The Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford, Connecticut, has appointed Allison Blais as its new president and CEO, effective January 2026. Blais, currently executive vice president and chief strategy and operations officer at New York’s 9/11 Memorial & Museum, will succeed Jeffrey N. Brown, who held the role for five years. The announcement was made by board chair Duffield Ashmead IV MD, who praised Blais's experience with large-scale capital projects and stakeholder engagement. Blais, a Connecticut native, expressed her long familiarity with the Wadsworth and her enthusiasm for working with museum director Matthew Hargraves.
This appointment matters because the Wadsworth Atheneum, founded in 1842, is the oldest continuously operating public art museum in the United States and holds significant collections spanning Baroque, Surrealist, and Hudson River School works, as well as the Serge Lifar Ballets Russes collection and the Samuel Colt firearms collection. Blais's background in major institutional leadership and capital projects signals a focus on growth and modernization, especially as the museum continues its Matrix contemporary art program and builds on a recent ranking as one of America's top 20 art museums by the Washington Post.