The Guardian-VA Dundee erases mentions of opioid-linked Sackler family
September 1, 2023 3 min 581 words
2023年9月1日，英国V&A Dundee博物馆移除了Sackler家族资助的提及，因其在美国鸦片危机中的中心作用引发愤怒。该博物馆于2018年开放，曾收到Sackler Trust的50万英镑捐款，以前在入口大厅的牌匾上有相关铭文。但最近，他们已经悄悄移除了Sackler名字的一切提及。此前，伦敦的V&A博物馆也去年取消了与Sackler家族的联系。 Sackler家族拥有制造成瘾药物OxyContin的Purdue Pharma公司，该药物在美国引发了导致50万人过量服用而死亡的鸦片危机。Purdue去年同意支付高达60亿美元的和解款项，以保护Sackler家族免受进一步法律诉讼的困扰。 这一故事由于Netflix电视剧《Painkiller》而更广泛传播，该剧以Matthew Broderick饰演的Richard Sackler为主角。V&A Dundee曾因迟迟不去掉Sackler名字而受到批评，但现在已经加入了与Sackler家族划清界限的文化机构之列。 Sackler家族的名字曾广泛出现在美国和英国的美术馆和大学中，但现在很难找到。V&A Dundee的这一举动受到了苏格兰药物论坛的欢迎，他们建议博物馆也应该纪念那些因药物过量而死亡的人。博物馆发言人表示，他们已同意在2023年8月移除与Sackler Trust有关的所有铭文。
The V&A Dundee has become the latest UK museum to remove a reference to the money it received from the Sackler family amid continuing anger over its central role in the opioid epidemic in the US.
The £80m museum, Scotland’s first devoted to design, opened in 2018 and had among its donors the Sackler Trust, which gave £500,000.
The contribution was recognised by a plaque in the entrance hall, which includes the names of major donors.
It has now emerged that the Sackler name was last month removed, erasing any public mention of it at the museum.
It follows the dropping, last October, of the name at the V&A in London with Sackler no longer referenced in the museum’s arts education centre or on the £2m Exhibition Road entrance, which opened in 2017.
Members of the Sackler family are owners of Purdue Pharma, makers of the addictive drug OxyContin, which has played a key role in an opioid epidemic that has led to more than 500,000 overdose deaths in the US over two decades.
Purdue last year agreed pay to up to $6bn (£4.7bn) to settle thousands of lawsuits with a deal that would shield members of the Sackler family from further legal action.
The story has become even more widely known because of the Netflix drama Painkiller, released last month, which stars Matthew Broderick as Richard Sackler, the head of the company.
The V&A has faced criticism for being slow to drop the Sackler name. In 2019 its director, Tristram Hunt, said the museum was proud of the support it had received from the family. “We are not going to be taking names down or denying the past,” he said.
But the museum soon became isolated as cultural institutions around the world followed the example set by organisations such as the National Portrait Gallery in severing ties and distancing themselves from the Sackler family.
The name was once ubiquitous in galleries and universities, from the Sackler wing at the Metropolitan Museum in New York to the Sackler escalator at Tate Modern. Now it is difficult to find.
A Sackler family stained-glass window remains at Westminster Abbey but the abbey’s website notes “with sadness the suffering caused in the USA by opioid addiction. Projects at the Abbey are no longer supported by charitable trusts associated with the Sackler family”.
When the V&A dropped the Sackler name last year the artist and activist Nan Goldin said: “The V&A has been the last bastion of holdouts in terms of those supporting the Sacklers.”
The latest move by V&A Dundee has been welcomed by the Scottish Drugs Forum, which this summer suggested the museum might also want to commemorate those who had died of drug overdoses.
Kirsten Horsburgh, the chief executive of the forum, said: “The celebration of the Sackler bequest was inappropriate and the V&A, by this action, have acknowledged that.
“We welcome that of course. Scotland and the city of Dundee, specifically, has seen untold damage caused by drugs as a result of the war on people who use drugs. Sadly that approach and attitude continues across the country.”
A spokesperson for V&A Dundee said: “Along with many other cultural organisations in the UK and abroad, V&A Dundee has removed signage relating to the Sackler Trust. It was agreed by V&A Dundee’s board to remove the final piece of Sackler Trust crediting in August 2023.”