.

At the University of New Hampshire, she joined the Gay Students Organization. When the state’s governor threatened to cut university funding if the group remained active, the club won a landmark lawsuit affirming the constitutional right of gay student groups to exist on campus. The experience ignited her political activism.

After graduation, Philbin moved to New York, where she worked as an art dealer. During the early AIDS crisis in the 1980s, she became a curator for Livet Reichard, a fundraising consulting firm with ties to the art world. The American Foundation for AIDS Research (AmFAR) was among its clients. Philbin saw countless friends fall ill with the virus. To raise money for AmFAR, she organized art exhibitions nationwide. She also helped organize a major AIDS awareness campaign and joined the radical AIDS activist group ACT UP.

After working as an independent curator, Philbin became the director of the New York Drawing Center in 1990. There, she raised money for ACT UP and related programs, generating as much as a million dollars in a single night. She revitalized the museum by incorporating new works and turning it into a community hub.

In 1999, Philbin accepted a job as the director of the Hammer Museum. Affiliated with UCLA, the quiet gallery was home to industrialist Armand Hammer’s art collection. Philbin saw great potential.

During her tenure, she quadrupled the budget, transforming the 35-employee institution into a 200-employee cutting-edge museum that attracts 250,000 visitors annually. Philbin curated celebrated exhibitions, showcased underrepresented artists, launched the popular biennial show “Made in L.A,” and developed dynamic public programs, including films, lectures, and an award-winning educational series for K-12 students. In 2022, she oversaw a $180 million renovation that added 20,000 square feet of public space and expanded the gallery by 60 percent.

Philbin was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2020. When she left Hammer in 2024, she received the Lawrence A. Fleischman Award for Scholarly Excellence in the Field of American Art History from The Smithsonian Institution.

She lives in Beverly Hills with her wife, Cynthia Wornham.