collaborators

Appointed Director in September 2012, Amy Sadao has forged connections with institutions across the city, dramatically increased ICA’s budget and staffing, and directed an ambitious contemporary program extending equity to overlooked and underrepresented artists, ideas, and publics. Before assuming the directorship of ICA, Sadao served for ten years as Executive Director of Visual AIDS in New York City where she expanded the organization’s resources and public awareness of its mission utilizing contemporary art to provoke dialogue about HIV/AIDS and supporting HIV-positive artists. Sadao has been notably honored for her work by ArtTable’s 2014 New Leadership Award; Christine Quinn, Speaker of the New York City Council, as a Women in the Arts Leader; and knighted by the Imperial Court of New York, the city’s oldest drag house, for her work as an AIDS and art activist. She serves on the board of directors of Denniston Hill, an artist residency program, the Pennsylvania Humanities Council, and is a Director Emeritus of Visual AIDS. Sadao began her career as a curatorial intern at the Whitney Museum of American Art, Phillip Morris Branch. She holds an MA in comparative ethnic studies from the University of California, Berkeley and a BFA from the Cooper Union School of Art.