{"id":153307,"date":"2025-11-22T06:42:07","date_gmt":"2025-11-22T06:42:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/153307\/"},"modified":"2025-11-22T06:42:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-22T06:42:07","slug":"former-canadian-director-of-philadelphia-art-museum-accused-by-board-of-theft-court-filings-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/153307\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Canadian director of Philadelphia Art Museum accused by board of theft, court filings show"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

The Philadelphia Art Museum claims Sasha Suda, its former director suing for wrongful dismissal, ‘misappropriated funds from the museum.’Hannah Yoon\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

The Philadelphia Museum of Art is pushing back against its former Canadian director\u2019s wrongful dismissal lawsuit, alleging in a court filing that Sasha Suda \u201cmisappropriated funds from the museum and lied to cover up her theft.\u201d<\/p>\n

The court documents were filed Nov. 20 in response to a lawsuit brought by Ms. Suda ten days earlier, in which she said she was terminated for cause from her role as director and chief executive after a \u201csham investigation\u201d and resistance from board members as she tried to modernize the institution. <\/p>\n

Ms. Suda joined the prestigious Philadelphia museum in 2022 on a five-year contract after departing her role as director and CEO of the National Gallery of Canada \u2013 a tenure that was also marked by controversy. <\/p>\n

In its response filed in Pennsylvania state court, the museum alleges that Ms. Suda repeatedly sought pay increases from the board\u2019s compensation committee between 2023 and 2025, but despite its refusal to grant any such raises, \u201cSuda took the money anyway, defying the board and violating her contract.\u201d<\/p>\n

When she began at the museum in 2022, she negotiated an annual base salary of US$720,000 \u2013 which the museum described in its court filing as a nearly fivefold increase from her salary at the helm of the National Gallery of Canada. <\/p>\n

Earlier: Former National Gallery director Sasha Suda sues Philadelphia Art Museum over dismissal<\/a><\/p>\n

The museum claims it explicitly informed Ms. Suda that, absent extraordinary performance, she would not receive any increases during the contract term. It noted that at the time the museum was navigating multimillion-dollar budget shortfalls and extreme financial pressure in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. <\/p>\n

Ms. Suda\u2019s lawyer, Luke Nikas, described the museum\u2019s theft accusations as false. <\/p>\n

\u201cThese are the same recycled allegations from the sham investigation that the museum manufactured as a pretext for Suda\u2019s wrongful termination,\u201d he said in an e-mailed statement to The Globe late Friday evening. \u201cThe motion, as well as its false narrative, fits the Philadelphia Museum\u2019s longstanding pattern of trying to cover up its misconduct and mistreatment of staff.\u201d<\/p>\n

The museum\u2019s court filing does not specify the size of the alleged improper pay increases Ms. Suda received without board approval. In her wrongful dismissal suit, though, Ms. Suda said she received a 3 per cent cost-of-living adjustment in line with what unionized staff had negotiated. That amounted to US$39,000 over two years and was, she claimed in her lawsuit, \u201cfully transparent in its application.\u201d <\/p>\n

The museum asserts that it not only denied her requests for a raise, but advised her in November of 2024 that she should not ask for one. \u201cThe committee chair told Suda, \u2018[W]e stretched to get to your requested base salary at the outset and you would hardly notice any increase in line with the rest of the staff. You need to show more progress on righting the ship and raising funds,\u2019\u201d the museum filing states. <\/p>\n

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Suda, pictured in 2019 at the National Gallery of Canada, joined the Philadelphia Art Museum in 2022 on a five-year contract.Justin Tang\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, according to the museum, Ms. Suda awarded herself a third unauthorized pay increase in July of this year. <\/p>\n

The compensation committee became aware of the increases on Sept. 8, as they were discussing \u201cthe merits of a pay increase for certain executive team members\u201d \u2013 which, according to the museum\u2019s filing, Ms. Suda \u201cbelatedly admitted\u201d that she had already authorized. <\/p>\n

Frustrated by her conduct, the committee excused Ms. Suda and moved into executive session. During the session, the court filing states, \u201cSuda sent a text message to a member of the committee in which she admitted, for the first time, that she herself had also received salary increases over the past few years.\u201d <\/p>\n

