Letter to the Board

To William L. Mack, Chair of the Board, Wendy Fisher, President, and members of the Board of Trustees of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, New York:

We, the signatories, representing current and former staff members of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, urge you to work with us to dismantle the systemic racism in our institution. We dissent from the public statements made by Richard Armstrong on June 7, and June 9, 2020, which have exacerbated the problem that we seek to rectify. The museum cannot call for “forgiveness” for its “missteps” without publicly and explicitly addressing its wrongdoings and making amends. Black Lives Matter. Armstrong’s failure to mention and honor that fact in these statements was an inexcusable omission. Senior leadership has repeatedly failed to demonstrate a sincere commitment to addressing an internal white dominant culture that has long created hostility for Black staff members and staff members of color. For years, staff have been met with platitudes about how change takes time. The future of museums is precarious and requires leadership that is fully dedicated to creating an equitable work environment and contending with and rectifying an exhibition history and collecting practice that has ignored the contributions of Black and Brown artists. The most visible egregious act of anti-Black violence in the museum’s recent history was the disrespectful and publicly hostile treatment of Chaédria LaBouvier, the first Black curator to mount an exhibition at the Guggenheim in its 80-year history. We are able to write this letter now due to her publicly sounding the alarm on a culture of institutional racism, sexism, classism, homophobia, and retaliatory white supremacy, a burden and risk that should never have been hers to bear, and one she carried alone.

LaBouvier’s landmark 2019 exhibition, Basquiat’s Defacement: The Untold Story, was critically acclaimed and immensely popular, attracting a diverse visitorship the Guggenheim seldom sees. Her curation and foundational scholarship has permanently influenced the way the museum and art world at large engage with themes of art and protest and political iconography, as well as the study of art of 1980s New York City. Yet, its success, scope, and impact have never been fully acknowledged or celebrated by the museum. Instead, LaBouvier encountered institutional racism in a multitude of forms leading up to, during, and following the exhibition’s run, ranging from exclusion from key aspects of exhibition planning to the spread of derogatory rumors among the staff by leadership. We apologize for our silence while this occurred, through which we became complicit in the harm inflicted on her by the institution. We were immobilized by paralyzing fear due to the culture of intimidation. We are now pursuing the betterment of this institution owing to LaBouvier’s courage and resistance from the beginning of her term until the present moment, and that is a debt that cannot be repaid and should not be erased.

LaBouvier’s experience was singular in its extremity and cruelty, but not isolated; it is one of countless examples of an aggressively pervasive problem. The Guggenheim’s Diversity, Equity, Accessibility, and Inclusion initiative has proven inadequate in addressing the deep-seated inequities and mistreatment experienced by many staff members, and perpetrated at all levels, from frontline staff to the executive cabinet. The failure to create a diverse and equitable workplace has resulted in a museum culture that refuses to take accountability for the violence and injustice inflicted upon its BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) constituents.

We stand in solidarity with the statement authored by our colleagues in the Curatorial department dated June 22, 2020 and support their call for equitable hiring practices, a significant financial commitment to diversifying the museum’s collection, exhibitions, and educational programming, and an independent investigation into the allegations surrounding Basquiat’s Defacement: The Untold Story. We must also acknowledge that they issued a letter that did not represent the needs of staff throughout the museum, including our collective agreement to acknowledge LaBouvier’s experience and that this moment would not be possible without the monumental risks and labor she undertook. This demonstrates a hierarchical conflict and institutional erasure that cannot exist in an equitable workplace. Likewise, we recognize that these efforts have occurred to a great extent without the presence of furloughed staff, who constitute the majority of the museum’s BIPOC employees, also emblematic of this institutional erasure and violence. We strive to move forward united in our effort, as described in the Curatorial department’s statement, “to formulate long-term goals to address systemic racism and other forms of discrimination and abuse.” To this end, we also stand firmly with our unionized colleagues in their ongoing fight for a fair contract, which is inextricable from any discussion about workplace equity and should have been affirmed and supported long before now.

The Guggenheim cannot claim to be a leading arts institution without first atoning for its wrongdoings and committing to concrete action and change. We therefore call for the museum to undertake the following actions:

WITHIN THE NEXT MONTH:

• Immediately commission an independent investigation and publicly report on the development, data, implementation, and aftermath of the Basquiat project.
• Commission an additional independent review, the results of which will be published on the museum’s website, of the “missteps made in our own eighty-year history” referred to by Richard Armstrong in his public letter dated June 9, 2020.
• Engage, listen to, and compensate any BIPOC consultants, scholars, staff, and students who offer guidance to undertake anti-racist work.
• Formulate and publish a plan to recruit BIPOC board members.
• Commit to providing annual reports to staff that show demonstrable changes to hiring and collecting practices.
• Meet with a staff council representing voices from across departments and permit at least one elected member to attend executive cabinet and board meetings.
• Enact a policy of zero tolerance for racist comments and actions.
• Terminate any and all contracts and agreements with the NYPD.

WITHIN THE NEXT SIX MONTHS:

• Take accountability for the results of the independent investigation of the Basquiat project and commit to restorative justice on terms set by LaBouvier.
• Replace those members of the executive cabinet who have repeatedly proven that they are not committed to decisive, anti-racist action and do not act in good faith with BIPOC leaders.
• Meet with signatories of this letter to discuss sustainable, long-term action that prioritizes equity, access, and inclusion as much as it does diversity.
• Overhaul the whistleblower system to ensure that BIPOC staff can safely and anonymously report discrimination without retaliation; conduct a comprehensive review of past complaints and censure repeat offenders.
• Hire BIPOC candidates with diverse perspectives for positions in all departments, particularly Communications, Curatorial, Development, Education, and Legal, and prioritize Director-level positions.
• Mandate anti-racist education and training for all levels of employees.
• Create a permanent, full-time, Director-level position dedicated to advocating for racial equity within the institution.
• Establish a transparent institution-wide process for exhibition development.
• Implement annual performance reviews of leadership by staff to ensure manager accountability and oversight, and to eliminate abuse of power; carry out the first round of these reviews upon implementation of this policy.
• Rectify pay inequity in the museum, implement salary transparency practices, and create clear and consistent paths for advancement; immediately establish pay bands, bringing employees at the same level within the same pay range.

IN PERPETUITY:

• Enact a new mission statement that commits to interrogating and correcting the museum’s history, with an acknowledgment of colleagues who were targeted and/or removed for challenging the status quo.
• Work with staff to uproot violent, exclusionary structures within the museum.
• Pledge to uphold a culture that values transparency and collaboration, and uplifts BIPOC voices.
• Acknowledge LaBouvier’s role as the museum’s first Black curator, as well as her position in the museum’s overall history, without equivocation or obfuscation.

Given the museum’s culture of fear and record of retaliation, we understand the risk we take in signing this letter. We also understand that many of our colleagues are not in a position to take that risk. We stand with those who have been silenced and erased: colleagues who were maligned to their peers, colleagues whose Human Resources claims were discounted, colleagues who were targeted in recent furloughs for speaking out, and colleagues who were pushed out of the institution for critiquing leadership on these very issues.

We have all heard and shared distressing stories of racism at the museum that we refuse to ignore. Reform alone is not enough. The museum must, first and foremost, name, take accountability for, and dismantle its anti-Blackness and racist practices. We speak out now to expose a culture of harm and begin our work to build a better Guggenheim. Finally, we are acutely aware of empty promises that have been made before to address the institution’s white dominant culture. There is a growing urgency for change and a need to heal deep mistrust that must be met by senior leadership now. We urge you to join us in this work.

Signed,

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