M HKA publishes an open letter from its staff: Keep the M HKA Collection in Antwerp

7 October 2025 - 12:42 pm – Open letter

M HKA publishes an open letter from its staff. In this letter, they express their concern about the recent policy decisions regarding the future of the M HKA. They call for transparency, consultation, and respect for the expertise built up over the years.

Source: M HKA

Dear Minister of Culture,
Dear staff of the Culture Cabinet,

As employees of the M HKA, we wish to express our concern about the recent policy decisions regarding the future of our museum, which we first learned about in the press on Friday and then again on Monday. A ten-year new construction project, whose plans you proudly presented in February, was abruptly discarded. We feel not only completely surprised but also shocked and even insulted by your plans, the way they were developed, and the communication surrounding them.

We understand that it was more pleasant for you last Monday to celebrate with "winners" elsewhere in Flanders than to address us personally in Antwerp. Since there was barely any room for nuance in the well-orchestrated communication campaign from your cabinet, we prefer to speak through this open letter. We also read that this insane plan was "worked on for a long time, in complete silence" in Ghent. We want to challenge this very plan—openly, transparently, not in secret.

The M HKA, with all its challenges, is a unique place in Flanders where the critical and societal potential of contemporary visual art is fully realized. Ambiguity and complexity find space here; beauty and meaning are not reduced to simple messages or "soundbites." In doing so, the museum fulfills a crucial role within the cultural landscape—not as a showcase or tourist attraction, but as a space for reflection, imagination, and dialogue.

The proposed changes have profound consequences for the urban cultural fabric, for the care and continuity of an international collection of contemporary art, and for the well-being of the people who work daily with dedication on this mission. We fear that the proposal insufficiently considers the accumulated expertise, the coherence between collection, context, and public, and the need for stable and well-equipped infrastructure. Our acquisition policy is strongly focused on the city of Antwerp as a gateway to the world and has grown from the history of the post-war avant-garde, the ICC, and the Wide White Space Gallery.

The M HKA is more than just exhibitions. For years, we have managed and made accessible an art collection of nearly 8,000 artworks, an art library of over 40,000 books, and dozens of archives from artists and institutions. This heritage function, unique within Flanders, is deeply connected to the history of Antwerp as an art city and to our mission to make knowledge and culture widely accessible. At the same time, the M HKA shows that it is more than a museum of contemporary art: it is a place for visual culture in the broadest sense, where art, film, image, and heritage come together—a unique position within Flanders and Belgium. In this context, the film-historical department De Cinema continues to commit to cinema and film heritage.

The many expressions of support we have received from artists, colleagues, and the public—and of course also from the Friends of the Museum and the M HKArt Circle—strengthen our conviction that it is outright absurd for a city with a strong connection to contemporary art, which plays an important role in the international art world and already has a well-functioning art hall (Extra City) and artist residencies (MORPHO), to be left without a museum of contemporary art.

As a team, we remain committed to heritage care, transparency, knowledge sharing, and public responsibility—values that every museum should uphold. We therefore ask for a dialogue between policy, sector, and staff so that we can work together toward sustainable solutions that do justice to heritage, public, and employees. It is essential for us that this debate is conducted transparently and constructively, with respect for the expertise and commitment of everyone connected to the museum.

Next Thursday, we open a new season with six new exhibitions—a powerful sign of the vitality of contemporary art in Antwerp.

We warmly invite you to be present.

The teams of M HKA, CKV, and De Cinema

This open letter originally appeared in Dutch on the M HKA website