A judge has ruled that the messy conflict between the Philadelphia Art Museum and its former director and CEO, Sasha Suda, who was dismissed in November, will go to arbitration, not to a jury trial, as Suda had requested in a civil suit. Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas Judge Michael E. Erdos referred to Suda’s contract, which dictates that disputes be solved in arbitration, reports the Philadelphia Inquirer.
“We are not surprised that the museum wants to hide its illegal conduct in a confidential arbitration,” Suda’s lawyer, Luke Nikas of Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, told the paper, adding, “but we will hold the museum accountable wherever the case is heard.”
In a statement to the paper, the museum said this would be “the best use of the resources of all—including the court’s.”
The museum told Suda in an email that she was dismissed “for cause,” without apparently specifying what that cause might have been. The dismissal came a day after the Inquirer published a report on the museum’s widely mocked rebranding, from the Philadelphia Museum of Art to the Philadelphia Art Museum. One board member told the Inquirer that the museum had not been informed of the change in advance. Whether the rebrand played into the decision to dismiss her is unknown.
Suda sued the museum less than a week later, saying she was accused by board members of misusing funds for personal gain. The museum went so far as to accuse her of theft. Her suit says that an investigation into her by the museum was a “sham.” The investigation reportedly was partly based on increases to Suda’s salary, which was $729,000 in 2023, placing her among the nation’s best-compensated leaders.
Sasha Suda.
Courtesy Philadelphia Museum of Art
“A small cabal of trustees commissioned a sham investigation to create a pretext for Ms. Suda’s termination,” Nikas told ARTnews at the time. “Ms. Suda fought for and believed in a museum that would serve Philadelphia and its people, not the egos of a handful of trustees.”
In a January interview with Philadelphia Magazine, Suda indicated that after her hire and before she took up the position, the board had attempted to strip her of the CEO portion of her title. Less than a month after Suda’s dismissal, the museum hired Daniel H. Weiss, the former president and CEO of New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, as its new director and CEO. The museum said that Weiss would “guide the art museum through at least 2028, providing stability for staff, stakeholders, and the community.” He took up the post on December 1.
