Janet Langsam is a cultural advocate, artist, journalist, and seasoned arts executive who has been nurturing artists and bolstering the cultural infrastructure of our community for more than 50 years. A Queens native and former Deputy Commissioner of Cultural Affairs for New York City, Langsam has spent the past 33 years at the helm of ArtsWestchester. Throughout her tenure as the organization’s CEO, Langsam spearheaded fundraising efforts that secured more than $75 million for the arts in the county, highlighting her unparalleled dedication to the cultural vibrancy of the Hudson Valley region. Under her visionary leadership, in 1998 ArtsWestchester acquired the historic 12-story bank building in White Plains, transforming it into an arts incubator with new offices, galleries, artist studios and spaces for creative businesses. During the pandemic, she rallied for the broader arts community by securing $10 million annually for upstate arts councils and $1 million in state funds for ArtsWestchester’s Restart the Arts Program. Throughout her distinguished career, she has been recognized for her leadership and ability to foster public/private partnerships to strengthen the arts throughout New York State.
Fred Wilson, a 1999 John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur (genius) Grant Award winner, is one of Purchase College’s most illustrious alumni, earning his BFA with the college’s first graduating class in 1976. In his work, Wilson explores themes tied to histories of colonization and enslavement, critiques the imbrication of art history and art institutions with these histories, and transforms these histories via site-specific installations. Wilson’s interventions in museums have underscored the biases of the Western canon and the exhibition practices that derived from it. Wilson reframes the roles indigenous, Black, and other historically oppressed groups have played in producing Western art worlds through wall texts, the rearrangement and manipulation of objects and spaces. His solo exhibition, Fred Wilson, was on view at the Neuberger in spring 2017. In February, the Neuberger Museum of Art and the Purchase College Global Black Studies and Media Studies programs launched The Fred Wilson Lectures in Global Black Studies to honor Wilson’s achievements and those of other Black makers and thinkers who shape our creative and cultural landscapes.
Lois Bregstein is one of the Neuberger Museum of Art’s most stalwart volunteers and an inspirational leader of the Museum’s arts education and engagement programs for visitors of every age and ability. Bregstein is a foundational member of the Museum Service Council and has served continuously as a Volunteer Museum Educator since 1977. She has led tours, developed programming, trained almost every volunteer who has served at the Museum, and collaborated on teacher guides for the permanent collection and special exhibitions while educating generations of Westchester County school- and college-age students. She served as President of the Neuberger’s Museum Service Council, of which the Volunteer Museum Educators are a part, for four years and served as a Member of the Board of the Directors of the Friends of the Neuberger Museum of Art for 11 years. As a member of the Friends Board, she chaired galas and worked to expand membership through special events and programming. Lois is a graduate of New Rochelle High School and Vassar College, where she majored in Art History and Philosophy. She earned a Master’s degree in Humanities at Manhattanville College.
