Profile·Los Angeles
Art Recovery LA appoints preservation advocate Jennifer Jameson Merchant as program manager
Art Recovery LA (ARLA), the conservator-led collective helping Los Angeles communities recover cultural collections damaged in the 2025 wildfires, has hired Jennifer Jameson Merchant as its program manager. A preservation advocate, public folklorist and nonprofit arts administrator, Merchant brings more than 15 years of community-based cultural work in Los Angeles and beyond to the role.

Art Recovery LA (ARLA), a collective of Southern California art conservators that formed to help families and institutions in Altadena and the Pacific Palisades rescue and conserve cultural collections and heirlooms after the 2025 Los Angeles wildfires, has named Jennifer Jameson Merchant as its program manager, announced 9 September 2026 by the Balboa Art Conservation Center. The collective recently received a $250,000 Getty Foundation grant to continue its emergency-response conservation work. Merchant is a preservation advocate, public folklorist and nonprofit arts administrator with over 15 years of experience in community-based cultural work in Los Angeles and beyond, spanning program design and management, grants administration, public programming, communications strategy, technical assistance and capacity building for artists and cultural heritage organisations.
