ICB Board Members
Jane Fortune
Vice-chair, Indianapolis City Ballet
Jane Fortune is an advocate for artistic preservation, social advancement and civic engagement. Her counsel has guided prestigious institutions and programs in the United States and Italy, her contributions have unlocked new opportunities in artistic, scientific and humanitarian endeavors and her passionate leadership has engaged new support for many worthwhile causes.
Jane’s philanthropic and civic endeavors are evident in the USA. She serves on the board of governors and is a sustaining life trustee of Indianapolis Museum of Art. In addition, she sits on the dean’s advisory board of Herron School of Art and Design in Indianapolis and the National Advisory Board of the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, D.C. Jane is a former member of the board of directors of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
In Florence, Italy, Jane is the cultural editor of The Florentine, the only English language newspaper in the city and since 2006, she has written a bi-monthly page on Italian art and culture. She is the founder, and chair, of The Florence Committee of the National Museum of Women in the Arts and is the past chair of the board of trustees of Studio Arts Center International (SACI), both in Florence. She has personally underwritten the restoration of several Italian works of art, by women, held in the Florence Museums, including Artemisia Gentileschi's David and Bathsheba and 2 lunettes by Suor Plautilla Nelli, titled Saint Catherine receives the Stigmata and Saint Dominic receives the Rosary.
Jane’s work also extended to USArtists, an American Fine Art Exhibition and Sale, which benefits the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, which she co-founded, and to the same organization’s Special Needs program, which she founded. The outgrowth of the Special Needs Program (the first such program, at that time, at any national Arts Fair) was an establishment of a Women’s Board Endowed Scholarship at Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts for persons with disabilities to attend PAFA’s art school.
Jane is a published author of two books To Florence, Con Amore (2007) which is an insiders, behind the scene, art and cultural guide to Florence, published by The Florentine Press, Florence, Italy and Invisible Women, Forgotten Artists of Florence, published October 2009, by The Florentine Press, Florence, Italy. She has also written for three other publications: The Restoration of a Masterpiece (2008) published by Sillabe, Florence, Italy, on the restoration of Artemisia Gentileschi’s David e Betsabea; the forward for the book Plautilla Nelli (1524-1588) The Painter –Prioress of Renaissance Florence, published by Syracuse University Press/Florence, Italy (2008), which is part of the Villa Rossa series on intercultural perspectives on Italy and Europe at Syracuse University/Florence and Orate Pro Pictora (2009), published by The Florentine Press,Florence, Italy, about the restoration of the two 'newly discovered' lunettes by Suor Plautilla Nelli.
In 2008, Jane received the Indiana University Purdue University, Indianapolis, Spirit of Philanthropy Award, the Herron School of Art and Design Honoree, Indianapolis, and in 2007, Indianapolis Mayor’s Advisory Council on Disabilities, Accessibility Award for exceptional commitment to furthering accessibility, and inclusion, to persons with disabilities. Maxwell Anderson, the Melvin & Bren Simon Director and CEO of the Indianapolis Museum of Art, proposed her for the accessibility award, for her leadership of an accessibility program, at the museum, that she funded.