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David Harvey

Former Adjunct, Class of
Courses Taught: Interpretive Creative Design: Museum Space

With a long career at two of the world’s most prestigious institutions, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and The American Museum of Natural History, Mr. Harvey has acquired a broad perspective on design and brings a depth of experience to creating interpretive exhibition environments for art and science based museums.

David Harvey joined the American Museum of Natural History as Director of Exhibitions in 1997, appointed Vice President for Exhibition in 1998 and in 2008 was appointed Senior Vice President for Exhibition. Throughout his career, Mr. Harvey has enjoyed sharing his perspective with classes from Parsons, FIT, Pratt, Barnard and ITP.
Mr. Harvey is responsible for the redesign of the Museum’s permanent halls, including the new Anne and Bernard Spitzer Hall of Human Origins, the Milstein Family Hall of Ocean Life and the Arthur Ross Hall of Meteorites, as well as for the development of all AMNH temporary and traveling exhibitions, including Race to the End of the Earth, Traveling the Silk Road, Extreme Mammals, Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future, Horse, Darwin, Mythic Creatures, Dinosaurs: Ancient Fossils, New Discoveries, Einstein, Pearls, The Genomic Revolution, and Gold.
Prior to joining the Museum, Mr. Harvey served as Senior Exhibition Designer at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. There, he was responsible for the architectural and exhibition design of the New Nineteenth-Century Galleries for European Painting and Sculpture and numerous major exhibitions including Degas, American Impressionism and Realism, Al-Andalus: The Arts of Islamic Spain, (New York and Granada, Spain) and The Art of Byzantium. His private clients have included Gianni Versace, Antonio Ratti, The Asia Society, The Baltimore Museum of Art and Leigh Keno Antiques.
Mr. Harvey received both an M.A. and an M.F.A. from the University of Iowa.