Roxana Velásquez

Roxana Velásquez is the Maruja Baldwin Executive Director and CEO at The San Diego Museum of Art. As a passionate advocate for the arts, Ms. Velásquez has focused on fostering cross-cultural dialogues within the San Diego community as well as nationally and internationally. Throughout her professional career, she has organized many high-profile exhibitions in her capacity as the Executive Director of the Museo Nacional de San Carlos, Museo Nacional de Arte (MUNAL), the Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City, and currently with The San Diego Museum of Art.

In all held leadership positions, Ms. Velásquez elevated each respective institution to international recognition. As the Executive Director and CEO of The San Diego Museum of Art, she has increased the institution’s holdings with the donation and acquisition of works of art by world-renowned artists including Francisco de Zurbarán’s Saint Francis in Prayer in a Grotto, 1655, Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida’s On the Seashore, Valencia, 1908, and Jusepe de Ribera’s Saint Bartholomew, ca. 1632. In 2018, the Museum acquired Lucas Cranach the Younger’s Nymph of the Spring, ca. 1540, and John Singer Sargent’s Portrait of John Alfred Parsons Millet, 1892. During Ms. Velásquez’s tenure, the Museum has acquired more than 1,100 works of art through donations and gifts. High-level exhibitions and loans from the Museum’s collection travel continuously around the world, reinforcing cultural exchange while at the same time raising the global recognition of the institution. These include United States Art from The San Diego Museum of Art at the Suzhou Museum in China (2010), Visions of India at the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum in Madrid (2012), Mexico’s National Museum of Anthropology (2013), and the National Museum of Fine Arts in Quebec (2014), and the loan of René Magritte’s The Shadows, 1966, to the National Art Center Tokyo (2015) and the Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art (2015). Most recently, Giorgione’s Portrait of a Man, 1506, was on loan to the Royal Academy of Arts (2016) and Juan Sánchez Cotán’s Still Life with Quince, Cabbage, Melon, and Cucumber, ca. 1602, was on loan to the Musei Reali di Torino (2018).

Since Ms. Velásquez’s arrival at the Museum, exhibitions have included From El Greco to Dalí, Gauguin to Warhol, Sorolla and America, The Invention of Glory, The Human Beast (German Expressionism), Mexican Modern Painting from the Andrés Blaisten Collection, and The Art of Music, an exhibition that included over 200 works of art with more than 50 lenders. At the conclusion of the exhibition at The San Diego Museum of Art, The Art of Music traveled to Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City, Mexico. Opening in 2017, Modern Masters from Latin America: The Pérez Simón Collection–an exhibition of 100 works from 15 countries featuring 75 artists celebrating the multifaceted history of Latin American modernism–was the Museum’s most-attended exhibition over the past decade. In 2019, Ms. Velásquez oversaw the internationally recognized Art & Empire: The Golden Age of Spain. This exhibition was the first in the U.S. to examine the notion of “Golden Age” beyond the shores of the Iberian Peninsula by bringing together works from Spain’s European, American, and Asian realms. Also under the guidance of Ms. Velásquez, the Museum has successfully collaborated with local peer institutions including the San Diego Symphony, the San Diego Youth Symphony, and the University of California, San Diego.

In addition to ongoing public and educational programs and bilingual initiatives, Ms. Velásquez has embraced innovation by bringing technology to the Museum’s galleries. This includes an award-winning mobile app featuring audio and video tours. And in 2020, SDMA launched its 360 Virtual Gallery Experience that allows an immersive digital exploration of the Museum galleries. Ms. Velásquez further participated in new information-exchange programs, including presenting at the first TEDx event staged simultaneously in two countries with speakers presenting in San Diego, California, and Tijuana, Baja California.

It is under Ms. Velásquez’s leadership that the Museum has published new catalogues and children’s books in addition to receiving multiple grants for exhibitions. Grants have been received from the Getty Foundation as well as the James Irvine Foundation to fund the Museum’s public art program Open Spaces for at-risk areas within the San Diego community.

Fall 2020 marked Ms. Velásquez’s 10th anniversary at the Museum. Read more about her accomplishments from the past 10 years: See the Decade in Review.

Ms. Velásquez is a member of multiple boards, including Association of Art Museum Directors; International Council of Museums; American Alliance of Museums; Asociación Mexicana de Profesionales de Museos; San Diego Tourism Authority; Curatorial Advisory Board at University of San Diego; and a Trustee of the Balboa Park Cultural Partnership (BPCP).

Ms. Velásquez has been distinguished by the King of Spain with the Cross of Isabel la Católica for outstanding cultural projects of Spanish art organized in Mexico (2007). The Belgian government awarded her with the prestigious decoration of the Knight of the Order of the Crown for cross-cultural relations between Belgium and Mexico (2014). Ms. Velásquez served on the Paris Biennial Commission responsible for selecting the international galleries and antique dealers to exhibit at the 2017 & 2018 Biennials. Most recently, she received the Charles Nathanson Memorial Award for Cross-Border Region Building at LEAD San Diego’s 18th Annual Visionary Awards. This award recognizes visionary leadership by addressing and demonstrating joint solutions to cross-border issues and further uniting San Diego and Baja California for a common future.