Hannah Jane Parkinson’s piece underscores the importance of cultural organisations having effective due diligence processes in place to “know your donor”, a key fundraising principle set out by the Charity Commission (First Sackler, now Bet365. The art world can’t keep taking money from companies that do us harm, 28 February). Right now, the Science Museum is facing the risks of having not given this principle enough consideration, after it was recently revealed that the sponsor of its climate gallery – Adani Green Energy, part of the controversial Adani conglomerate – had been used by the parent company as a way to generate investment for its coalmining projects.
There are significant funding pressures across the arts, but we need to discriminate between private donations that are genuinely philanthropic, and the money paid by the Sackler family or a fossil fuel company such as BP, which is clearly a transaction undertaken with the aim of enhancing their reputations. Furthermore, an unethical sponsor with an image problem is much more likely to target its payments on the larger and better funded institutions, where their association with the arts will gain greater public profile, than community-based organisations that are struggling to make ends meet. When many of these smaller organisations are taking on the difficult ethical questions associated with their collections, programmes and sources of funding, it is disappointing that institutions that should be offering an example of best practice – such as the British Museum and Science Museum – continue to lag behind.
Dr Chris Garrard
Co-director, Culture Unstained
