Eastern will soon welcome a new director for the Tarble Arts Center at the end of March.

On March 31, Michael Watts, the current director of Tarble will be leaving his position he has had since February of 1986.

Watts retired from Eastern on May 2014 but agreed to keep his position as a part-time director until someone replaced his position.

Dana Ringuette, the chair of the Screening Committee, said there were 13 people who applied for the job.

“The applications came from all over the U.S. (including) people with experience from different museums,” he said.

Tarble is one of the few museums that are accredited by the official accrediting committee, which is rare for a museum, Ringuette said.

He said the interviews will start on February 3rd with Peter Van Ael and the last day will be February 12th with Rehema Barber.

“Every candidate will have two open sessions as a part of the interview schedules,” Ringuette said. “All community members can attend the interviews because there will be a question and answer portion of the interviews.”

The first interview day will be from 6 p.m. to 6:45 p.m. The second one will be from 2:15 p.m. to 3:15 p.m.

The first finalists is Rehema Barber, who is a visiting academic professional and the coordinator of Figure One, an off-campus exhibition space operated by the University of Illinois’ School of Art and Design.

Sherry Maurer is the second finalist. She recently stepped down as director of the Augustana College Art Museum. She was also an adjunct instructor at Black Hawk College, and the Midcoast Fine Arts Bucktown coordinator.

The third finalist is Michael Schetz, who is the current assistant director of Tarble.

The fourth finalist is Peter Van Ael, who is the coordinator of the Interdisciplinary Certificate Program of Graduate Study in Museum Studies. He is also a coordinator of the Jack Olson Gallery and Gallery 214 at the Northern Illinois University School of Art and Design.

Ringuette said the committee consists of five members including him.

Members include Keith Perry, from the Tarble advisory board, Elizabeth Heldebrandt of Booth Library, Chris Kahler, an art professor and Malgorzta Rymsza-Pawlowska, an assistant history professor.

Glenn Hild, interim dean of college of arts and humanities, will have final say in who will get hired.

It is unknown the exact date when the new director will start once hired.

All information on when the finalists will be interviewed can be found on Eastern’s arts and humanities website.

Stephanie White can be reached at 581-2812 or at [email protected].