Neil MacGregor
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Robert Neil MacGregor (born 1946) is an art historian and museum director.
He was educated at New College, Oxford (M.A. modern languages, honorary fellow), École Normale Supérieure, Paris (philosophy), Edinburgh University (law, Green Prize, called to the Bar 1972), and the Courtauld Institute of Art (MA distinction).
He taught History of Art and Architecture at the University of Reading until he left to assume the position of editor of the Burlington Magazine from 1981 until 1987, when he became a highly successful director of the National Gallery in London. At the National Gallery he was dubbed "Saint Neil", partly because of his popularity at that institution and partly because of his devout Christianity, and the nickname stuck after his departure from the Gallery. He was also the first director of the National Gallery to decline the offer of a knighthood. During his directorship MacGregor presented two BBC television series on art: Making Masterpieces, a behind-the-scenes tour of the National Gallery, in 1997 and Seeing Salvation, on the representation of Jesus in western art, in 2000.
After reversing the fortunes of the National Gallery, he was made director of the British Museum in 2002, at the time in a financial crisis. MacGregor has thus far proved himself to be a diplomatic director of the British Museum, opening discussions with Greece about the Elgin Marbles (although he believes firmly that they should remain in the British Museum) and sending curators to Iraq in 2003 to assess the damage done to the country's museums during the Iraq War. In May 2006 The Art Newspaper mooted him as one of four possible successors to Philippe de Montebello for the directorship of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. [1]
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| Preceded by Sir Michael Levey |
Director of the National Gallery 1987–2002 |
Succeeded by Charles Saumarez Smith |
| Preceded by Robert Anderson |
Director of the British Museum 2002 – present |
Incumbent |
Categories: 1946 births | Living people | Scottish historians | British curators | People associated with the National Gallery, London | Employees of the British Museum | Alumni of the Courtauld Institute of Art | Fellows of New College, Oxford | Alumni of New College, Oxford | Alumni of the École Normale Supérieure | Alumni of the University of Edinburgh | People who have declined a British honour | Museum directors
