NEW YORK.- Decorative arts curator Clare Le Corbeiller, 71, died. According to her husband Jean Le Corbellier, she fought cancer for five years. Clare Le Corbeiller was Curator Emerita of the Department of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She specialized in Continental porcelain, jewelry and metalwork and Chinese export porcelain.

She was born in 1931 in Cambridge, England. Her parents were American. At the time of her birth, her father was studying history in Cambridge. Her mother worked at the Museum of Modern Art as editor at Lincoln Kirstein’s magazine Dance Index. In 1952 Clare Le Corbeiller began working at the Met a summer volunteer. She only left the Met when her two daughters were born. In 1953 she began working at the central cataloguing department of the museum. When this department was eliminated in 1959, she went to the European Sculpture and Decorative Arts department. In 1968 she was given the post of assistant curator. She was a curator in 1991. In 2000 she retired and was named curator emerita. She was honored by the annual issue of the Met’s Journal which had a record contribution of 28 essays by her colleagues.