Last week, staff at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Lacma) announced their intent to unionise last week as part of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME). The new union, Lacma United, will represent more than 300 museum employees across departments including curatorial, visitor services, education, publications and more.
Workers involved in the organising effort cite fairer compensation, expanded benefits and increased transparency as central motivations for the union push. The union will join the AFSCME Cultural Workers United District Council 36, the same local that has supported successful campaigns at Los Angeles institutions including the Museum of Contemporary Art, the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures, the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County and the La Brea Tar Pits and Museum.
“I’ve had the privilege of editing books and exhibition materials at Lacma for nearly 25 years,” says Sara Cody, a senior publications editor at the museum. “But as departments have shrunk and workloads have grown increasingly unsustainable, it’s become more and more challenging to uphold the level of excellence these projects deserve. Forming our union will ensure that we all have the resources and respect to consistently produce our best work as the museum moves forward.”
In a letter addressed to other Lacma workers, the museum’s executive team and its board of directors, dated 29 October, organisers with Lacma United wrote in part: “Many employees are struggling with wages that have not kept up with the rising cost of living in the sixth-most expensive city in the world. At the same time, employees in virtually every department continue to absorb expanded responsibilities and workloads, often without additional compensation, due to high turnover, limited resources and positions that have been vacated or frozen.”
The newly organised group has requested that the museum voluntarily recognise the union by 5 November.
“For many years, my co-workers and I have been asked to do more with less,” Alyce de Carteret, an assistant curator of the art of the Ancient Americas at Lacma, said in a statement. “What we accomplish together is a direct result of our dedication despite a lack of resources and proper support. Imagine what we could do with more.”
In a statement share with The Art Newspaper Michael Govan, Lacma’s chief executive and director, said: “Museum leadership has received the letter from Lacma United. We are reviewing it carefully and very much look forward to continuing to support our amazing staff.”
The employees’ unionising effort coincides with a period of growth for Lacma. On 1 November, Lacma held the 14th edition of its annual Art+Film gala, with attendees including Cynthia Erivo, Salma Hayek Pinault, Cindy Crawford, Leonardo DiCaprio, Dustin Hoffman, Demi Moore, George Lucas, Tessa Thompson and Kristin Wiig, plus a performance by Doja Cat. The event raised nearly $6.5m, the biggest take in the gala’s history.
The museum is also in the final stages of constructing a $720m new building, the David Geffen Galleries, designed by the Swiss architect Peter Zumthor. Scheduled to open in April 2026, the new building will display works from Lacma’s permanent location in raised galleries that will stretch across Wilshire Boulevard.
Over the last five years, museum workers across the US have been unionising at an unprecedented rate, spurred by Covid-era layoffs and furloughs, post-pandemic austerity measures, stagnant wages and growing awareness of systemic inequities within major cultural institutions. Workers at museums across the country—including the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Philadelphia Art Museum, the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, the Denver Art Museum and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum—have formed unions. These efforts have broadened definitions of cultural labour, bringing educators, visitor services staff, retail workers and curators into the same conversations about value and visibility. While some institutions have embraced collective bargaining, others have resisted unionising campaigns.
A recent survey of 3,000 museum employees by Museums Moving Forward (MMF) suggests that, although conditions for museum workers who are in unions have improved modestly since the survey’s previous iteration, deep inequities in pay and opportunities for advancement persist. The 2025 MMF report features input from staff across institutions nationwide and includes several prominent stakeholders, among them Lacma’s vice president of education and public programmes, Naima Keith.
