Via Hyperallergic:
“One after the other, major museums across the country have announced layoffs and furloughs of staffers and freelancers, citing losses from COVID-19 closures. Now, these institutions are facing public pressure from thousands of artists, scholars, and museum workers who argue in two new petitions that letting go of lower-level staff should not be the automatic response to the crisis.
A group named NYC Art Workers circulated a petition last week urging museums to “do everything in [their] power to retain all staff members during the COVID-19 crisis” while sharply criticizing the income disparities between top management and ordinary workers in these institutions. It has garnered more than 1,600 signatures to date.
The anonymous group is a coalition of workers who have been employed by the Dia Art Foundation, Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New Museum, Smithsonian Museum, and Studio Museum in Harlem. In an email to Hyperallergic, the workers explained that they have chosen to remain unnamed out of fear of retaliation.
“We have a simple demand: before a single museum worker is laid off, let every mid-six- or seven-figure museum director draw a salary of zero,” the petition starts. “Let our wealthy trustees, who so expertly raise money for council field trips and directors’ first class-flights, fundraise instead for staff retention. Let the conversation around deaccessioning artwork and dipping into endowments start if it means saving jobs.””