Considered one of the finest small museums in America, the New Museum is routinely acclaimed for its exhibitions of contemporary art under the stewardship of its longtime director, Lisa Phillips.
At the helm for 21 years, Ms. Phillips has earned the admiration of her peers by growing the institution from a scrappy operation into an influential cultural force with increased attendance, exhibition space, staff, budget and visibility.
But there is another side to the New Museum described by former and current staff members who complain of unhealthy work conditions, low pay, low morale and incidents in which they say they were asked by museum leaders to act unethically.
A former finance director says Ms. Phillips told her to mislead the museum’s board about a cash shortfall. Art handlers say they were forced to work overnight at times to meet onerous deadlines. A former exhibitions director says that when the museum could not locate a work of art, its top officials suggested just making a copy, without telling the artist.
“The best analogy I can come up with,” said Derya Kovey, a former registrar at the museum, “is a sweatshop.”
The complaints are coming forward at a time when the pandemic and the Black Lives Matter movement have forced many institutions to re-evaluate how they operate, and museum employees are feeling newly empowered to address long-simmering concerns.
In recent weeks, the New Museum responded to the coronavirus crisis by cutting its budget — to $11 million from $14 million — forcing layoffs that critics say were used to silence staff members who helped establish a union at the museum last year. In a complaint to the National Labor Relations Board, the union charged that “layoffs have been discriminatory and retaliatory” because the union’s entire steward committee and bargaining committee were initially laid off or furloughed.
The museum says the criticisms are unfounded and unfair, characterizing them broadly in a statement as “falsehoods and hearsay from disgruntled former staffers.” The union’s complaint “has no merit,” it said in another statement, and the layoffs were not targeted but “were made across all departments and staff levels” and “only for legitimate business reasons during an unprecedented crisis.”
Ms. Phillips, who declined to be interviewed, said in a statement: “My record in making the New Museum a diverse, exciting, and creative space for experimentation for team members and visitors alike speaks for itself.”
But the number of people who describe negative experiences while working at the New Museum — and do so publicly, by name — is unusual. Many attribute their concerns to the sense that the museum, under Ms. Phillips, tries to match the output and impact of New York City’s major museums, but does not have anywhere near the same level of resources, which can severely strain the staff.
“There was very much an ends-justify-the-means approach to what staff were asked to do in the name of realizing some very ambitious exhibitions,” said Sam Rauch, who was a director of exhibitions management at the museum. “And there is no question it takes a toll.”
In more than 30 interviews with former and current staff members from all ranks, an image emerged of a museum where some employees felt compromised or mistreated. Many of them chose to depart.
The museum has had four chief financial officers in ten years and four exhibition directors in 12 years. One executive, Timothy Walker, sent his resignation letter to every printer in the building in an effort to make clear how he, and other staff members, had been treated.
“I have been forced to take this action as a result of the hostile work environment and culture of abusive behavior that pervades the museum, the lack of resources and authority provided to meet established goals,” Mr. Walker, who moved from Miami to become the director of development, wrote in 2016. “The situation I have described to you is intolerable.”
Many former employees say they would have been happy to build careers there, had the conditions been different.
“Management seems to feel that turnover is good, that they give people a start in the art world,” said Lily Bartle, an editor at the museum, who helped organize the union and was laid off in April after less than two years there. “But the reality is, people are trapped in low-paying positions and are forced to come and go quickly. You would be emailing somebody and realize they had left weeks ago. I think I got about 13 new phone lists in just my last six months of working there.”
The museum said that it does not have high turnover — and that its attrition rate is normal for a museum of its size: “Of 68 full-time staff, 25 have been with the New Museum for over eight years and another 10 for over five years.”
Ms. Phillips remains widely respected by many artists and art professionals.
“I’ve known Lisa for more than three decades and think she is one of the most outstanding director curators of her generation,” said Adam Weinberg, the director of the Whitney Museum of American Art, where Ms. Phillips spent 23 years. “She always puts the artists and the art first. I know former and current staff who only have good things to say.”
