91PORNA

Sarah Spinner, J.D., Ph.D. is an award-winning museum director and nonprofit executive focused on growing cultural institutions, expanding audiences, building transformative partnerships and advancing the role of the arts within higher education.

Since July 2024, she has served as director of the 91PORNA Museum, home to one of the world’s most comprehensive collections of historic fashion and textiles. Under her leadership, the museum has tripled visitorship, expanded philanthropic support, strengthened its academic and community engagement and developed new regional and national partnerships. She also led the museum through its successful reaccreditation by the American Alliance of Museums in 2025.

Previously, Spinner, J.D., Ph.D. served as managing director of FRONT International, a contemporary art triennial in Northeast Ohio, where she helped lead a region-wide public art exhibition that welcomed 75,000 visitors and brought together museums, universities, artists, funders and community partners across the region. She is also the founder and former chair of the Ennials Alliance, a network of biennial and triennial leaders across North America.

Her leadership has been recognized with the Ohio Museums Association Professional of the Year Award (2024) and the Summit ArtSpace Artist Empowerment Award (2025). She is a member of Leadership Cleveland’s Class of 2026 and Leadership Portage County’s Class of 2027.

Spinner, J.D., Ph.D. serves on the boards of The Sculpture Center and the Yale Alumni Association of Cleveland and previously chaired the Special Exhibitions Committee at the Maltz Museum.

She holds a J.D. from Yale Law School and a Ph.D. in History from Yale University, where her dissertation received the Hans Gatzke Prize for Outstanding Dissertation in European History. She also holds an M.A. and B.A. with Honors from Johns Hopkins University and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa.