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Jun 29, 2020 · Many museums have expressed solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement, but what actions will follow the words for those institutions with links to Britain's imperial past?
Jun 29, 2020 · Many museums have expressed solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement, but what actions will follow the words for those institutions with links to Britain's imperial past?
May 25, 2021 · On 25 May 2020, George Floyd, a Black man from Minneapolis, was killed by a police officer during arrest. Footage of his death spread around the globe, reigniting the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement and leading to a wave of protests against racial injustice and inequality.
- Walker Art Center, Minneapolis
- The Getty, Los Angeles
- SFMOMA, San Francisco
- The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
- The British Museum, London
- The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City
- Bristol Museum and Art Gallery, Bristol
- Musée Du Quai Branly, Paris
- International Slavery Museum, Liverpool
As a contemporary art gallery in Minneapolis, the Walker Art Center has been close to the heart of the protests in the city and of the wider demonstrations around the globe. Following widespread criticism of the Minneapolis Police Department’s overzealous response to protests in the area, the management team at the gallery decided to cut all ties i...
In marked contrast to the Walker Art Center, the Getty found that its social media posts were less welcomed by protestors and their supporters. Indeed, the institution’s president, Jim Cuno, felt he needed to issue an apology following widespread criticism of his institution on social media. In posts that failed to acknowledge the Black Lives Matte...
A similar situation affected SFMOMA in San Francisco following its social media posts on the subject of race and art. According to some campaigners, a critical comment concerning one of its posts was covered up by the gallery’s social media team. The original post had shown a Glenn Ligon work of art, a silkscreen print, and included a quotation by ...
The Met has also come under fire for its apparent silence on the issue of ongoing protests around the world. The museum had posted a couple of images from its collection that highlighted racial issues but only issued a written statement about the killing of black individuals by serving police officers much later. This, again, led to some criticism ...
Hartwig Fischer, the director of the British Museum issued a statement about his institution in early June. It referenced both the Black Lives Matter campaign as well as Mr Floyd’s death. “[We]… stand in solidarity with the British Black community,” his statement read, before going on to mention the wider African-American community and black people...
This gallery, which has a wide-ranging collection that is drawn from all over the globe, received a large number of complaints about its stance during the protests. A privately run institution, the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art took the decision to allow police officers to use its facilities while they were patrolling the downtown area of Kansas City...
Bristol has been one of the centres of the Black Lives Matter protests in the UK, largely due to its high racial diversity and historic connections with the slave trade. Bristolians even took the law into their own hands by forcibly removing a statue erected to celebrate a 17th-century slave trader, Edward Colston. The Bristol Museum and Art Galler...
Emmanuel Kasarhérou, who is the recently appointed director of the Branly Museum in Paris, said that he would like to update the colonial-era museum so that it is more in keeping with the cultural values of today. In an announcement referencing the current protests about race and inequality, he said that the colonial context by which many of the in...
Opened in 2007, the International Slavery Museum is run by Liverpool City Council. Like Bristol, Liverpool was a major slave port and much of its wealth was built on the transatlantic slave trade. The museum used the Black Lives Matter hashtag in its social media posts following the removal of the Edward Colston statue in Bristol. Many had seen the...
The Black Lives Matter demonstrations spread across the UK last summer in reaction to George Floyd’s killing by police officer Derek Chauvin in the US, an event which sparked a global call for racial justice. And in Bristol, the port city’s strong links to slavery were under the spotlight.
- Helen Lock
The ongoing activity of the International Slavery Museum continues to be a vehicle for social justice at the forefront of museum activism, community engagement and inclusion. For many decades, NML has worked with Black communities and organisations to collaborate, engage and co-create.
Mar 24, 2023 · See the BLM placards in the Bristol Museums collection on our online search. During Black Lives Matter protests against police brutality and racial inequality on 7 June 2020, people left placards at the base of the Colston statue plinth.
