Sweeney, James Johnson

Sweeney, James Johnson (1900–86) museum director, art historian/critic; born in New York City. He studied at Georgetown University (B.A. 1922) and at several other institutions. In Paris during the 1920s he was an editor on the literary magazine Transition. He was a journalist in Chicago (1931–32), director of exhibitions at the University of Chicago (1933–34), and lectured at New York University (1935–40). He was curator at the Museum of Modern Art (1945–46), director of the Guggenheim Museum (1952–59), and director of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (1961–68). In the 1970s he chaired the executive committee of the Israel Museum, Jerusalem. His specialty was 20th-century avant-garde art and his numerous publications include the book Plastic Redirections in Twentieth Century Art (1934).