ABOUT
WHAT IS REMUSEUM?
Remuseum is a museum think tank seeking to promote innovation among art museums across the United States. Remuseum does this work through research, convenings, and catalytic support for innovators among museum leaders (directors, educators, curators, and trustees). With a focus on relevance, governance, and financial sustainability, Remuseum supports new ways for museums to sustain and fulfill their missions, almost all of which are now centered on the public.
Remuseum was inspired and originally funded by entrepreneur and philanthropist David Booth together with support from Alice Walton and Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, where it remains closely affiliated. Remuseum has received additional support from the Ford Foundation and the Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation.
In 2026, Remuseum launched The Vanguard, a $100,000 award and 12-month accelerator for innovative leaders in the visual and performing arts. The Vanguard is supported by the Doris Duke Foundation, David Booth, the Alice L. Walton Foundation, the Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation, the Arison Arts Foundation, Pilot House Philanthropy, Amy and David Abrams, the Hill Art Foundation, and the Jasteka Foundation.
Remuseum is led by entrepreneur and innovative museum director Stephen Reily.
ABOUT STEPHEN REILY – FOUNDING DIRECTOR OF REMUSEUM
Stephen Reily is the Founding Director of Remuseum, a museum think tank launched at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art to promote innovation among art museums across the United States. He is the leader, in partnership with the Doris Duke Foundation, of The Vanguard, the first-ever award and accelerator for innovative leaders in the visual and performing arts. He has been named a Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation Entrepreneur for his work with Remuseum.
A longtime supporter of museums and the arts, Reily served as the Director of the Speed Art Museum from 2017-2021, with a record of innovation, access, and public engagement that included the “Speed for All” free family membership for anyone for whom cost was a barrier to entry; “The Art of Bourbon,” the leading national nonprofit bourbon auction; and “Promise, Witness, Remembrance,” an exhibition cited as a model of relevance and innovation as the museum responded in real time to the police killing of Breonna Taylor and a year of protests in Louisville. He currently serves on the Board of the American Federation of Arts and previously served on the boards of Creative Capital Foundation, The New Museum, and the Speed Art Museum.
A graduate of Yale College and Stanford Law School, Stephen Reily clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens before beginning his career as an entrepreneur, co-founding IMC Licensing, a global leader in brand licensing that has generated over $9 billion in consumer product sales for the Fortune 500 brands it represents. As a social entrepreneur, Reily was longtime Chair of the Greater Louisville Project, which for 20 years used data to catalyze civic progress in Louisville, and partnered with the Louisville Urban League to create the Reily Reentry Program, responsible for a majority of criminal-record expungements granted to citizens of Kentucky.
































