Justin Shubow
President of the National Civic Art Society
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Justin Shubow is President of the National Civic Art Society. Among his duties, he serves as the Executive Director of Rebuild Penn Station, a National Civic Art Society initiative to promote the reconstruction of the original Pennsylvania Station in New York City designed by McKim, Mead & White. He is also a Commissioner on the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, an independent federal agency comprising seven presidential appointees who are the aesthetic guardians of Washington, D.C. Mr. Shubow has testified in Congress on topics such as the future of the National Mall and the design of the Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial. He is the author of The Gehry Towers over Eisenhower: The National Civic Art Society Report on the Eisenhower Memorial, a critical examination of the memorial’s competition, design, and agency approval. He has published architectural criticism at Forbes online, First Things, Public Discourse, The Washington Post, and The Weekly Standard. Mr. Shubow is a former editor at Forward newspaper and Commentary magazine, and is a recipient of a Robert Novak Journalism Fellowship. He has delivered talks on architecture and other subjects at the U.S. Department of State, Baylor University, Colorado College, Hamilton College, and the Universities of Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, and others. Mr. Shubow received a B.A. from Columbia University, a J.D. from Yale Law School, and completed four years of study in the University of Michigan’s Ph.D. program in philosophy; he has taught philosophy courses as an instructor at the University of Michigan and Yale College. He is a member of the Board of Academic Advisors for the Alexander Hamilton Institute for the Study of Western Civilization.
Founded in 2002, the National Civic Art Society is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization headquartered in Washington, D.C. that educates and empowers civic leaders in the promotion of public art and architecture worthy of our great Republic. We do this by advancing the classical tradition in architecture, urbanism, and their allied arts. Through our programs and initiatives we guide government agencies and officials; assist practitioners; and educate students and the general public in the preservation and creation of beautiful, dignified public buildings, monuments, and spaces. We are mindful of Winston Churchill’s assertion: “We shape our buildings; thereafter they shape us.”
