Private Faces in Public Places: A Case Study of the New Beyeler Art Museum

Abstract

Over the last few decades, the number of museums has been on the increase in Europe as well as in the United States. Traditionally, European museums were either institutions established by the state, and therefore part of the public sector, or heavily subsidized by tax money. In the case of art museums, there was almost total dependence on direct state funding in France, Italy and the Netherlands, and about 80 percent in Britain and Germany (Schuster, 1985). The situation in the U.S. is quite different, as most museums there are private. Interestingly enough, many of the newly founded museums are private. Private collectors nowadays often no longer want to donate their collections to public institutions, but to establish their own museums. As a result, the museum ‘industry’ is getting bigger and bigger, both with respect to the number of museums and the number of visitors. This affects the competition between museums and increases the economic relevance for the whole industry. More and more private museums are challenging the publicly dominated museum world in Europe.