"On the day I was laid off from the Kennedy Center, I felt a little like Dolley Madison saving the Stuart portrait of Washington before the British sacked the capital. A crucial difference is that my institution, unlike the White House in 1814, had been on fire for months."
"Though staffers had been assured that we'd have our jobs until July, I was one of dozens of people let go on March 26. From the moment I received a calendar invitation for a meeting with human resources, I knew I had to scramble."
"Shortly after Trump's shutdown announcement, the center's president, Richard Grenell, told me to 'get rid of everything' in the permanent collection because we needed all new art for the reopening."
"I hurriedly emailed the families of the late maestro Julius Rudel, the center's first artistic director, and of the late Nehemia Azaz, whose wood-carved installation depicting 43 instruments mentioned in the Jewish Bible covers a wall in the historic Israeli Lounge."
The Kennedy Center experienced turmoil under President Trump, leading to staff layoffs and a two-year closure announcement. The center's president ordered the removal of existing artworks, prompting urgent actions from staff. The author, responsible for the artworks, faced the challenge of notifying families of late artists about the changes. The closure announcement coincided with the country's 250th birthday, an event the author was hired to commemorate, highlighting the dramatic shift in the institution's direction.
Read at The Atlantic
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