BUFFALO, N.Y. — The Burchfield Penney Art Center has a new executive director to lead the museum.
Scott Propeack is someone who worked his way up at the cultural organization to where he is today. While Propeack is now leading the Burchfield Penney Art Center, he says he didn't grow up going to museums.
"I was really interested when I learned about museums as an adult, and started going to exhibitions, about the ways that museums and the arts could help tell stories about community," Propeack said.
Propeack says when he started working at the Burchfield Penney in August of 1997, he thought it would be a temporary job.
"But as soon as I started working here, I realized it's amazing what the arts can do," Propeack said.
"What was your first job here, and what was that experience like?" 2 On Your Side's Kelly Dudzik asked.
"I was the museum registrar, and so I was responsible for all the artwork coming in and out of the building, the care, the location for it. It was a very sort of technical job in a lot of ways, but it was interesting because it helped me learn all about artists of Western New York that I was unfamiliar with," Propeack said.
And that laid the foundation for where Propeack is today, leading a staff of about 30 and overseeing a $3.6 million budget.
"We are a space that is built and exists to honor the community, and so we're very unique nationally in that regard as far as regional museums go," said Scott Propeack.
One of his goals is to make museums more accessible.
"We need to actually lift up voices and stories of people who have not had that opportunity, and I think that every direction that we're going to be moving in is going to be doing that more often rather than less often. We will continue to celebrate Charles Burchfield's work, and the historic artists, but really giving us space for the younger artists to find a way to see themselves in the arts," Propeack said.