SAINT LOUIS, MO.- The Saint Louis Art Museum announced the promotion of Matthew H. Robb to Associate Curator of Ancient American and Native American Art.

Robb has been an integral member of the Museum’s curatorial staff since 2007, when he was awarded the Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Curatorial Fellowship for Pre-Columbian Art. In 2009 he was appointed Assistant Curator of Ancient American and Native American Art. Robb has curated galleries for the Museum’s permanent collection including Highlights of the Pre-Columbian Collection (2008), Plains Indian Artwork from the Donald Danforth Jr. Collection (2010) and most recently, the Museum’s featured exhibition Fiery Pool: The Maya and the Mythic Sea (2011).

Robb has also offered his expertise as an instructor and guest lecturer at local universities, and has been invited to present his research on the ancient Mexican city of Teotihuacan at museums and universities nationwide. He has been invited to organize a symposium for the 54th International Congress of Americanists in Vienna in 2012.

“Matthew will continue to develop collections, exhibitions and programs that will showcase the multifaceted aesthetic achievements of the ancient and indigenous cultures of the Americas," said Brent R. Benjamin, Saint Louis Art Museum Director. “He will be an essential contributor to the reinstallation of the Museum’s African, Oceanic and Art of the Americas collections.”

The addition of gallery space provided by the Museum’s expansion project, now underway, will result in an increase of approximately 60 percent in the galleries for the Ancient American and Native American Art, overseen by Robb and housed in the Museum’s Main Building.

“Researching the collections at the Saint Louis Art Museum has been a wonderful experience for me thus far, and I am delighted to have the opportunity to continue,” said Matthew H. Robb. “The collections include some true masterpieces, as well as several areas of exceptional depth and quality. It will be a thrill to present these extraordinary objects to the public.”

Robb received his Ph.D. from Yale University in 2007, and was awarded the Frances Blanshard Fellowship Fund Award for an Outstanding Dissertation in the History of Art. He also holds a Master of Arts from the University of Texas at Austin, and a Bachelor of Arts degree from Princeton University.