The Portland Museum of Art on Monday named Margaret Burgess as the new associate curator of modern and European art.

Burgess will oversee the presentation and development of the museum's collection of 19th- and 20th-century European art, including the Joan Whitney Payson Collection, the Scott M. Black Collection and the Albert Otten Collection. Burgess will join the staff in January.

"We are delighted to have Margaret Burgess join the museum's curatorial staff," acting director and chief curator Tom Denenberg said in a press release. "Meg is thoughtful, enthusiastic, and will bring great energy to the museum's European art exhibitions and programs."

Burgess has worked as a research fellow at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., and as an Andrew W. Mellon Foundation curatorial fellow at the Cleveland Museum of Art. She has also held positions at Buckingham Palace, London; the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, England; the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice, Italy; and the Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.

She has contributed to several exhibitions, books and other publications, including: "Sargent and the Sea" (2009), "Barcelona & Modernity: Picasso, Gaudí, Miró, Dalí" (2006), "Monet in Normandy" (2006), "Cleveland Art" (2003-05), "British Pictures, 1840-1940" (1999) and "Transformations in Cleveland Art, 1796-1946" (1996).

She earned her doctoral in British and American art and art criticism, and her master's in 19th-century French painting from the University of Oxford, England. She has an undergraduate degree in Art History from Stanford University.

Burgess joins the museum's curatorial staff, which includes: Denenberg; Susan Danly, curator of graphics, photography and contemporary art; and Sage Lewis, curatorial coordinator.

Meanwhile, the museum's search for a new executive director continues, with a handful of top candidates targeted for interviews. No timetable has been set for hiring a new executive director.

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