Gregory Annenberg Weingarten

Gregory Annenberg Weingarten, a Vice President and Director of the Annenberg Foundation, has championed the special bond between the United States and France. From his Paris-based office, Gregory has established the Annenberg Foundation as a vital presence abroad, and is among the most generous American contributors to France.

Gregory's deep appreciation for the visual and performing arts, education, and global well-being, is reflected in his grantmaking. Among the signature projects of Gregory's philanthropy is a grant of $2.1 million to the Institut Curie. These funds will be used over five years to support the creation of a laboratory of translational research in pediatric oncology at one of the leading medical, biological and biophysical research centers in the world. The lab will work to better understand the origin of neuroblastoma, one of the most common forms of childhood cancer, in order to identify new drugs targeting the tumor cells.

Gregory is currently involved in a project with the Louvre Museum that aims to energize educational outreach to disadvantaged children with dynamic state of the art technology and tactile tools. He provided a grant to help create FRAME (French Regional American Museum Exchange), which sponsors an important exchange of art and ideas between French and American institutions. His $64,000 grant to the international consortium supported the "Adam" and "Eve" special exhibition exchange between the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art and Musées de la Ville de Strasbourg. 

He has worked with the Museum of Modern Art in New York to create a digital archive of their world-class collection of German expressionist prints. The archive is available for viewing here. His work with the museum has also led to the creation of MoMa's exhibition, "German Expressionism: The Graphic Impulse."

Gregory has also provided significant funding to the American Academy of Dance in Paris (L'Academie Americaine de Danse de Paris), which provides American-style dance instruction to students from around the world.

Another project that has been a part of Gregory's philanthropy is the Annenberg Fund for the American Friends of the Paris Opera and Ballet, created to foster exciting trans-Atlantic artistic productions. Through Gregory's ongoing support, the Paris Opera and Ballet was able to facilitate exchanges between with the New York City Ballet, and present productions such as American artist Bill Viola's highly acclaimed version of Tristan and Isolde, which opened in Paris and later triumphed in New York.

Through the Foundation, Gregory also supports dance organizations such as Les Etés de la Danse de Paris, a summer dance festival, which introduced the Alvin Ailey Dance Company and the San Francisco Ballet to the French public. 

In the humanitarian sector, he has funded programs with CARE France to provide drinking water to arid regions of Africa; with Medecins du Monde a program serving youth in Peru. Gregory established the Annenberg Fund for Endangered Cultural Heritage in the Developing World with the World Monuments Fund, to assist communities with their historic and cultural preservation.

Gregory has helped to showcase American artists at the Pompidou Center (Centre National d'art et de Culture Georges Pompidou) with the “Morphosis” show in 2006 and the recent exhibit of the late American sculptor Alexander Calder. He also sponsored the creation of a youth-oriented Internet site for the Centre in 2005.

In 2009, his grant of $725,000 to The Musées des Arts Décoratifs helped the museum acquire the "Deuxième Rhinocéros" by Francois-Xavier Lalanne. Other visual art grantees include the Museum of Decorative Arts in Paris, where Gregory established an Annenberg wing for youth education.

In the domain of education, he inaugurated the opening of the Annenberg Center for Arts and Sciences at the Ecole Active Bilingue Jeanine Manuel in Paris in 2007. The Center provides a hands-on approach to science for school children, using a method pioneered by French and American experts. Gregory has also provided scholarship support for journalism students from developing countries at the American University of Paris, and to American students studying at the Parson's School in Paris. He is an active supporter of the American Library in Paris with key endowment and building support. Gregory has also partnered with the Memorial of the Shoah in Paris to sponsor the Summer University, an international conference and workshop on the teaching of the Holocaust.

Gregory has also been a long time supporter of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology and the British Museum.

In the U.S., at Mr. Weingarten's direction the Foundation provided key support to renovating the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, and is involved in future opening of the “Peopling of America Center” on Ellis Island. In Portland, Oregon, his support was instrumental in funding a holocaust memorial, a long time project conceived from the community of survivors.

Gregory's effort to create a vibrant partnership between France and America earned him the title of “Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres” (Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters), awarded by French Minister of Culture Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres in 2007. His wife, Regina – a partner on all Paris-based projects, earned the prestigious “Legion of Honor” distinction in early 2009.

Gregory graduated from Stanford with a degree in Political Science. He later worked as a journalist at the Times of London, before embarking on a career as an artist. He currently shows his work primarily in the U.S. and France.