MUSEUM AT RISK
Save the M HKA

Letter to Minister of Culture Caroline Gennez

29 October 2025 - 5:15 pm – Mission

On October 27, 2025, we sent a letter as Save the Museum | Museum at Risk to Caroline Gennez, Flemish Minister of Culture, in which we emphasized our core principles and requested an urgent suspension of point 5.2.4 from the concept note. Today, we are publishing the letter publicly.

Dear Minister Gennez,

Save the Museum | Museum at Risk is a recently established collective of artists and numerous actors from the arts field, backed by a steering group of external experts. We are astonished by a number of plans that you unexpectedly revealed to us in your concept note. Our particular attention is drawn to the closure of one of Flanders' two leading museums of contemporary art, namely the one in Antwerp.

Your draft memorandum currently prompts us to take four positions:

  1. We want a Museum for Contemporary Art in Antwerp
  2. A Museum for Contemporary Art has a Collection
  3. A Museum of Contemporary Art of International Standing requires an appropriate Infrastructure and Funding
  4. We want Participation and Co-Decision Rights in the Reform of Flemish Museums

The arts sector is experiencing the current circumstances as a crisis without precedent in our immediate environment. In a tradition of consultation with public authorities, we would like to reach out to you to find a solution together. This tradition of consultation has been yielding positive results for 25 years: Minister Luc Martens recognised visual artists as a point of contact in the form of the NICC, followed by Governor Camille Paulus and Antwerp Alderman for Culture Eric Antonis (wages and buildings). They were followed in turn by Minister Bert Anciaux (recognition as an arts centre) and Alderman for Culture Philip Heylen (studio policy). And not least by Minister of Social Affairs Frank Vandenbroucke in the artists' statute dossier.

We still believe that it is in both parties' interests to continue this tradition. That is why we would like to put forward our fourth point: “We want a say and co-decision rights in the reform of Flemish museums”. Knowledge is not only to be found among experts at the top; on the contrary, what really matters is known among experienced experts in the field, who are more than willing to advise policymakers and collaborate. We consider it desirable and even necessary to involve these people in the field in your planned large-scale reform.

In practical terms, this means that we are requesting the suspension of point 5.2.4. of your draft memorandum. We argue that a transition project must, in fact, precede the redevelopment of the current museum. With our knowledge in the field, we can therefore work together to achieve a widely supported result within the planned two-year period that will enable both the sector and policy to excel.

Given the urgency of the matter, we kindly request that you schedule a meeting with our representatives at your earliest convenience.

Yours sincerely,

Danny Devos, artist
Tamara Beheydt, writer and curator

on behalf of Save the Museum | Museum at Risk

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