Jennifer Jae Gutierrez is Executive Director of the Image Permanence Institute (IPI) at Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT). IPI is an academic research laboratory, within the College of Art and Design, focused on research that informs the preservation of cultural heritage collections. Areas of expertise include the preservation of photographic materials and sustainable practices in preservation environmental management.

Prior to her appointment at RIT, Jae was the Arthur J. Bell Senior Photograph Conservator at the Center for Creative Photography (CCP), University of Arizona, Tucson where she established the institution’s conservation department. Before that, she held a faculty appointment in the Art Conservation Department at the University of Delaware (UD) where she taught undergraduate- and graduate-level courses in preventive conservation, conservation ethics, and the conservation of photographic materials. She also served as Associate Director of the Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation from 2010-2012.

Jae is a professional associate of the American Institute for Conservation (AIC) and has a Master of Science in Art Conservation from the University of Delaware specializing in photograph conservation. Recently published essays include The Preservation of Platinum and Palladium Prints: Storage and Display (American Institute for Conservation, 2017), Preventing Destruction: Preserving Our Irreplaceable Photographic Heritage (Smithsonian, 2017), and Pinups, Photograms, Polaroids and Printing Plates: Iterations in Robert Heinecken’s Work Process (Museum of Modern Art, 2014). With Debra Hess Norris she edited Issues in the Conservation of Photographs published by the Getty Conservation Institute in 2010.