A bunch of officers overseeing main UK cultural establishments, together with the British Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the Nationwide Gallery, have signed a public letter defending using funding from company sponsors, a observe that has been extensively criticized by activist teams.
Printed within the Monetary Occasions, the transient letter requires an finish to what it describes as “relentless negativity” surrounding personal sector partnerships.
Authored by Alistair Spalding and Britannia Morton, co-chief executives of Sadler’s Wells Theatre, the letter is backed by ten organizations, together with the Science Museum Group. The letter comes one 12 months after protests over the sponsorship of literary festivals by Baillie Gifford, an funding agency criticized for ties to fossil fuels and Israel. In 2023, 9 festivals ended partnerships with the agency amid strain from the general public.
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The letter argues that enterprise partnerships assist cultural organizations broaden and compete for status. “Our museums, theatres, festivals and artists have to function inside the financial buildings wherein society operates,” it states.
Notably absent among the many signatories had been any representatives from the Tate museum community. Maria Balshaw, director of the Tate, just lately opposed British Petroleum’s £50 million sponsorship of the British Museum, saying that such a deal was out of step with public opinion.
In 2019, the Nationwide Portrait Gallery in London refused a £1 million grant from the Sackler Trust, turning into one of many first main museums to show down funding from the American Pharmaceutical household after activists uncovered their connection to the US’s opioid epidemic.
Philanthropic advisors are seeing the scrutiny change the habits of collectors and humanities patrons. “I do assume the protests are a deterrent,” Leslie Ramos, an arts funding adviser advised FT in March. “There’s concern about reputational injury.
