{"id":288748,"date":"2026-02-17T20:08:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-17T20:08:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/288748\/"},"modified":"2026-02-17T20:08:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T20:08:11","slug":"barbican-arts-head-devyani-saltzman-leaves-role-after-18-months-the-art-newspaper","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/288748\/","title":{"rendered":"Barbican arts head Devyani Saltzman leaves role after 18 months – The Art Newspaper"},"content":{"rendered":"

Devyani Saltzman, the director of arts and participation at the Barbican centre in London, is leaving her post after only 18 months in the role. According to<\/a>The Stage, Saltzman was made redundant. A Barbican spokesperson said that it is \u201cunable to comment on individual staffing matters\u201d.<\/p>\n

Saltzman recently announced a five-year creative vision for the venue, saying last June:\u00a0\u201cAt a time of deep international geopolitical and technological change, our ideas-led, seasonal approach allows us tangibly to respond to the world today, through a programme that allows audiences to see the world holistically, in a wholly new light: interconnected, and always evolving.\u201d Last month a new chief executive, Abigail Pogson, started at the central London arts venue, which draws around 1.5 million people annually.<\/p>\n

Saltzman, appointed in 2024<\/a>, was previously the director of public programming at the Art Gallery of Ontario. \u201cKey to her vision for the next chapter of the Barbican is the potential to create a new type of ethos in public institutions that is truly in service to their people and public, in addition to presenting the best of cutting-edge programming,\u201d said a press statement on her appointment. Saltzman was approached for comment.<\/p>\n

Saltzman\u2019s departure caps a turbulent time for the Barbican.\u00a0In 2021, the Barbican Centre carried out an extensive staff reorganisation following the publication of a book that included more than 100 alleged instances of prejudicial behaviour at its venue.<\/p>\n

Will Gompertz was appointed director of arts and learning at the Barbican in March 2021, later becoming artistic director.\u00a0In late 2023, he left the museum after being appointed the director of Sir John Soane\u2019s Museum in London.\u00a0Gompertz was at the forefront of implementing the organisation\u2019s anti-racism plan.<\/p>\n

In 2023, meanwhile, a display at the Curve Gallery at the centre was taken down <\/a>after\u00a0Resolve Collective accused Barbican staff of censoring a talk.<\/p>\n

According to<\/a> the Guardian, Saltzman\u00a0had been seen \u201cas a figure who helped repair trust between the organisation and sections of the artistic community\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Devyani Saltzman, the director of arts and participation at the Barbican centre in London, is leaving her post…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":288749,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[40976,442,498,499,500,29148,501,156,12603,111,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-288748","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts-and-design","8":"tag-appointments-departures","9":"tag-arts","10":"tag-arts-and-design","11":"tag-artsanddesign","12":"tag-artsdesign","13":"tag-barbican","14":"tag-design","15":"tag-entertainment","16":"tag-museums-heritage","17":"tag-new-zealand","18":"tag-newzealand","19":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288748","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=288748"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288748\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/288749"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=288748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=288748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=288748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}