2026 Portfolio Reviewers
Guusje Sanders, Curator, Mingei International Museum
Guusje Sanders, originally from the Netherlands and residing in the United States since 2006, joined Mingei International Museum's curatorial team as Curator in August 2023. Most recently she curated Boundless: Reflections of Southern California Landscapes in Midcentury Studio Ceramics and Restitched: Feed Sacks in Mid-Twentieth Century Quilts and co-curated Blue Gold: The Art and Science of Indigo, presented as part of Getty's PST ART: Art and Science Collide. Prior to this position, she served as the Associate Curator at the Institute of Contemporary Art, San Diego, formerly Lux Art Institute for 6 years. Approaching her curatorial practice as a platform for diverse voices, she places a strong emphasis on accessibility and curatorial and institutional accountability. Sanders holds a Master's in Exhibition and Museum Studies from the San Francisco Art Institute and a Bachelor's in Art History from the University of Wisconsin - Madison.
Follow Guusje on Instagram @guusje_sanders
Alex DeCosta, Director, Hyde Art Gallery
Co-Founder & President, Front Row Center
Alex DeCosta is an artist, arts administrator, curator, and art installation specialist with a passion for arts education and directing community accessible art programming through regional exhibitions, artist workshops and lectures, and collaborative initiatives across multiple institutions.
After graduating from NYC’s School of Visual Arts, Alex DeCosta became an assistant for several artists’ studios around the city. Over the next several years, Alex gained extensive experience handling artwork and curating exhibitions for various institutions including Gallery HO and Art MORA Gallery in Chelsea, the Armory and SCOPE Art Fairs, and the Jamaica Center for Arts & Learning in Queens. In 2012, Alex joined the New York Foundation for the Arts as an assistant for their fiscal sponsorship program and shortly after, became a full-time art handler for Sotheby’s Auction House. Since relocating to San Diego, Alex has continued advancing his career in art curation at Madison Gallery and Laguna Art Museum, before accepting the gallery directorial position for the Hyde Art Gallery at Grossmont College in April 2016.
The Hyde Art Gallery services the entire Grossmont College and San Diego County community as a supplemental educational resource with exhibitions featuring local and international artists, in conjunction with lectures and studio workshops. The gallery’s exhibition schedule features rotating media to equitably represent the various studio art disciplines taught at Grossmont - ceramics, digital arts, drawing, jewelry design, painting, photography, and sculpture. Due to this consistent demand for different extra-curricular content, the gallery is always looking for new and engaging artists, artist groups, and independent curators. Its primary aim is to not only influence and refine our students’ respective art practices but also expand their understanding of the endless variety of mediums, techniques, and concepts at their disposal to achieve their educational goals.
In 2023, Alex and his husband founded Front Row Center, a non-profit 501©3 performing arts company focused on providing equitable and accessible youth theatrical opportunities, through exceptional educational programming, theatrical productions, and workshops. Their goal was to make these Theatre Arts experiences attainable to all young performers.
Follow the Hyde Art Gallery on instagram @hydeartgallery and Alex @alexdecosta
Daniel Dennert, Curator & Arts Program Manager, San Diego International Airport
Daniel Dennert is an Oceanside-born, San Diego native. He is an arts leader with over a decade of experience in programming and management within theater, museum, and educational organizations. Daniel is passionate about assisting and promoting artists in developing new work, playing an instrumental role in bringing projects to life across disciplines—from visual and installation art to dance and theatre. He works diligently to foster processes that prioritize access and equity, with a particular focus on community engagement. Daniel has held various industry service roles and regularly serves on selection and funding panels for organizations such as the California Arts Council and Arts District Liberty Station. A lover of aviation, Daniel currently oversees the temporary exhibition and performing arts programs at the Airport Authority, where he aims to elevate the exceptional creators of the San Diego region to a global audience.
Follow Daniel on Instagram @danieldennert
Donna Cosentino, Director, The Photographer’s Eye Gallery
In a life dedicated to photography since 1971, Donna has been a student, lab tech, photojournalist, museum docent, curator, educator, lecturer, and leader in the photographic community. After thirty years of teaching photography at the college level, Donna retired as the photography department head at Palomar College in 2018. That same year she opened The Photographer’s Eye in Escondido, California, a non-profit gallery whose mission is to bring awareness to the power of the photographic image, teach darkroom and alternative process techniques, and give rising photographic artists exposure.
As a gallerist and curator with a deep love of the photographic image, she has a broad interest in multiple styles of photography and is interested in representational/documentary photography as well as conceptual photography. A practicing photographer whose work has been shown in museums and galleries, her deep connection to the natural world is expressed through her black and white darkroom work and use of historic/alternative processes.
Follow Donna on Instagram @donnadcosentino
Amy Crum, Associate Curator, The Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego
Amy Crum is an Associate Curator at MCASD. As a scholar and curator Amy Crum specializes in contemporary art of the Americas. Prior to joining MCASD, Crum served as the Postdoctoral Curatorial Research Fellow in Latinx Art at the Museum of Fine Arts Houston where she helped organize the exhibition, Frida Kahlo: The Making of an Icon, which opened in January 2026. She has held positions at several American museums where she worked on exhibitions like Picasso and Rivera: Conversations Across Time (2017) at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and Ear to the Ground: Earth and Element in Contemporary Art (2019) at the New Orleans Museum of Art. Additionally, Crum has curated a number of independent gallery exhibitions as an alumna of the Mellon Foundation/Center for Curatorial Leadership and the Independent Curators International Curatorial Intensive.
As an academic Crum has participated in the Tyson Scholars program hosted by the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art and served as the Predoctoral Fellow in Latinx Art at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Her doctoral dissertation examined several experimental mural exhibitions in Los Angeles and Mexico by Chicanx artists beginning in the 1970s in dialogue with the emergence of practices like installation art, institutional critique, and social practice art. Her research has been supported by the Institute for Studies on Latin American Art, the Fowler Museum, and the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center. Prior to earning her PhD in Art History from the University of California Los Angeles (Summer 2026) she earned her MA from Tulane University (2019).
Follow Amy on Instagram @crummy_disposition