Board of Directors
Alison Castle
Educated at Columbia and NYU in philosophy, photography, and film, Alison has worked primarily as a book editor and author for the past two decades. Her books include The Stanley Kubrick Archives, Saturday Night Live: The Book, The Complete Jacques Tati, and Marc Newson: Works. She is also a contributor to publications including Gagosian Quarterly, The Road Rat, Chaos 69, and Vogue. Aside from photography and film, Alison is passionate about furniture and design. Preserving and promoting her father's legacy is now her main focus.
www.alisoncastle.com
Kathrine Page
Kathrine is the former Gretchen Hupfel Curator of Contemporary Art at the Delaware Contemporary museum in Wilmington. Prior to her curatorial position, she served as president of the board at the Delaware Contemporary. She is currently project director at John William Gallery in Wilmington.
Kathrine's enduring relationship with Nancy and Wendell Castle spans decades, having showcased the Jurs-Castle family's work at the Davison Gallery in Rochester, NY, The Delaware Contemporary, and Nancy’s work at Spencer Hill Gallery in Corning, NY. As a proud contributor to the Wendell Castle Project board, Kathrine maintains her deep commitment to the Castle legacy championing their artistic vision, firmly believing in the transformative power of art as catalyst for community engagement, dialogue, and discovery.
www.kathrinepage.com
Marc Benda
Marc Benda was born in 1976 in Zurich, Switzerland. He studied at Sotheby’s Institute in London (1996-97) and economics and business at Hochschule St. Gallen (1997-2002). In 2002, he began working with Barry Friedman in New York, where he built a pioneering program of internationally renowned designers. The two co-founded Friedman Benda in 2007, specializing in contemporary and post-war design. The gallery’s collaboration with Wendell Castle dates back to 2006, with regular exhibitions both at the gallery and in institutional settings.
www.friedmanbenda.com
Stan Rickel
Stan is a distinguished industrial designer and educator. As co-founder of Rickel Jackson Design, Stan contributed to the creation of exhibits and products for renowned clients such as Anchor Hocking, Tiger, Mattel, Farberware, Conair, United Chair, and George Kovacs. Stan has been an influential faculty member at prestigious institutions including Pratt Institute, Syracuse University, and the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT), where he has taught since 2001 and is currently the head of the undergraduate and graduate industrial design programs. Stan's impact extends beyond the classroom. He has co-founded and led initiatives such as Studio930 and the Livability Lab and launched the ArcWorks DS7 project. Stan is committed to mentoring the next generation of designers, fostering empathy in design and championing the transformative potential of education.
Roger Wall
Roger has a long history in the furniture and design business, dating back to 1990 when he began working in sales at Knoll. Since 1994 he has been the president of Spinneybeck / FilzFelt, a division of MillerKnoll. An avid collector and champion of craft and design furniture, Roger also sits on the boards of the Harry Bertoia Foundation as well as Spinneybeck/Knoll nonprofits in North America, Ireland, and China.
Glenn Adamson
Glenn is a curator, writer and historian based in New York and London. He has previously been Director of the Museum of Arts and Design and Head of Research at the V&A.
Dr. Adamson’s publications include Thinking Through Craft (2007); The Craft Reader (2010); Postmodernism: Style and Subversion (2011, with Jane Pavitt); The Invention of Craft (2013); Art in the Making (2016, with Julia Bryan-Wilson); Fewer Better Things: The Hidden Wisdom of Objects (2018); Objects: USA 2020; and Craft: An American History (2021). His most recent book, A Century of Tomorrows, was published by Bloomsbury in December 2024.
Dr. Adamson is Artistic Director for Design Doha, a biennial in Qatar; curator at large for the Vitra Design Museum; and editor of Material Intelligence, a quarterly online journal published by the Chipstone Foundation.
His current curatorial projects include Toshiko Takaezu: Worlds Within for the Isamu Noguchi Museum and Nike: Form Follows Motion for the Vitra Design Museum.
Sarah Jesse
Sarah, the Mary W. and Donald R. Clark Director, came to the Memorial Art Gallery in 2024. Prior, she served as Director of the Academy Art Museum in Easton, Maryland, and Deputy Director, as well as Interim Director and CEO, of the Orange County Museum of Art.
She was also Associate Vice President of Education at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Bernsen Director of Education and Public Programs at the Philbrook Museum of Art in Tulsa, Oklahoma; and Assistant Director of Public Programs at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, Illinois. She holds a Master’s degree in art history from the University of Illinois at Chicago and a Bachelor of Arts degree from Oberlin College.
She has worked in the museum field for over twenty years and has dedicated her career to making museums accessible to everyone.
Marc Newsome
Born in Sydney, Australia in 1963, Marc Newson has remained at the forefront of global design for over four decades. An internationally celebrated industrial designer, Newson’s innovative practice continues to embrace a remarkable breadth and complexity—from furniture, marine, automotive, and aviation design, to architectural projects, timepieces, luxury goods, jewelry and fine-art installations. Marc Newson’s practice continues to operate from its central London Studio.
Newson studied Fine Art at Sydney College of the Arts (now part of Sydney University), specializing in silversmithing and jewelry-making. Newson has fostered longstanding relationships with numerous prestigious brands including Louis Vuitton, Montblanc, Hermès, Nike, Dom Pérignon, Ford, Jaeger-LeCoultre, Swarovski and Ferrari. Newson has acted as Creative Director of Qantas Airways and was appointed Designer for Special Projects at Apple—a position marking his critical involvement in the design of the ‘Apple Watch’. In 2019, Marc and Sir Jonathan Ive founded the creative collective LoveFrom.
Newson is represented by Gagosian Gallery, their only industrial designer and is also represented in Paris by Galerie kreo. Newson’s work is in the permanent collections of many major museums including, The Museum of Modern Art and Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum (New York), San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Design Museum and V&A Museum (London), Musée National d’Art Moderne, Centre Pompidou and Musée des Arts Décoratifs (Paris), Vitra Design useum (Weil am Rhein), Museum Angewandte Kunst (Frankfurt), Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg, Museu do Design e da Moda (Lisbon), Israel Museum (Jerusalem), Powerhouse Museum (Sydney), the National Gallery of Victoria (Melbourne), and the National Gallery of Australia (Canberra).
Newson’s work has been featured in numerous international books and publications and has been the subject of radio and television programs including, interviews on PBS, Charlie Rose, BBC’s Imagine ‘Marc Newson Urban Spaceman’, Objects of Desire on Sky Arts, and Objectified’, a documentary film by Gary Hustwit. In 2013, Newson spoke at TEDxSydney.
Newson has been included in TIME Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People and has received numerous industry awards and distinctions. He holds Honorary Doctorates from Sydney University and the Royal College of Art, has held Adjunct Professorships at Sydney University and Hong Kong Polytechnic University, and was appointed RDI (Royal Designer for Industry) by the Royal Society of Arts. In 2012, he was awarded CBE (Commander of the most Excellent Order of the British Empire) by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.
Staff
Ken Page
For over 25 years, Ken has been an avid furniture maker and admirer of Wendell Castle. He first met Wendell and Nancy through his wife, Kathrine. Ken volunteered to serve as the Director of the Wendell Castle Workshop with the objective of establishing a sustainably operating school, in line with Wendell’s spirit. He retired as an Engineering Program Director having managed space telescope, automation, and chemical facility projects and operations over a 40-year career.
