Lesley Wright was the founding director of the Grinnell College Museum of Art, retiring in 2021. In establishing the museum and its reputation, she developed the museum’s mission, collection policies, and infrastructure. She taught museum studies, inaugurated a national advisory board, and increased donor activity. She curated or co-curated over 14 major group exhibitions, primarily of contemporary art and always looking for points of interdisciplinary connection between artists and the community. She championed robust outreach for every museum project, frequently bringing national and international artists to Iowa. She has served on the boards of the Grinnell Chamber of Commerce, the Hotel-Motel Tax Committee, the Grinnell Area Arts Council, and the Association of Midwest Museums. In retirement, she is on the boards of the Iowa Cultural Coalition and the Grinnell School of Music and advises the Grant Wood Art Colony. She has led initiatives for 8 public art pieces on and off campus, including the commissioning of a mural for the School of Music.
Her museum background includes serving as the curator at the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art, a position at the University Art Museum at UC Berkeley (now the Berkeley Art Museum), and a Luce Foundation internship at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. She has her Ph.D. in American art history from Stanford University (supervised by Wanda Corn). A native of California, she has lived in Iowa since 1992 and is married to Donald Doe, a retired art museum director.