Colin Fanning Joins Curatorial Staff at the Smithsonian American Art Muse​um’s Renwick Gallery 

The Smithsonian American Art Museum has appointed Colin Fanning as the Lloyd Herman Curator of Craft. Fanning’s duties include research into collection objects; acquiring artworks for the museum’s collection; collection displays at the museum’s Renwick Gallery, its branch for contemporary craft and decorative art; and organizing exhibitions about craft and maker culture. Fanning began work Monday, Sept. 21.

“After a national search, I am delighted to welcome Colin Fanning to this role,” said Mary Savig, the Fleur and Charles Bresler Curator in Charge at the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum. “Colin will creatively advance the Renwick’s exploration of craft’s resonance in American culture.”  

Fanning comes to the museum from the Philadelphia Museum of Art, where he was the Louis C. Madeira IV Associate Curator of European Decorative Arts. Fanning previously served as curatorial fellow for European decorative arts from 2014–2017, a consulting curator from 2017–2019 and assistant curator from 2021–2026 at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. In Philadelphia, he curated and co-curated exhibitions, including “The Architecture of Francis Kéré: Building for Community” (2016), “Design Currents: Oki Sato, Faye Toogood, Zanini de Zanine” (2016–2017), “Dieter Rams: Principled Design” (2018–2019), “Designs for Different Futures” (2019–2020), “Rhythms of Nature: The Art and Design of DRIFT” (2022–2023), “Firing the Imagination: Japanese Influence in French Ceramics, 1860–1910” (2024–2025), “Naoto Fukasawa: Things in Themselves” (2024–2025) and, most recently, “Workshop of the World: Arts and Crafts in Philadelphia” (2026).

In addition to exhibition catalogs, his writing has appeared in scholarly publications, including The Journal of Design History, The Public Historian and The Journal of Glass Studies and periodicals such as The Magazine Antiques and World of Interiors. He serves on the boards of the American Friends of Attingham, the Decorative Arts Society Inc. and the Design Studies Forum. Since 2021, Fanning has co-convened, with Antonia Behan of Queen’s University, Ontario, the Craft History Workshop, a virtual works-in-progress seminar for interdisciplinary histories of making.

Fanning earned a bachelor’s degree in fine arts in interior design from Syracuse University and a master’s degree in decorative arts, design history and material culture from Bard Graduate Center, where he is completing a doctoral dissertation on the Cranbrook Academy of Art’s graduate design program and its wider impact on creative education in the United States in the late 20th century.

The Smithsonian American Art Museum’s Renwick Gallery opened its doors Jan. 28, 1972, under the stewardship of founding director Lloyd Herman, to showcase the ingenuity and relevance of craft and design in American culture. For more than 50 years, the museum has celebrated the creativity of American craft artists, and the vital role craft plays in modern life. Through exhibitions and installations in the galleries at the Renwick, the objects on display showcase the history of the studio craft movement while also introducing contemporary artworks that push the boundaries of what is considered to be handmade in the 21st century.