Dr. Richard Brettell, founding director of the Edith O’Donnell Institute of Art History at The University of Texas at Dallas, has been elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. “With its origins in the 18th century and its conjoining of the arts and the sciences in the great tradition of liberal learning, the American academy is particularly important for me,” he said. About the Academy Founded in 1780, the American Academy of Arts & Sciences is both an honorary society that recognizes and celebrates the excellence of its members and an independent research center convening leaders from across disciplines, professions and perspectives to address significant challenges. Brettell also helped create the French American Museum Exchange (FRAME), a formal collaboration of museums in the U.S. and France that serves as a catalyst for cultural exchange. Brettell’s museum experience includes serving as the Eugene McDermott Director at the Dallas Museum of Art and Searle Curator of European Painting at the Art Institute of Chicago.