Art historian, educator, architectural preservationist, and native of Miami Beach, Ms. Camber joined the Bass Museum in 1980 as Assistant Director and was promoted to Director after an interim directorship. The advancement of the Bass Museum of Art under her leadership includes the dramatic growth of the facility. She led the $8 million capital campaign to renovate and expand the museum, culminating in a soaring addition designed by internationally known architect Arata Isozaki. During her tenure she also substantially reorganized the museum, secured its accreditation by the American Association of Art Museums and designation as a Major Cultural Institution by the state of Florida, more than quintupled the size of its permanent collection, expanded the museum’s mission to make it more encyclopedic in scope, and instituted significant education, special exhibition, and publication programs.

"Diane Camber has been the driving force behind the Bass Museum of Art,” said H.I.H. Princess Thi-Nga of Vietnam, Chairman of the Board of Trustees and President of the Friends of the Bass Museum. “Curating and expanding the museum’s fine collections and creating innovative and educational exhibitions and programs, she has exposed the public to art of the past as well as exciting new areas of art. Under Diane’s leadership the museum was substantially enlarged, allowing for the presentation of ambitious exhibitions and transforming the museum into a major cultural destination. The City of Miami Beach has been greatly served. We are all very sorry to see her step down, but are confident that the next leader will build upon her achievements and take the Bass Museum of Art to its next level.”

Miami Beach Mayor David Dermer reflected on Ms. Camber’s years of service to the community. “A native daughter of Miami Beach, Diane Camber has truly dedicated her career to making our city a better place, filled with cultural offerings and educational opportunities. While attracting national and international visitors, she has always served our city’s residents as well, having played a key role in the preservation of historic architecture in Miami Beach and maintaining a level of active community involvement beyond the walls of the museum.”

The Bass Museum of Art became Miami’s first public building with an exhibition space for fine art in 1963, when the City of Miami Beach accepted a gift of the art collection of John and Johanna Bass upon condition that it would maintain the collection and provide for its exhibition to the public. Roger Bass, son of John and Johanna Bass, and the museum’s longest serving trustee, commented on Ms. Camber’s role in preserving his family’s legacy:

My association with Diane Camber has been a warm and productive one since 1980, when she became the chief administrator and artistic director of the museum. At that time, the museum was badly in need of reorganization, collections cataloguing, and in some cases, re-attribution of works of art. During her long tenure she thoroughly professionalized the institution. Not only dealing with the business of day-to-day operations, but also effectively obtaining financial and community support and grants, establishing substantive educational and publications programs, maintaining rapport with the city, and encouraging the growth of the Friends of the Bass into a major support and advocacy arm; all while curating creative exhibitions, attracting prestigious international traveling exhibitions, and shepherding the major site expansion to bring the museum to the level of recognition it now holds. I am personally very sorry to have her leave us. But in recognition of these accomplishments, and with personal gratitude, I wish her the very best in her future endeavors.

Trustee John Bass, grandson of the founders, echoed Roger Bass’s sentiments, adding, “We are sorry that the time has come for Diane to step down. Her 26 years of devoted service to the Bass Museum has been exemplary. She will most assuredly be missed.”

Early in her tenure, Ms. Camber attracted national press for initiating the museum’s collection of twentieth-century design and architecture, which was rare among art museums at the time. The groundbreaking effort led to many programs and publications, culminating at first in the catalogue and exhibition The Making of Miami Beach 1933-1942: The Architecture of Lawrence Murray Dixon (Rizzoli) and now in the upcoming exhibition Promises of Paradise: Staging Mid-Century Miami and book Miami Modern Metropolis. Under her direction, the museum’s permanent collection was documented in the 160-page catalogue Paintings and Textiles of the Bass Museum of Art, the first scholarly book on selected works from the museum’s founding collection of Old Master paintings and ecclesiastic textiles and tapestries, leading to worldwide recognition of the collection.

