The appointment follows that of Dr Stefano Carboni, formerly a curator of Islamic art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, as director of the Art Gallery of Western Australia in May 2009, our special correspondent points out, but obviously no plot is involved.
Neither appointment was made specifically for the applicants' knowledge of Islamic art, although this academic background may ensure that it is appropriately regarded in the extension of the collections for which they are responsible.
Had this been so and the direction which the annointed wanted to develop they would have been better off at the Art Gallery of South Australia which has probably the best holding of Islamic art in Australia.
The directorship of that museum was open until a year ago when it was filled by Nick Mitzevich, whose world has tended to be principally contemporary Australian art.
Mitzevich took the job after Dr Christopher Menz spit the dummy and refused to take a renewal of his contract at the Art Gallery of South Australia because it refused to boost gallery funds by $1 million extra for gallery maintenance..
The AGNSW appears to have bitten the bullet and offered a much increased salary package for its top job, confirmed at $450,000.
The Aga Khan Foundation meanwhile tends to rely internationally on volunteer labour.
The increase is believed to flow from Dr Tony Elwood's signed renewal of his directorship at the Queensland Art Gallery for a second term, taking him theoretically off the market at a much enhanced rate..
Dr Brand and Dr Elwood have been betters' favourites on everyone's list to fill either the directorship vacancy in NSW or in Melbourne where Dr Gerard Vaughan recently retired as director of the National Gallery of Victoria..
Dr Brand was associated with the development of an Aga Khan Museum in Toronto which came about because the Aga Khan was fond of Canada.
He was impressed by Canada's hospitality to refugees when Idi Amin expelled many of their faith in the 1960s.
The new museum in Toronto is scheduled to open next year. Dr Brand, however, is only a consultant director to the museum which signals a limited or less secure occupational life span.
Dr Brand, who has an American wife, has had an exceptional career at art museums in North America.
Dr Carbone's background was Visiting Professor of Islamic Art at the Bard Graduate Center for the Decorative Arts and curator of Islamic Art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, both in New York.
He has an Australian wife who clearly supported his job application.
Dr Carbone is an authority on Islamic glass and an expert in the ornate styles of Islamic calligraphy. He speaks and reads Arabic, one of seven languages in which he can converse.
He has written books and articles on the fertile art trade between Venice and the Islamic world, from Persian and Ottoman miniatures and ceramics to calligraphy, textiles and woven carpets.
Dr Brand's connection to the Islamic world lies in his early studied in the field of art in the Indian sub-continent.
He has a superlative record although in 2010, after serving four or five contracted years as the director of the J. Paul Getty Museum, Brand stepped down from his role over differences of opinion over the museum’s strategic vision with James N. Wood, president and chief executive of the J. Paul Getty Trust.
But he is said to have dealt brilliantly with the problems created by the Getty's acquisition of antiquities which did not have the appropriate export licences.
The glamour of being associated with the opening of a magnificent new building appears not to have been enough to keep him in frequently icy Toronto.
The architect of the 10,000 metre structure is Fumihiki Maki who is responsible for many imaginatively conceived arts and corporate structures around the world.
These include the Center for the Arts, Yerba Buena Center, at San Franciso, California and the newly completed fourth tower of the World Trade Complex in New York.
But the promise of an impressive new building, however, is not necessarily enough to keep a good man at a job.
This was shown recently when the librarian at the University of Technology Dr Alex Byrne, left to become the NSW State Librarian and Chief Librarian at the State Library of NSW despite the creation of a new building by one of the world's most famous architects, Frank Gehry.
The Aga Khan museum, due to open in 2013, will be dedicated to the acquisition, preservation and display of artefacts - from various periods and geographies - relating to the intellectual, cultural, artistic and religious heritage of Islamic communities.
It contains over one thousand artefacts and artworks and spans over one thousand years of history.
He is reported to have been disappointed at recent offerings of Islamic art on world markets but adding to the collection has not been a priority.
Dr Brand also leaves behind a huge constituency. The museum ministers directly to a quarter of the world's population (Muslims) and it ministers indirectly to the rest.
The 73 year old Aga Khan bears the hereditary title of the Imam of the largest branch of the Ismlamist follower of the Shia faith.
They affirm the Imamat of the descendants of Ismail ibn Jafar, eldest son of Imam Ja'far al-Sadiq, while the larger Twelver branch of Shi`ism follows Ismail's younger brother Musa al-Kazim and his descendants.
Dr Brand will be the ninth director of the AGNSW in its 120-year history and will assume his new role mid-year after finalising his consultancy with the AKM.
His earlier appointments included serving as director of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond, where he was the driving force behind a $125 million capital campaign to fund the largest expansion in the Museum’s history This is his wife's native state..
From 1996 to 2000, Dr Brand was Assistant Director, Curatorial and Collection Development, at the Queensland Art Gallery in Brisbane, where he led the development of the Gallery’s world-renowned collection of Asia-Pacific art.
From 1988 to 1996 he was curator of Asian art at the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra and was co-director of the Smithsonian Institution Mughal Garden Project in Lahore, Pakistan from 1988 to 1993.
Dr Brand was born in Australia and earned his BA (Honours) from the Australian National University and his MA and PhD in art history from Harvard University.
Will he find it harder working with a group of trustees headed by Steven Lowy, president of the trustees of the AGNSW than for the Aga Khan?
The Khan has featured lately in rumbles involving his divorce pay-out to his wife and the development of a harbour for his yacht in the Bahamas which wealthy neighbours said was not ecologically sound.
Dr Brand does not have the flamboyance of Dr Capon but is more the quiet achiever who obviously has been able to pull levers with the business as well as the acadamic community.
His appointment to the Foundation was low key and its PR less pronounced than that which Dr Capon aspired for.
