Curators

Osnat Misch-Brandl

She is Curator of Chalcolithic and Canaanite Periods, Israel Museum, Jerusalem, where she has worked since 1979.  During her tenure, her many exhibitions and accompanying catalogues—both on her own and with her predecessor, Miriam Tadmor—include:  3500-Year-Old Jewelry (1980); The Oldest Gold in the World (1994); and A 6,000-Year-Old Nobleman: Finds from the Cave of the Warrior (2003). She is also responsible for the renewal of the Chalcolithic and Bronze Age Galleries of the Samuel and Saidye Bronfman Archaeology Wing at the Israel Museum between 2008 and 2010.  Ms. Misch-Brandl holds a Master's degree in Biblical and Classical Archaeology from The Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Michael Sebbane

Director of the National Treasures Storerooms, Israel Antiquities Authority, he is an expert on the Southern Levant in the Chalcolithic period and Early Bronze Age. He is especially interested in tracking technological innovations, ceremonial developments, and evidence for cultural interconnections in this period, particularly through studying the typological development and distribution patterns of mace heads. Dr. Sebbane has also published on copper metallurgy and urbanization in this period. He received his Ph.D. from the Nadler Institute of Archaeology, Tel Aviv University.

Daniel M. Master

He is a Professor of Archaeology, Wheaton College, is Co-Director of the Leon Levy Expedition to Ashkelon, Israel, and Research Associate of the Harvard Semitic Museum.  Professor Master is also general editor of the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Archaeology, and a series editor of the Ashkelon Final Report Series published by the Harvard Semitic Museum.  He has co-published two final reports on Ashkelon and one on the site of Tell Dothan in the West Bank.  His most recent volume, Ashkelon 3, The Seventh Century BC, won the 2012 Levi-Sala Book Prize.

Jennifer Y. Chi

Jennifer Y. Chi, who joined ISAW in 2007, established and leads the Institute’s exhibition program. Dr. Chi was curator of ISAW’s inaugural exhibition, Wine, Worship, and Sacrifice: The Golden Graves of Ancient Vani (2008); co-curator of The Lost World of Old Europe: The Danube Valley 5000–3500 BC (2009); and co-editor of the accompanying catalogues for both. A specialist in Roman imperial sculpture, she was a fellow of The Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1999–2000. She also organized nationally touring exhibitions in her previous position as curator of the White-Levy Collection. An area of special interest is ancient costume and its social and political implications as represented in art. She has recently completed chapters on Greek, Roman, and Etruscan costume for the Encyclopedia of World Costume (2008), co-authored with Larissa Bonfante. Dr. Chi is currently organizing future exhibitions for ISAW, including one devoted to archaeology and aesthetics. She is also a member of the sculpture publication team at the renowned classical site of Aphrodisias, in Turkey. Jennifer Chi holds a Master of Studies from the University of Oxford and a Ph.D. from the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University.