Jonathan Yorba

Jonathan Lorenzo Yorba is the Chief Executive Officer of The Mexican Museum in San Francisco, CA. His nationally recognized expertise in Mexican Art made him the ideal fit for this selective position by the Board of Trustees.


Previously Yorba served as the Arts & Cultural Affairs Director for the City of Riverside. He was responsible for promoting the City’s participation in arts and cultural affairs locally, regionally, statewide, nationally and internationally – with a dual emphasis on economic development and quality of life. Yorba worked with the Mayor, City Council, and City Management on a significant $1.68 billion dollar “Riverside Renaissance” program of public improvements that include the Fox Performing Arts Center, the Riverside Metropolitan Museum, the Riverside Municipal Auditorium, and the Libraries.

Yorba has more than 20 years of executive leadership experience in the arts and the humanities. He is Adjunct Professor of Museum Studies at John F. Kennedy University, has taught in the Getty Leadership Institute, and has authored several scholarly publications including Arte Latino: Treasures from the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Yorba travels internationally to research art and to develop cultural exchanges, and has a particular interest in the varied effects of an increasingly globalized world on contemporary museum, heritage, and exhibition practice.

Jonathan Yorba serves as Chair of the Ford Foundation Fellows Fund, which works to increase the number of under-represented people receiving their doctorates and helps to diversify the nation’s professoriate, and he is also a member of The Community Foundation Advisory Council. Dr. Yorba received the Award for Museum Leadership from the Smithsonian Institution.