Sasha Suda, the former director and CEO of the Philadelphia Art Museum, sued her former employer Monday in Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas.
The 30-page lawsuit outlines her tensions with board members over how much authority she had to act on certain issues without their approval, and provides details into her dismissal.
The Philadelphia Art Museum dismissed Suda for cause after commissioning an independent investigation, according to Art Museum leaders.
According to the suit, Suda was “terminated when her efforts to modernize the museum clashed with a small, corrupt, and unethical faction of the board intent on preserving the status quo.”
Suda, who was in her third year of a five-year contract, is suing for two years of pay, as well as “significant damages for the museum’s repeated and malicious violations of the non-disparagement and confidentiality clauses in her employment agreement, and an injunction enforcing the confidentiality and non-disparagement terms of her agreement,” according to her lawyer, Luke Nikas of Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan.
In a statement, the Art Museum called the suit “without merit” and declined to comment further.
Read the full lawsuit here: