Neue Galerie to Merge With Metropolitan Museum of Art
Following the consolidation, the Neue Galerie will be renamed as the Met Ronald S. Lauder Neue Galerie, or the ‘Met Neue’

Ronald S. Lauder and Max Hollein, director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in front of Gustav Klimt’s Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I (1907). Photo: Thomas Loof. Courtesy Neue Galerie
New York’s Neue Galerie will merge with the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2028, according to the New York Times. Following the consolidation, the Neue Galerie will be renamed as the Met Ronald S. Lauder Neue Galerie, or the ‘Met Neue’.
The Neue Galerie was opened in 2001 by the collector and Estee Lauder cosmetics heir Ronald S. Lauder, who has appeared in the news over recent years for his associations with Jeffrey Epstein, as well as his support of Israel. Lauder has cultivated a sustained relationship with the Met over the years: he gave 91 pieces of arms and armor to the museum in 2020, and his brother, Leonard A. Lauder, donated 78 Cubist artworks, valued at more than $1 billion, in 2013.
The merger will allow the Met to expand its collection of Austrian and German modernist work from the early 20th century, including pieces by the likes of Max Beckmann, Ernst Ludwig, Otto Dix, George Grosz and more. The gallery’s most famous work is Gustav Klimt’s Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I or Woman in Gold (1907).
The announcement coincides with the Met’s sustained goal to build a new wing of modern and contemporary art, scheduled to open in 2030.
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