University President Frederick Lawrence appointed Executive Vice President at Sotheby's George Wachter '73 P'12 as chair of the Board of Overseers for the Rose Art Museum on Feb. 22.

Wachter has been at Sotheby's since he graduated from Brandeis as an Art History major 38 years ago. He is also co-chairman of the Old Master Paintings Worldwide department, a field devoted to pre-1800 European paintings, a subject on which he also lectures. Wachter is a board member of the Frick Collection in New York, though he said that the process of running a board will be new to him.

Lawrence portrayed the move as proof of his commitment to the long-run stability of the museum. "This is another important step along the path of revitalizing the Rose," he said in a BrandeisNOW press release.

In an interview with the Justice, Wachter said that the Rose has two great advantages: its location on the campus of a university where it can be used for teaching, and "if not the best, certainly one of the best collections of contemporary art in New England."

Wachter thinks that better publicity is necessary for the museum. "I want to put the Rose on the map more than it already is," he said.

Additionally, Wachter is providing the funding for the Fine Arts department's digitization of the George and Fern Wachter Visual Resources Center collection. The funding has allowed art professors to teach classes digitally instead of using antiquated Kodak carousels.

Roy Dawes, director of museum operations, praised Wachter's background. "Mr. Wachter is well known in the art world and is greatly respected," he said in an interview with the Justice.

Commenting on the 2009 controversy over the University's plan to sell artwork from the museum, Wachter said that he was "extremely disappointed at what happened two years ago and I am so happy that nothing bad happened at the end of the day and all of the art that they had is still in the museum." He added, "I wouldn't have taken this job if I didn't feel there was a commitment to the future of the Rose and to the future of the collection, and there is without any question a real commitment from Brandeis to that, and that's why I'm doing it."

Wachter said that his most interesting project at Sotheby's was the 1995 auction of the New York Historical Society's Old Masters collection. The collection was donated in 1867 by Thomas Jefferson Bryan, before the Metropolitan Museum existed, and its sale to support the Society's endowment prompted a public outcry and legal challenge similar to that experienced when the Rose sought to sell its artwork.

The Rose has 6,000 works worth an estimated $350 to $400 million, according to a Jan. 28, 2009 New York Times article. The University is currently conducting a search for a new director of the museum.