Met Museum Balances Budget and Embraces Contemporary Art

New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art has achieved a balanced budget for the first time in three years under director Max Hollein, who took the helm in April 2018. The museum had faced a severe financial crisis, with a deficit growing from $3.5 million in 2014 to $7.7 million in 2015 and $10 million in 2016, despite attracting over 6 million visitors in 2015. This led to the resignation of director Thomas P. Campbell in 2017 and the controversial decision in January 2018 to end the 50-year-old pay-as-you-wish admission policy for non-New Yorkers, instituting a $25 ticket fee. The change, announced by president and CEO Daniel H. Weiss, drew fierce criticism but helped stabilize finances. The museum now operates with an annual budget of $350 million. Hollein, an Austrian art historian formerly at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco and the Städel Museum in Frankfurt, has launched contemporary art commissions. Currently, Ragnar Kjartansson's immersive video installation Death is Elsewhere is on view at the Robert Lehman Wing through September 2, 2019. Wangechi Mutu will create sculptures for the Fifth Avenue facade niches, the first outdoor installation in Met history, to be unveiled September 9, 2019. Kent Monkman will produce monumental paintings for the Great Hall starting December 19, 2019. Hollein stated these projects demonstrate the Met's desire to collaborate unusually with contemporary artists, using the building and public spaces as temporary platforms.