Sackler name to be removed from Metropolitan Museum of Art galleries

The Sackler family name that has graced galleries at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art for nearly 50 years will be removed as the institution tries to distance itself from a family accused of fuelling the opioid crisis.

In a joint statement on Thursday, the Met and descendants of Mortimer and Raymond Sackler said they had “mutually agreed” to remove the family name from seven exhibition spaces, including the wing that houses the Temple of Dendur.

“Our families have strongly supported The Met, and we believe this to be in the best interest of the museum and the important mission it serves,” the Sackler family members said.

Dan Weiss, the Met’s president and chief executive, called it “a gracious gesture” that would help the museum to serve future generations.

The Sacklers’ family-founded company, Purdue Pharma, manufactured and marketed OxyContin, a highly addictive pain medication that has been at the centre of America’s opioid epidemic.

In 2019, the Met, London’s National Portrait Gallery and the Tate group of galleries in the UK said they would no longer accept donations from the family. But institutions have struggled to rescind naming rights enshrined in contracts, some of which are decades old. Some are also wary of jeopardising funding sources, particularly at a time when the pandemic has curtailed attendance.

The move marks one of the most visible instances in which a family name that fell into disrepute has been removed from an institution that benefited from its philanthropy. The Louvre removed the Sackler name from its oriental antiquities wing in July 2019.

Museums, universities and cultural institutions around the world have been grappling with ethical dilemmas as wealthy donors who once seemed unimpeachable have suddenly become toxic because of revelations from various scandals.

At the same time, social activists have raised pressure on the Met and others to return gifts or sever ties with benefactors whom they regard as unpalatable.

Speaking to Time Magazine in September, Weiss articulated some of the complications.

“It is not for us to make a judgment about the responsibility or the culpability of the Sacklers with information that is incomplete. That’s not our business. We’re not a court of law,” he said.

Weiss also noted that new information unearthed through court testimony and the book Empire of Pain by journalist Patrick Radden Keefe would allow the board “to make a more thoughtful judgment”.

Last year Purdue Pharma agreed an $8.3bn criminal and civil settlement with the US justice department in connection with its role in fuelling the US opioid epidemic. In a related civil settlement, members of the billionaire Sackler family that own Purdue agreed to pay $225m while denying the allegations against them.