In addition two museum directors from Oxford and a head of collections from Aberdeen University (put quite simply “All we are doing is returning stolen property”), the new director of the British Museum, Dr Nicholas Cullinan, drew attention in a panel debate at the Pitt Rivers Museum at the end of March 2025.
Lewis McNaught observes the following: Whether Britain’s national collections will respond with the same humility remains to be seen. It was encouraging to see new director of the British Museum answering probing questions on how the British Museum plans to address their legacies of inequality and trauma under his new leadership.
Cullinan’s ideas for sharing the collection, more international exchange, more collaboration by Britain’s largest and most visited museum are the guarded statements of a well-versed diplomat.
But it’s still early days and Cullinan’s track record at the National Portrait Gallery, plus his assertion of the useful role of technology in breaking down binary problems (“it will change things”) must be welcomed.
Also welcome was his insistence he is “impatient to make changes now”. We shall be watching developments closely.
