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Our Staff
Ann Sumner,
Director
Barber Professor of Fine Art and Curatorial Practice
Ann Sumner read History of Art at the Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London and undertook her PhD at Newnham College, Cambridge. She began her career at the National Portrait Gallery, London and has held curatorial positions at the Holburne Museum, University of Bath, Whitworth Art Gallery, University of Manchester, Dulwich Picture Gallery, Harewood House Trust and the National Museum of Wales, where she was Head of Fine Art for seven years prior to her appointment as Director of the Barber Institute.
Her specialist areas of interest are 17th-century British portraiture and miniature painting, 18th-century British portraiture and landscape painting and French 19th-century painting, as well as the art of Wales. She has published work on the Welsh landscape painter Thomas Jones, curating and co-authoring the 2003 bi-centenary catalogue Thomas Jones: An Artist Rediscovered (Yale University Press) as well as researching the Impressionist paintings at Cardiff publishing Colour and Light: 50 Impressionist and Post-Impressionist Works in the National Museum of Wales (2004). She curated the exhibition Reunited: Gwen John, Mère Poussepin and the Catholic Church at the Barber in 2008 and Sisley in England and Wales (curated jointly with Christopher Riopelle) at the National Gallery also in 2008. Ann Sumner was the co-curator of Objects of Affection: Pre-Raphaelite Portraits by John Brett in 2010. She is currently lead curator, and working in collaboration with Professor Kenneth McConkey, on Court on Cavas: Tennis in Art, opening at the Barber in May 2011. She is also working on the Norwegian artist Thomas Fearnley for an exhibition in 2012, which she is co-curating with Professor David Jackson.
Professor Sumner is a member of the Steering Group for Pre 1900 European Paintings Specialist Subject Network, a Trustee of the Methodist Art Collection of Modern Art and a member of the panel from the Leverhulme Art History Prize 2010. She also sits on the Curatorial Advisory Group for the Ironbridge Trust.
Eurydice Georganteli, MA, PhD, FSA
Curator of Coins & University Lecturer in Numismatics
Eurydice Georganteli studied Archaeology and History of Art at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and the University of Oxford. She has held scholarships at the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, and has been Fellow in Byzantine Studies at Dumbarton Oaks, and at the Clore Leadership Programme in Cultural Management.
Eurydice has worked for the Hellenic Ministry of Culture and taught at the University of Thessaly, Volos, before becoming the Barber Institute Curator of the Coin Collection and Lecturer in Numismatics and Economic History at the University of Birmingham in 2000. She has been a Visiting Lecturer at the AHRB Centre for Byzantine Cultural History at Queen’s University, Belfast, and contributes to the MBA programme of the University of Birmingham Business School. Her book Encounters: Travel and Money in the Byzantine World (London 2006) in co-authorship with Barrie Cook was the recipient of the 2007 Royal Numismatic Society Lhotka Memorial Prize. She is currently completing a monograph on the Via Egnatia and the economy of the medieval Balkans. She is the project manager and principal curator of the exhibition Sacred and Profane: Treasures of Ancient Egypt from the Myers Collection, Eton College and University of Birmingham (Barber Institute, June 2010-January 2012) and the related publication E. Georganteli & M. Bommas (eds), Sacred and Profane: Treasures of Ancient Egypt from the Myers Collection, Eton College and University of Birmingham, London 2010.
Her previous Barber Institute projects include Matthew Boulton and the Art of Making Money (2009-2010) Changing Landscapes: The Industrial Revolution and the British Banknote (an AHRC-funded partnership project with the British Museum, Barber Institute of Fine Arts, 2008-2009) Encounters: Travel and Money in the Byzantine World (an AHRC-funded partnership project with the British Museum, Barber Institute of Fine Arts, 2007-2008) Talking Coins: Numismatic Treasures from the Barber Institute of Fine Arts (2002-2006). She was the project manager of the New Coin Gallery (2002) and the Coin Study Room (2005) and since 2000 she has been working on the electronic catalogue and digital photography of the Coin Collection.
Elsewhere, she is member of the Executive Committee of the UK Society for the Promotion of Byzantine Studies, Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London and Fellow of the Royal Numismatic Society.
Here at the Barber, Eurydice is currently researching for the exhibition and publication project The City in your Hands: Money and Citizenship (on display between 2012-2015) a partnership project with the British Museum. Elsewhere she is a contributor to the international documentary production The Empire of Trebizond and the Black Sea (Small Planet, November 2010).
Robert Wenley, Deputy Director
Head of Collections and Learning
Robert Wenley joined the Barber Institute in May 2010 from Glasgow Museums, where he was the Curator of European Art, 1600-1800 and based at the Burrell Collection from 2003 until 2010. Robert studied History (BA Hons) at Durham University and Gallery Studies (M. Litt.) at St Andrew's University. This was followed by 12 years in the curatorial section at the Wallace Collection, London, where he specialised in, and published on, French bronzes from the 16th-18th centuries. He was Reviews Editor for the Sculpture Journal from 2000 until 2010 and now sits on the Editorial Board.
His other specialist areas of interest are Dutch and Flemish 17th century paintings, and the history of collecting, particularly in Britain, and he has published numerous articles on these subjects.
Here at the Barber, Robert will be researching and managing new displays of the Barber’s collection of sculpture and decorative art in 2011. He’ll also be project leading several exhibitions, including one focusing on Govaert Flinck’s fine Portrait of a Boy (2012) to mark the 80th anniversary of the Barber, on Sir Henry and Lady Barber (2012-13) and The Foundations of the Collection in 2013, at the National Gallery. He will also be supervising and contributing to research into, and publication of, the collection, including online.
Tess Radcliffe, MA
Learning and Access Officer
Tess Radcliffe read Fine Art (BA Hons) at the University of Wolverhampton and History of Art (MA) at the University of Birmingham. She has worked as both education and outreach officers at museums across the West Midlands, including Ikon, Bilston Craft Gallery and Wolverhampton Art Gallery and Museum, as well as for the Museum on the Move touring history bus in outreach.
She has also worked as an art teacher at King Edwards VI College and as an artist and gallery educator at the New Art Gallery Walsall. Most recently she worked at Birmingham Central Library as Education and Outreach officer. Her particular areas of interest are drawings and 20th century European art.