National Gallery of Art ends diversity programmes after Trump executive order
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(Credits: Far Out / Clem Onojeghuo)
The National Gallery of Art has ended its diversity, equity and inclusion programmes after executive orders from Donald Trump, with the initiatives ending on Monday.
A spokesperson for the museum stated, “The National Gallery of Art has closed its office of belonging and inclusion and removed related language from our website”. The order was signed shortly after his inauguration on Monday, with the administration describing the DEI initiatives as “illegal and immoral”.
After Trump’s last term in office, the NGA then spent $820,000 on rebranding these initiatives. The museum created a new logo and released a new vision mission statement in 2021, with a “focus on diversity, equity, access and inclusion throughout our work to diversify the stories we tell, the ways in which we tell them, and our staff.”
This scheme highlighted a lack of diversity among the upper management curatorial staff at NGA, which had consisted of nearly all white people until that point. This change in their approach led to new hires, including the NGA’s first curator of African American art and a chief curator and diversified exhibitions showcasing the work of more women and people of colour.
In light of the recent executive orders, the NGA have changed the wording of their mission statement, which used to include the phrase “diversity, equity, access and inclusion”, but now says, “welcoming and accessible.”
Before the presidential election, the museum’s chief diversity, inclusion and belonging officer resigned and the post was never rehired. The NGA was created in 1937 by Congress and receives nearly 80% of its funding from the federal government. During the inauguration ceremony, Vice President J.D. Vance and his wife Usha attended a dinner at the museum with their cabinet nominees.
Arts organisations and museums such as the NGA are now searching for an appropriate way to respond to this order, with institutions such as The Smithsonian Institute declining to comment on how their diversity and inclusion schemes will be impacted.
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