Some of the staff, such as Karen Wong, the deputy director, and Regan L. Grusy, the vice president of strategic partnerships, have come forward in recent days to express their support for Ms. Phillips. In an interview Jennifer Heslin, a former retail director at the New Museum, also described a very positive experience. Margot Norton, a curator of nine years there, said in an email that she has had “incredible opportunities” that “have been possible due to the mentorship and support of Lisa Phillips and Massimiliano Gioni,” the artistic director.
The museum’s board said in a statement that it “stands firmly behind Ms. Phillips and her stellar leadership, her tremendous accomplishments, and her character,” adding that she has turned the museum “into a powerhouse of acclaimed exhibitions and innovative programs known the world over.”
The museum, which recently reopened after being closed because of the pandemic, occupies a niche within the New York art world, presenting many emerging or underexposed contemporary artists. Founded by Marcia Tucker in 1977 to celebrate living artists, it has no permanent collection, but shows art drawn from institutions, galleries and collectors all over the world.
The exhibitions have often been a great success, ranging from the immersive videos of Pipilotti Rist to the graphic drawings and paintings of Raymond Pettibon to the sexually charged creations of Sarah Lucas.
“They’re doing some interesting shows other museums wouldn’t do,” said Christine Poggi, the director of the New York University Institute of Fine Arts.
Ms. Phillips, only the second director in the museum’s history, is credited with giving it a new home in Lower Manhattan — an eye-catching building designed by the Japanese architecture firm Sanaa — and adding an urban think tank and a tech-business incubator. She is now planning a $63 million expansion, designed by the firm of the starchitect Rem Koolhaas.
Moreover, Ms. Phillips established herself as a champion of equity — initiating the first study to collect salary data by gender for museum directors and serving as chairwoman of the Association of Art Museum Directors’ professional issues committee.
Ms. Phillips sees sexism in many of the complaints against her, suggesting that an unfairly critical eye has been cast on decisiveness that would be forgiven — even commended — in a hard-charging male boss. But some of her former staff members say that in some instances, the museum did just the opposite of what they would have expected from an institution run by a woman.
Vere van Gool, the former associate director and curator at the museum’s IdeasCity program, said nothing happened when she complained three times to management about a museum executive, who told her that his son — then working as an intern at the museum — “sits next to you with a hard-on all day.”
“That is damaging in a workplace environment when something that crosses a professional line is dismissed,” she said. “It wasn’t taken seriously.”
The New Museum said that it “has strict workplace policies,” adding, “we quickly address all claims of inappropriate conduct.”
Regarded as one of the more powerful art museum directors in America, Ms. Phillips has been paid accordingly — $768,000 before a 30 percent cut as part of the belt-tightening related to the pandemic — a salary higher than those of other executives who lead museums of its size (68 full-time). By comparison, James Rondeau at the Art Institute of Chicago earns about the same amount but oversees a museum with a budget of more than $100 million and a full-time staff of 695.
One New Museum trustee, Lonti Ebers, quit the board in 2018 over what she saw as Ms. Phillips’s efforts to negotiate a larger compensation package, one Ms. Ebers viewed as disproportionate to the museum’s small budget and lower-level employee salaries, according to two people she spoke to about it.
Sometimes, boards pay particularly valued directors higher salaries, executive search experts say, even if that compensation is out of sync with the budget. In Ms. Phillips’s case, the New Museum said her contract was reviewed by “an independent compensation consultant who provided industry comparables and the terms were overwhelmingly approved by the Board.”
But her compensation became part of the conversation when the union at the museum pressed for higher wages last year. Working in a nonprofit often involves low pay. But the new union, whose creation Ms. Phillips had fought, argued that low-level employees were earning unlivable wages (starting at $35,000 a year).
“Her salary was outsized for the size of the museum and the rest of the staff was very low paid,” said Maida Rosenstein, the president of Local 2110, which includes MoMA and the Guggenheim.
The workers argued for a base salary of $51,000 a year; the museum ultimately agreed to $46,000.
The pay issue was exacerbated by physical working conditions that some art handlers described as unsafe due to rushed deadlines and the building’s limitations.
Because the museum lacks a freight elevator, for example, artwork has sometimes been moved by art handlers who had to stand atop the passenger elevator, a practice to which Ms. Kovey, the former registrar, said she objected.
“I just told my supervisor that I cannot be involved with this,” Ms. Kovey said.
