Columbia Center for Oral History Portal > Oral history interview with Caroline Huber, 2015Biographical NoteCaroline Huber was born outside of Philadelphia and grew up in Glower, PA. She married museum curator and director Walter C. Hopps in 1983, and worked as co-director of DiverseWorks, a nonprofit contemporary arts organization in Houston. She served on the board of the Orange Show Center for Visionary Art, Houston, including two terms as President. She has also served on the Menil Foundation Board of Trustees, the Cornudas Mountain Foundation National Advisory Committee and the The Jay DeFeo Foundation Advisory Committee
Scope and ContentsCaroline Huber discusses meeting her husband Walter Hopps in 1976 while working at the Smithsonian Bicentennial. She describes an incident involving Robert Rauschenberg and Merce Cunningham regarding Rauschenberg's piece Minutia, describing how he commissioned a replica of the piece to allow two separate shows to showcase it and run smoothly. She discusses in depth her husband's professional relationship with the de Menil family as head curator of Rice University's Art Barn and eventually as director of the Menil Collection, overseeing the institute from construction through Mrs. de Menil's death. Shortly after Mrs. de Menil's death, Hopps resigned as director and redirected his energies towards curatorial pursuits including the Rauschenberg retrospectives presented by the Guggenheim and Ace Gallery. Huber also discusses Hopps' start as a photographer, his transition to curating, and his professional influences and personal philosophies
SubjectsAccess ConditionsCopyright by the Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York and Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, 2015
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