Boston, MA - Co-Producers Tony Fusco & Robert Four are happy to announce that the 10th Anniversary AD20/21 Lifetime Achievement Award will be presented to Jonathan Leo Fairbanks at the Gala Preview of the show on Thursday evening, April 6th. AD20/21, which includes the Boston Print Fair, is the only art and design fair of its kind in New England, featuring close to 50 modern to contemporary exhibitors.

The Gala Preview celebrates Boston Design Week, a 12-day design festival March 29-April 9 with 80+ events citywide. www.BostonDesignWeek.com. All proceeds from the 6:30 Gala will benefit Design Museum Boston. The 2017 Lifetime Achievement Award winner will be presented at 6:00pm at the Gala. Past Lifetime Achievement Award Recipients include: Vladimir Kagan, Dakota Jackson, Massimo and Leila Vignelli, Vicente Wolf, John P. Axelrod, Susan Park, Robert Campbell, and Virginia Bohlin. Gala Preview tickets are $250 (VIP Admission at 5:30pm), $100 (Gala at 6:30pm). More information at www.AD2021.com/gala

Art, design, and true creative vision are the cornerstones of Jonathan Leo Fairbanks’s multifaceted career as a curator, educator, museum administrator, artist, historian, and writer. Fairbanks (b. 1933) founded the department of American Decorative Arts and Sculpture at Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and served as its Curator for 30 years, 1970-1999. He received his training at the University of Utah (BFA, 1953), University of Pennsylvania and the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts (MFA, 1957), Winterthur Museum and the University of Delaware (MA, 1961). Employed at Winterthur over the next decade, he became the Associate Curator for Conservation responsible for building the conservation/research wing of that Museum.

While at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, he curated numerous groundbreaking exhibitions, bringing American decorative arts to international attention, including: Paul Revere’s Boston; Frontier America; Witness to America’s Past; New England Begins: The Seventeenth Century; The Art that is Life: The Arts and Crafts Movement in America; Glass Today, and others. He also inaugurated the innovative “Please Be Seated” program, launching contemporary studio furniture into the prominence of collections and gallery use.

The following decade included extensive curatorial, educational, editorial, and research positions, serving on White House and State Department Committees. In 2012 he was named to his current position as Director of Fuller Craft Museum, Brockton. Over the past five years, he has continued to play a leading role as an advocate for American crafts and decorative arts while leading Fuller Craft Museum, growing its staff, programming, collection, and national reputation.

AD20/21 and The Boston Print Fair take place April 6-9, 2017 at The Cyclorama at the Boston Center for the Arts in the South End. AD20/21 features modern to contemporary fine art, Mid-Century furnishings and contemporary studio furniture, jewelry, decorative arts, glass, and sculpture. The Boston Print Fair features fine print galleries, contemporary print publishers, photography, drawings and other works on paper. The weekend show takes place Friday, April 8 from 1-8pm, Saturday, April 9 from 11am-8pm, and Sunday April 10 from 11am-5pm. Weekend admission is $15, under 12 free, and includes a complimentary color show catalog and admission to all special programs at the fair. Valet and discount parking is available, and the show café is catered by Jules Catering. For details, including directions and hotel information visit www.AD2021.com or call 617-363-0405.