Mark Bessire talks about his job at “the portal to the campus and the community.”
LEWISTON – Standing just outside the glass doors to the Bates College Museum of Art, Mark Bessire’s enthusiasm is obvious.
With an excited grin, he rattles off the finer points of the two-floor museum: its Marsden Hartley collection, its commitment to contemporary and traditional artwork, its community programs.
He talks proudly about the gallery’s ever-changing free public exhibits and its ties to the Twin Cities.
“It’s the most inviting place,” he said. “It’s really the portal to the campus and the community.”
Soon, it will become Bessire’s place. In August, he will take over as museum director.
Bessire, 38, discovered his love of college museums several years ago while working for Harvard’s Fogg Art Museum. There he found a place where the interests of college students, community members and scholars could merge.
Five years ago, he moved to the Institute for Contemporary Art at the Maine College of Art in Portland, where he worked on fund-raising, development and exhibitions as chief curator.
While he enjoyed working at the Maine College of Art, he said, the opportunity to work at the Bates museum, with its mix of scholarly pursuits, campus exhibitions and community work, was too exciting to pass up.
“I just love it so much that when the directorship at Bates came up, I was so excited at the possibilities,” he said.
As one of 50 to 100 applicants nationwide, Bessire’s ideas and experience made him a standout. He was one of four applicants invited to campus to speak to community members.
On Friday, he officially became the college museum’s new director.
He will replace Genetta McLean, who spent about a decade transforming the college’s small college museum into a place where both art scholars and local schoolchildren are welcomed. She left Bates last year to lead the Roundtop Center for the Arts in Damariscotta.
“I get to work on all she’s done before me and I get to take it to another level,” Bessire said.
He will start mid-August.
Bessire said he hopes to increase the museum’s visibility so both Bates students and Lewiston-Auburn residents will get the chance to fall in love with college museums as he has.
Said Bessire, “I want to make sure that this is seen as a resource for everybody.”
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