Several recent staff members said exhibits were often installed into the night because the museum fails to budget adequate time for complex shows, often changes decisions at the last minute and does not want to lose admission revenue by closing galleries between exhibitions.
“Small issues become big issues when the pace of work is very fast and there is not much margin for error,” said Zaq Landsberg, an art handler, who said he caught a panel that fell from the ceiling last month, narrowly avoiding injury. “I have been deeply concerned about safety for a while.”
Walsh Hansen, who supervised art handling and collection management until 2018, said he argued for more installation time. “Safety was never put first,” he said.
The museum said it is scrupulous about all safety protocols and has “built in more turnaround time for exhibitions.”
Other staff members complained that they felt ethical corners were cut. Mr. Rauch and Ms. Kovey said, for example, that they were asked to lie to U.S. Customs about whether an artwork to be imported for “The Keeper” show included bird or reptile parts, a statement that would have helped the museum avoid a cumbersome permits process. Both said they refused and the item was eliminated.
“If we import them without declaration to U.S. Fish and Wildlife we risk their confiscation and destruction if we are caught,” Ms. Kovey wrote in a series of May 2016 emails obtained by The Times, “plus whatever fines.”
Mr. Gioni, responded: “I have shown them in Italy and Korea and there was no question or issue with it. Can we declare it’s plastic and not leather?”
Asked about this, the museum called Mr. Gioni’s “leather” suggestion “an offhand remark” in a casual conversation and noted that the animal items were not exhibited. “No one tried to sidestep Customs,” the museum said.
Other emails show that, between 2014 and 2017, some museum officials tried to avoid admitting that it had lost track of a banner by the Turner prizewinning artist Jeremy Deller that it had placed in storage.
Mr. Rauch and Melisa Lujan, a former registrar, said their museum superiors discussed fabricating a new one without telling the artist.
“On several occasions, they asked me if it would be possible to refabricate, even without the knowledge or permission of the artist,” Mr. Rauch said. “I had to decline that request and felt very uncomfortable that I had been asked in the first place.”
The museum called the account by the former employees “false” and said the museum had never considered refabricating the banner without the artist’s “participation and consent.” The artist said that he was informed of the banner’s loss and refabrication and that he did not have a complaint with the way the museum had handled it.
Another former employee expressed concern about the museum’s transparency on financial issues. E. Annette Nash Govan said that, as the museum’s chief financial officer in 2015, she was chastised for informing the board’s finance committee that the museum had a severe cash crunch and was having a hard time covering payroll.
Ms. Govan said she was subsequently fired, less than a year into the job, and that Ms. Phillips told her it was because Ms. Govan had conveyed bad news to the board.
“I wanted to tell the truth,” Ms. Govan said. “I believe in honesty, whatever the numbers or the facts reveal.”
The museum responded that it has “a diligent and rigorous governance structure” and makes “full and detailed disclosure” to the board. The board said in its statement that Ms. Phillips has always “focused on having a supportive and respectful work environment.”
But several staff members criticized her management style, including three who each spent one- to two-year stints as Ms. Phillips’s executive assistant from 2010 to 2017.
“It was emotionally abusive — she really belittled people,” said Erika Anderson, one assistant. “I had to unlearn most of the experience that I gained there and reteach myself how to be a good working professional.”
Adam Glick, another assistant, said that, after a tape recorder he provided to Ms. Phillips failed to work, she thrust it back at him, saying, “Get this piece of crap off my desk. I never want to see it again,” and the end of the cord struck him on the side of his face.
After Mr. Glick confronted Ms. Phillips about it that evening by email, she responded, “Sorry if that happened accidentally,” Mr. Glick said.
“This sort of volatile behavior and the inadequate apology that followed was indicative of the culture,” Mr. Glick said. “Management regularly refused to acknowledge reality and truth.”
The museum said “this characterization is inconsistent with who Ms. Phillips is” and “a complete misrepresentation of the situation.”
A third assistant, Sarah Getto, who left after two years in 2017, said the museum lacked the necessary checks and balances. “Normal management systems would have prevented the vast majority of abuses and disorder that I witnessed, but Lisa Phillips does not run the New Museum as an institution,” Ms. Getto said. “Because she controls all oversight — including the board — it’s her private fiefdom.”
Zachary Small contributed reporting.
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