Controversial rebrand hangs over Philadelphia Art Museum as fired CEO sues<\/a><\/p>\n

In response, the board chair convened a special committee to investigate the matter, and a law firm was engaged to review documents and conduct interviews, including with Ms. Suda. The investigation was led by a former Acting United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, according to the court filing. During the interview, the museum alleges, Ms. Suda \u201clied about her actions, claiming, among other things, that her subordinates had advised her she was entitled to receive these increases.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Oct. 27, the executive committee voted to terminate Ms. Suda for cause, the filing states.<\/p>\n

Ms. Suda\u2019s tenure at the National Gallery of Canada was marked by upheaval that began soon after her arrival in 2019<\/a>. She had previously been curator of European art at the Art Gallery of Ontario, but had no managerial experience when she became director and CEO of Canada\u2019s national art museum. <\/p>\n

Ms. Suda terminated several senior staff members, and many more either left or were fired over the next few years. The Globe and Mail reported at the time that although the gallery wouldn\u2019t discuss details related to the terminations, estimates of the number of departures ranged between 30 and 40<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Philadelphia Art Museum is seeking to have the wrongful dismissal case addressed through arbitration, arguing that neither Ms. Suda\u2019s \u201cmeritless breach of contract claim, nor her delusional allegations of victimhood and persecution\u201d have any place in court. <\/p>\n

Mr. Nikas said he was not surprised by the museum\u2019s push for arbitration. \u201cWe expected the Museum would prefer to hide the sordid details about its unlawful treatment of Sasha Suda in a confidential arbitration,\u201d he said. \u201cIf the Museum had nothing to hide, it would not be afraid to litigate in state court where we filed the case.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms. Suda has asked for a jury trial, seeking damages and other relief in an amount to be determined over its course. <\/p>\n

On Friday, the Philadelphia Art Museum named Daniel H. Weiss, the former president and chief executive of New York\u2019s Metropolitan Museum of Art, as Ms. Suda\u2019s replacement.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: The Philadelphia Art Museum claims Sasha Suda, its former director suing for wrongful…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":153308,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[2522,307,304,2511,305,306,2523,2476,2503,2524,289,2502,2516,2517,2513,2504,2501,308,113,835,93,246,2515,2509,2533,2505,2506,1523,61,60,2512,166,1529,2525,768,2528,2529,2531,2526,2530,2152,2527,2507,2519,2520,1650,2518,2153,2510,80,2521,2514,2508,268,2532],"class_list":{"0":"post-153307","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts-and-design","8":"tag-alberta","9":"tag-arts","10":"tag-arts-and-design","11":"tag-arts-news","12":"tag-artsanddesign","13":"tag-artsdesign","14":"tag-bc","15":"tag-breaking-news","16":"tag-breaking-news-video","17":"tag-british-columbia","18":"tag-canada","19":"tag-canada-news","20":"tag-canada-sports","21":"tag-canada-sports-news","22":"tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","23":"tag-canadian-breaking-news","24":"tag-canadian-news","25":"tag-design","26":"tag-economy","27":"tag-education","28":"tag-entertainment","29":"tag-environment","30":"tag-federal-government","31":"tag-foreign-news","32":"tag-globe-and-mail","33":"tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","34":"tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","35":"tag-government","36":"tag-ie","37":"tag-ireland","38":"tag-life-news","39":"tag-lifestyle","40":"tag-local-news","41":"tag-manitoba","42":"tag-national-news","43":"tag-new-brunswick","44":"tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","45":"tag-northwest-territories","46":"tag-nova-scotia","47":"tag-nunavut","48":"tag-ontario","49":"tag-pei","50":"tag-photos","51":"tag-political-news","52":"tag-political-opinion","53":"tag-politics","54":"tag-politics-news","55":"tag-quebec","56":"tag-sports-news","57":"tag-technology","58":"tag-travel","59":"tag-trudeau","60":"tag-us-news","61":"tag-world-news","62":"tag-yukon"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153307","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=153307"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153307\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/153308"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=153307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=153307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=153307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}