After the museum’s expansion was completed in 2002, she organized larger exhibitions including the triad of Haitian exhibitions presented in 2006 Allegories of Haitian Life from the Collection of Jonathan Demme, Edouard Duval-Carrie: The Vodou Pantheon, and Haitian Art from the Bass Museum Collection. Most recently she curated The Private Jade Collection of H.I.H. Princess Thi-Nga of Vietnam (2007).

Other significant exhibitions which were organized by the museum under Ms. Camber’s directorship include Desert Cliche: Israel Now (1997; organized by the Bass Museum; traveled throughout U.S. and Israel), globe>miami< island: encounters at the bass museum of art
(2001-02), and Yayoi Kusama (2002-03).

Ms. Camber also attracted major national and international touring exhibitions to Miami Beach, including The Precious Legacy: Judaic Treasures from the Czechoslovak State Collections (1984; which set a record attendance milestone), two major Christo exhibitions, Christo: Three Projects (1986) and Christo and Jean-Claude: The Wurth Museum Collection (2005), Images of Arcadia, Images of Reality: Seventeenth Century Netherlandish Paintings from Swiss Collections (1989), L’Ecole de Nice (1990), Chagall in Nice (1991), Buckminster Fuller: Harmonizing Nature, Humanity and Technology (1991), The Drawings of Federico Garcia Lorca (1992), The Palaces of St. Petersburg (1992), Passionate Visions of the American South: Self-taught Artists from 1940 to the Present (1996), Fellini: Costumes and Fashion (1996), Los Sorolla de Valencia (1996), Meret Oppenheim: Beyond the Teacup (1997), and Picasso: The Vollard Suite (1998). Larger exhibitions after the expansion include Painting Revolution: Kandinsky, Malevich and the Russian Avant-Garde (2001), Picasso: Suite 347 (2004), Paris Moderne: Art Deco Works from the Musee d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (2004-05), and Retratos: 2,000 Years of Latin American Portraits (2005).

Reflecting on her career, Ms. Camber remarked, “I am enormously proud of the successes of the Bass Museum over the past 26 years. During this time, the museum has made great strides not only in size and in the quality of its collections, exhibitions, and programs, but in the role it has played as a vital cultural anchor in the Miami Beach community. The museum is in the best position of its history, with membership, attendance, revenue, and staff at peak performance.”

Ms. Camber earned her B.A. in art history at Barnard College, taking graduate courses in art history at Columbia University where she studied with the legendary Meyer Shapiro. She also took studio art courses at the Columbia University School of Painting and Sculpture and later at the Massachusetts College Art in Boston. She received her M.Ed. in Visual Arts Education from Boston State College. She began her museum career at the Albright-Knox Gallery in Buffalo, New York, and later worked at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the De Cordova and Dana Museum in Lincoln, Massachusetts. Returning to Miami Beach in the late 1970s, Ms. Camber served as Associate Director of the Miami Design Preservation League. In that role, she helped spearhead the campaign to recognize the cultural and architectural heritage of the Miami Beach Historical and Architectural District, culminating in the enrollment of the Art Deco District on the National Register of Historic Places.

Ms. Camber’s accomplishments have been recognized nationally and internationally. She has been honored by the National Council of Jewish Women and named one of the American Heart Association’s “Ten Women with Heart.” The government of France recognized her cultural contributions with the prestigious designation of Ms. Camber as a Chevalier des Arts et Lettres. She has been a member of panel discussions, symposia, and advisory groups on collecting and museum practices for national organizations including the National Endowment for the Arts and the American Association of Museums, as well as internationally in such countries as Argentina, Spain, and Turkey.

Ms. Camber is a member of the American Association of Art Museum Directors, Art Table, the Florida Art Museum Directors Association (past president), and the Blue Ribbon Committee to establish a cultural arts district in Miami Beach. She previously served on the Advisory Council of Directors to the Museum Trustees Association, the Board of Directors of the Chaim Gross Foundation in New York, and the Steering Committee for New World School of the Arts in Miami.

In retirement, Ms. Camber plans to continue her association with historic architecture and museums, working with organizations in the areas of collections management, community education, and cultural tourism.