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Sheldon M. Bonovitz

Board Member

Sheldon is Chairman Emeritus of Duane Morris, LLP, having stepped down as Chairman in January 2008 to resume full-time practice.

During his tenure as Chairman, Sheldon led the firm from a regional to a national and international platform increasing revenue from $75 million to $375 million with partner profits increasing more than three-fold.

Sheldon and his wife, Jill, have made a commitment to give more than two hundred works from their collection of art created by self-taught American artists to the Philadelphia Museum of Art.  The exhibition, “Great and Mighty Things”: Outsider Art from the Jill and Sheldon Bonovitz Collection, was at the Philadelphia Museum of Art from March 3, 2013 through June 9, 2013.

Sheldon and Jill made a gift of a collection of Indian textiles, called Kanthas, to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, exhibited at the Museum in 2009.  The catalog won the Barr Award, the highest annual award for a publication of any type from a museum world-wide.  They also very recently made a commitment to give another collection of Indian textiles to the Philadelphia Museum of Art called Phulkaris, which will be exhibited at the Museum in 2017.

Sheldon is a Trustee of the following not-for-profit institutions:  The Philadelphia Museum of Art; The Barnes Foundation; and the Free Library of Philadelphia.  He is also a trustee of two Foundations that provide grants to cultural and educational institutions in the Philadelphia region:  The Christian and Mary Lindback Foundation and the Dolfinger-McMahon Foundation.   He is trustee emeritus of The Curtis Institute of Music and the Philadelphia Orchestra.

Sheldon formerly was the Chairman of The Fund for the School District of Philadelphia and is Chairman and a Founder of the Foundation of Self-Taught Artists.  The latter Foundation made a film “James Castle: Portrait of an Artist” which was shown in several film festivals.

Sheldon serves on the public company Board of Directors of Comcast Corporation.  He also serves on the Advisory Board of several privately-held companies and a leveraged buy-out fund.

Sheldon has written numerous articles on corporate tax, has lectured at various tax institutes throughout the country and has taught advanced courses in taxation at the University of Pennsylvania Law School and at the Graduate Tax Program of Temple University School of Law.  Sheldon most recently was an adjunct professor at Columbia Law School teaching a course on “The Large Law Firm – Organization, Operation, Strategies and Issues,” covering the subject in a current, realistic, large law firm setting.  He previously taught this course at Harvard Law School.

A former Attorney-Advisor to the Honorable Arnold Raum of the United States Tax Court, Sheldon is a graduate of Harvard Law School and the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Finance and Commerce.