SHOW MET THE MONEY!
Museum says no more freebies for out-of-staters
OUT-OF-STATE visitors to the Metropolitan Museum of Art will soon have to cough up some dough to enjoy its priceless Michelangelos.
In a sweeping policy change, the Fifth Ave. museum announced Thursday that it will charge admission to non-New York State residents.
The financially strapped arts mecca has operated under a pay-what-you-wish policy since 1970.
But starting March 1, the Met will charge out-of-town adults $25 and seniors $17, and students will pay $12.
The announcement triggered howls of criticism from some longtime fans of the museum.
“The Metropolitan Museum of Art sits on public land, in a building owned by the city,” tweeted Angus Johnston, a historian who teaches at CUNY. “It’s repugnant that the city agreed to this change.”
Some tourists, after visiting the Met on Thursday, said they would have no problem paying an admission fee.
“I want to support the arts,” said David Jones, 55, of Boston.
Phyllis White, 67, said she and her husband happily paid the $17 suggested donation for seniors.
“We felt it was a bargain,” added White, of Oakland, Mich. “The Michelangelo exhibit alone was worth the cost of admission.”
Under the new policy, the tickets will be good for three days, allowing tourists to visit the Met — as well as the Met Breuer and the Cloisters — multiple times over that period.
New York State residents will still be able to pay what they wish to enjoy the museum’s more than 2 million works of art. They can show one of several forms of identification — a driver’s license, NYC ID card, library card or even a utility bill — to avoid the mandatory fees.
Entrance will remain free for children under 12 and pay-what-you-wish for students up to graduate school in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.
The move is seen as an attempt to reverse the fortunes of the nation’s largest art museum.
The Met, which receives $26 million from the city, registered a $10 million deficit in its last fiscal year. The vaunted museum laid off some 90 employees in May amid an effort to rein in costs.
The Met’s former director Thomas Campbell, dogged by questions of financial mismanagement, resigned in June.
Met President and CEO Daniel Weiss said Thursday he expects the policy change to generate an additional $6 million to $11 million in annual revenue.
“This is not a silver bullet,” Weiss said. “It’s meaningful and it’s important but it’s not determining.”