(New York, April 9, 2026)—The Metropolitan Museum of Art announced today the appointment of Oluremi C. Onabanjo as Curator in the Department of Photographs, following a comprehensive international search conducted over several months. Onabanjo joins The Met from The Museum of Modern Art, where she currently serves as The Peter Schub Curator in the Robert B. Menschel Department of Photography.
In her role as Curator at The Met, she will develop exhibitions, acquisitions, and scholarship in twentieth century and contemporary photography as well as time-based media, with an emphasis on international practices, particularly in Africa and Asia. Onabanjo will help lead the stewardship and interpretation of the Walther Collection—a landmark gift of over 6,500 photographs, albums, and works of time-based media—including a major exhibition planned for 2028, while working collaboratively across the Museum to expand the presentation of photography within a broader, interconnected narrative of art. In close collaboration with colleagues across the Museum, she will contribute to projects that extend beyond the boundaries of medium and department, advancing new and holistic approaches to the presentation of art across cultures and time.
“Oluremi C. Onabanjo is among the most compelling voices in contemporary photography today,” said Max Hollein, The Met’s Marina Kellen French Director and Chief Executive Officer. “Her scholarship and curatorial vision reflect a deep engagement with the histories of the medium and a thoughtful approach to the ways photography shapes our understanding of the world. As we look toward the future of art at The Met—including the development of the Oscar L. and H.M. Agnes Hsu-Tang Wing—Onabanjo’s perspective will be invaluable in advancing a more expansive and globally connected narrative of art, fostering new dialogues across departments, cultures, and time.”
She joins the Department at a pivotal moment as the Museum advances key institutional initiatives, including the development of Tang Wing for Modern and Contemporary Art, opening in 2030. In this context, photography will continue to play an important role in shaping how art from the late nineteenth century to the present is presented across the Museum’s galleries. This appointment reflects a broader institutional commitment to expanding the narratives through which art of the late nineteenth century to the present is presented. She will begin at The Met later this summer.
“Onabanjo brings a remarkable depth of knowledge and a rigorous approach to the study of photography,” said Jeff Rosenheim, The Met’s Curator in Charge of the Department of Photographs. “Her work reflects a nuanced understanding of the medium’s histories and its global trajectories, as well as a strong commitment to expanding the collection in meaningful and enduring ways. We look forward to the perspectives she will bring to the Department and to the Museum as a whole.”
Onabanjo commented: “I am honored to join The Met at such a dynamic moment as it looks ahead to the future of Photography in the Museum. The Met’s extraordinary collection and its commitment to presenting art across cultures and time offer a powerful context for rethinking the histories of photography. I look forward to contributing to the Department’s work and to engaging new audiences with the medium.”
About Oluremi C. Onabanjo
Onabanjo’s curatorial practice is grounded in a fine-tuned examination of photography’s social, political, and aesthetic dimensions, with a particular commitment to the medium’s history across the African continent and African Diaspora, and its entanglement in forms of visuality, knowledge production, and archival formation across the globe. First joining The Museum of Modern Art in 2021 as an Associate Curator, Onabanjo has served as The Peter Schub Curator in the Robert B. Menschel Department of Photography since 2024, where she oversees the Museum’s collection of more than 35,000 photographs spanning the history of the medium.
At MoMA, she spearheaded major acquisitions which have broadened and deepened the Museum’s engagement with image-makers across the globe such as Gabrielle Goliath, Aline Motta, Marilyn Nance, Silvia Rosi, Eslanda Robeson, and Zofia Rydet. She also served on the Museum’s Early Modern Working Group (which she co-chaired from 2022–2024) and was instrumental in integrating photography into the ongoing reinstallation of the Museum’s collection through evolving presentations such as A Little Gallery of the Photo-Secession, Ernest Cole’s House of Bondage, The City as Spectacle, and Visual Vernaculars. Her exhibitions and collaborations include New Photography 2025: Lines of Belonging (2025); New Photography 2023: Kelani Abass, Akinbode Akinbiyi, Yagazie Emezi, Amanda Iheme, Abraham Oghobase, Karl Ohiri, Logo Oluwamuyiwa (2023); Projects: Ming Smith (2023); as well as Ideas of Africa: Portraiture and Political Imagination, on view through July 25, 2026.
