School of Visual Arts Chair David A. Ross Resigns Over Ties to Epstein
35Feb. 5, 2026
David A. Rosshas stepped down as chair of the master’s degree program in art practice at theSchool of Visual Artsin New York following the revelation of his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. The resignation comes afterArtnewspublished his correspondence with the convicted pedophile, who committed suicide in a Manhattan prison in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges. The roughly sixty letters between the men are part of the trove released by the Department of Justice last month.
Before assuming his role at SVA in 2009, Ross served as the director of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; and the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston. In a letter sent to theNew York Times, Ross said that he had been introduced to Epstein in the 1990s, and that he had cultivated the relationship because ”it was part of my job to befriend people who had the capacity and interest in supporting” the Whitney, where he worked at the time.
Ross wrote Epstein in 2008 after the financier was jailed on charges of soliciting adults and minors for prostitution, corresponding with him for the next few years before reaching out again in 2015, when he learned Epstein was being investigated on the same charges. In one 2009 email, responding to Epstein’s idea for an exhibition titled “Statutory” that would feature underage models made to look older than they were, Ross wrote, “You are incredible!” Ross then asked Epstein if he was aware of the “total porno commercial kiddie picture” of a naked ten-year-old Brooke Shields that Richard Prince appropriated for his 1983 work Spiritual America.
In his statement to the Times, Ross said that he had believed Epstein when the financier told him the sex crime charges were leveled at him as a form of political retribution for his support of former president Bill Clinton and that he was “mortified” and “ashamed” when he learned the truth of Epstein’s depravity.
“I continue to be appalled by his crimes and remain deeply concerned for its many victims,” wrote Ross. SVA told the Times that it had accepted his resignation “immediately.”