The Guggenheim Museum in New York will lay off 20 staff, round 7% of its workers, the establishment introduced right this moment, February 28, citing post-pandemic monetary constraints. The workers cuts are set to enter impact instantly and can impression all departments apart from senior management and curators, the New York Instances reported. It’s the third spherical of layoffs on the museum in 5 years.
“The prolonged post-pandemic interval has offered plenty of challenges felt throughout our subject, in the USA and overseas, together with rising prices, variable attendance ranges, and adjustments in worldwide tourism,” a spokesperson for the Guggenheim instructed Hyperallergic in a press release.
Lately, the museum has raised ticket costs, lowered working bills, and applied hiring freezes; nonetheless, the spokesperson continued, “our present monetary image requires us to make the troublesome resolution to scale back staffing and reorganize some groups to place the museum nicely for the long run.”
The layoffs affected 14 union employees in Native 2110 United Auto Employees, the chapter’s president Olga Brudastova instructed Hyperallergic. She added that they have been terminated from their positions “with out discover” and “denied any union illustration” on the conferences concerning the layoffs.
“The Union has already filed a grievance over this and has demanded data and bargaining with the Museum over the layoffs,” Brudastova mentioned.
A Guggenheim spokesperson mentioned that the layoffs didn’t impression employees within the museum’s different bargaining unit, Worldwide Union of Working Engineers Native 30.
Two earlier rounds of layoffs on the Guggenheim museum within the final 5 years affected greater than two dozen employees, together with two deputy administrators. Amid the reductions, the museum’s earlier director Richard Armstrong, who stepped down from the function in 2023, took dwelling complete compensation packages that reached over $1 million, based on the museum’s tax filings.
The workers cuts on the Guggenheim comply with latest mass layoffs on the Brooklyn Museum impacting 47 full- and part-time staff. On Tuesday, February 25, Brooklyn Museum employees and supporters protested the cuts with a rally outdoors the establishment’s profit dinner. This morning, Metropolis Council’s Committee on Civil Service and Labor held an oversight listening to to evaluate the layoffs throughout which union representatives and metropolis officers urged the museum to “exhaust all choices” to avert workers reductions.
