National Gallery Paid Out $2 Million in Severance Over Three Years
National Gallery of Canada (courtesy NGC)
The National Gallery of Canada spent more than $2 million on severance payments to departing staff during a period roughly corresponding to the three years Sasha Suda was the gallery's director.
Suda embarked on transformative policies of "decolonization" and "Indigenization" that resulted in the layoff or reshuffling of many senior staff, including top curators. As well, programming shifted to tell more art stories through an Indigenous or racialized lens. A number of senior curatorial positions remain vacant.
A document obtained through Access to Information shows severance payments totalled $2,073,629 from April 19, 2019, to Sept. 7, 2022, when the request was filed. Suda served as director from April 19, 2019, until July of 2022.
The gallery does not specify which employees, or what categories of employees, received severance payments. It said releasing further details would breach the privacy of the individuals involved.
That $2-million figure does not include funds paid to staff whose jobs were lost during the months when the gallery was closed due to the pandemic, says Douglas Chow, the gallery's communications director.
Nor does it include any severance paid to four senior employees released in November, including deputy director Kitty Scott and Indigenous curator Greg Hill. The much-publicized departure of that foursome thrust the gallery into the international spotlight.
Chow said the gallery's staffing level has declined from 312 people in 2019 to 267 now – a drop of more than 14 per cent.
"As with sectors around the world, COVID-19 disrupted our workforce numbers," said Chow. "However, we are building back our team for the future with new hires."
Five prominent art establishment figures with years of experience working at federal museums or on their boards were asked by Galleries West to comment on the $2-million figure. Most were reluctant to address it specifically, not knowing all the details surrounding it, but they did express concern more generally on the way the National Gallery and its board are spending federal tax dollars. As well, most of them also encouraged news organizations to continue digging into various controversies at the gallery under Suda and her interim replacement, Angela Cassie.
"That figure is obviously quite high," said a former head of a national museum who requested anonymity. "It speaks of a new CEO that wanted to clean house and that message was passed on to the acting CEO afterwards. At a time when frugal was the watch word it seems that the axe was swinging quite gleefully to push people out…. There was probably a need for change at the NGC, but she (Suda) went about it with a cavalier attitude which would have pushed the numbers up. The result is a much-weakened gallery sitting without a rudder in tempestuous seas."
A former gallery board member, who also requested anonymity, offered these comments: "I'm pleased you are working on this particular issue. Given the sheer magnitude of staff terminations during the Suda regime and since, the costs to the Gallery and the taxpayer must be very considerable. I hope you are able shine a light on this important information. The exact amounts deserve public scrutiny."
Similar sentiments were echoed by Michael Audain, a former head of the gallery board: "While I'm happy to occasionally comment on National Gallery matters, I don’t feel equipped to tackle this one. But it would be interesting to learn how much additional taxpayers' money was devoted to the four recent senior dismissals."
However, Victor Rabinovitch, a former CEO of what used to be called the Canadian Museum of Civilization, sounded a cautionary note.
"Many payments can come under the 'heading' severance. Every person who 'severs' their employment is entitled to a single allowance, that, I think is two weeks per year of work. Union agreements sometimes provide for higher severance payments, but I’ve no idea what is the status at NGC."
Marc Mayer, a former gallery director, refused comment except to say everything the gallery’s board has been doing recently is "obscene."
The $2-million figure represents enough money to pay the director's salary – now listed at between $204,200 to $240,200 annually – for eight or nine years.
Suda left to become CEO of the Philadelphia Museum of Art three years into her five-year term at the gallery. Cassie became the interim director in Ottawa on July 10, 2022.
A new full-time director is expected to be hired within the next few months. Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez must approve whoever is proposed by the board.
Nathalie Bondil, former director of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, was a favoured candidate for many wealthy and powerful gallery supporters. But in a recent interview with the Montreal newspaper La Presse, Bondil said she will not be a candidate.
The gallery has been spending about $65 million to $75 million annually in operating expenses in recent years, according to corporate reports posted on the gallery's website. Salaries and employee benefits are the largest expense category, accounting for spending of roughly $25 million a year.
During Suda's term, and partly because of pandemic uncertainty, few exhibitions were offered at the gallery. Chow says that is changing.
"The Gallery is back to full programming after more than two years of the pandemic," said Chow. "Most notably, 2022 attendance was 27 per cent above visitation projections and we eagerly anticipate our exciting exhibitions and programming for 2023."
This month the gallery opens a solo exhibition by the Toronto multimedia artist known as Paul P. The main spring and summer exhibition opens in March. It is Uninvited: Canadian Women Artists in the Modern Moment, a touring show organized by the McMichael Canadian Art Collection in Kleinburg, Ont., that features contemporaries of the Group of Seven. The major fall exhibition will mark the 100th anniversary of the birth of Quebec abstract artist Jean Paul Riopelle.
