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`I KNOW EXACTLY what I am walking into," said Steven Klindt, who begins his new job as director of the Queens Museum on Monday. He should. As director of several museums in the Midwest - most recently the Tweed Museum in Duluth, Minn. - Klindt has wrestled with some of the same challenges that face Queens' premiere museum as it strains from adolesence toward adulthood: drawing new visitors and members, attracting news organizations that swim after only the biggest fish, and overseeing a major expansion that museum officials hope will increase not only the museum's size, but its public profile as well.
The museum, which presents an eclectic mix of fine arts and exhibits of New York's history and culture, is planning a $14-million expansion, starting in March, that will double the building's exhibition space and restore its 1939 neo-classical facade.
Two days after after accepting the museum post in September, Klindt, 41, a native Iowan, appeared relaxed and eager to acquaint himself with his new surroundings during the opening of the museum's current exhibit on the art and history of the 1939 and 1964 World Fairs. Klindt, who has a special interest in photography and a master of arts degree, will mostly leave the curating to the museum's staff. Such expansions, he said, are his specialty.
"One of my favorite things...