Prior to her tenure at MoMA, Onabanjo served on the curatorial team for the 8th Triennial of Photography Hamburg (2021) and was the Director of Exhibitions & Collections at The Walther Collection in New York, where she oversaw a dynamic acquisition, exhibition, research, and publication program committed to a critical engagement with historical and contemporary photography across the globe. Onabanjo has taught and lectured widely on international histories of photography, including at Yale University, NYU’s Institute for Fine Arts, University of California Berkeley, Instituto Moreira Salles, and FOAM Photography Museum, and her writing is featured in catalogues published by The Art Institute of Chicago, Aperture Foundation, Jeu de Paume, The Studio Museum in Harlem, and the São Paulo Bienal among others. She is the author of Ming Smith: Invisible Man, Somewhere Everywhere (2023) and the editor of Marilyn Nance: Last Day in Lagos (2022). Onabanjo was the inaugural recipient of the Vilcek Foundation Prize for Curatorial Work (2025) and a 2024 Center for Curatorial Leadership Fellow. She sits on the Photography Advisory Board of the Istanbul Modern. Onabanjo holds a PhD in art history and a BA in Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African studies from Columbia University, and an MSc in visual, material, and museum anthropology from Oxford University.
About The Department of Photographs
The Department of Photographs at The Met is devoted to the study, collection, and exhibition of photography and time-based media from 1839 to the present. Established as an independent curatorial department in 1992, the Department of Photographs houses a collection of more than 90,000 works as well as the archives of three American artists: Walker Evans, Diane Arbus, and James Van Der Zee. In 2025, the Department's collection of late-twentieth century and contemporary photography and time-based media was greatly expanded with the acquisition of The Walther Collection. The landmark gift comprises more than 6,500 photographs, including exceptionally important works from Africa and Asia, as well as related nineteenth and twentieth-century vernacular photography.
About the Tang Wing for Modern and Contemporary Art
A world-class home for The Met’s renowned holdings of 20th- and 21st-century art, the Oscar L. Tang and H.M. Agnes Hsu-Tang Wing will open in 2030. The Met’s bold new vision for the Tang Wing is designed by Mexican architect Frida Escobedo—the first woman to design a new wing in the Museum’s 154-year history. Drawing inspiration from The Met’s varied architectural styles, diverse art holdings, and setting within Central Park, the Tang Wing will add to the Museum’s rich history of advancing thoughtful and visionary architecture that is itself a work of art. The reimagined wing will remain within the existing 123,000-square-foot building’s footprint and be no higher than the original height of the 1880 wing at the center of the Museum complex. The new wing will increase gallery space by nearly 50 percent, creating connections across our collection of 5,000 years of art.
The project will address critical accessibility, infrastructure, and sustainability needs that will improve the visitor experience by creating dynamic spaces for the exhibition of art of varying scales and media, thoughtfully designed outdoor spaces, and areas for expanded educational and community programming. The project will utilize cutting-edge sustainable design practices to dramatically reduce energy consumption in that part of the Museum. Construction is expected to begin in 2026 and will generate 4,000 union jobs, targeting 30-40 percent participation by minority and women-owned businesses.
About The Met
The Metropolitan Museum of Art was founded in 1870 by a group of American citizens—businessmen and financiers as well as leading artists and thinkers of the day—who wanted to create a museum to bring art and art education to the American people. Today, The Met displays tens of thousands of objects covering 5,000 years of art from around the world for everyone to experience and enjoy. The Museum lives in two iconic sites in New York City—The Met Fifth Avenue and The Met Cloisters. Millions of people also take part in The Met experience online. Since its founding, The Met has always aspired to be more than a treasury of rare and beautiful objects. Every day, art comes alive in the Museum’s galleries and through its exhibitions and events, revealing both new ideas and unexpected connections across time and across cultures
The Metropolitan Museum of Art Appoints Oluremi C. Onabanjo as Curator in the Department of Photographs
Contact: Julie Niemi
Communications@metmuseum.org