Charles Nagel (architect)

Charles Nagel Jr. (1899 – 1992) was a Saint Louis, Missouri architect, curator, and museum director.

Life & Education[]

Nagel, Jr. was the son of Charles Nagel, a lawyer and politician, and his second wife Anne Shepley. Charles Nagel Jr. attended Yale University, where he earned three degrees, culminating with an M.F.A. in architecture. He died in Massachusetts, on 20 February 1992, and is buried there.

Career[]

He was employed at the Saint Louis architectural firms of Jamieson & Spearl and Hall & Proetz, and with Coolidge, Shepley, Bulfinch, Abbott in Boston, and later the firm of Nagel & Dunn in Saint Louis. He was curator of Decorative Arts at Yale's Gallery of Fine Arts, director of the Saint Louis Art Museum, the Brooklyn Museum, and the National Portrait Gallery.

As the director of the Brooklyn Museum, Nagel co-organized, with then Curator of Decorative and Industrial Arts at the Art Institute of Chicago, Meyric R. Rogers, the major exhibition of Italian design titled Italy at Work: Her Renaissance in Design Today.^[1][2] The exhibition traveled to twelve US museums between 1950-1953.^[3]

Nagel served as juror and secretary of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial Competition, which led to the selection of the Gateway Arch design.^[4]

References[]