The V&A Dundee in Scotland has erased references to donations received from the Sackler family, the latest museum to do so as anger continues to boil over their role in the opioid epidemic in the US.
The design-focused museum, the first of its kind in Scotland when it opened in 2018, had received £500,000 from the Sackler Trust.
A plaque in the entrance hall, which includes major donor names, included the Sackler family.
According to the Guardian, it has now emerged that the Sackler name was removed in August, erasing any public mention of it at the museum.
It follows the dropping of the Sackler name at the V&A museum in London, referenced at its £2 million entrance which opened in 2017.
Some members of the Sackler family own a drugs company responsible for making OxyContin, an addictive drug that has damaged thousands and has caused an epidemic of overdoses in the US.
More than 500,000 overdose deaths over the last two decade relate to OxyContin.
Purdue, the company owned by Sackler family members, agreed pay to up to $6 billion (£4.7 billion) to settle thousands of lawsuits with a deal that would shield members of the Sackler family from further legal action.
The Sackler name was once found across arts institutions across the world, from the Metropolitan Museum’s Sackler Wing in New York City to the Sackler escalator at London’s Tate Modern.
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”.
“The V&A has been the last bastion of holdouts in terms of those supporting the Sacklers,” artist Nan Goldin told the Guardian.
Shafi Musaddique is a news editor at Alliance magazine.
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