Tate chief who snubbed Saatchi collection gets top arts job

SIR Nicholas Serota, the man who once turned down Charles Saatchi’s £200million art collection, is to leave his role as director of Tate galleries after 28 years.

Sir Nicholas, pictured, will become chairman of Arts Council England and replace Sir Peter Bazalgette, who was appointed chairman of ITV earlier this year.

Before the referendum, Sir Nicholas said that leaving the EU would ‘diminish the quality of what we are able to show and do’ at Tate Modern.

Sir Nicholas, 70, is credited with transforming the Tate. He was the force behind the creation of Tate Modern in a former power station in Southwark, south London, while rebranding the original gallery at Millbank as Tate Britain. He also oversaw the opening of Tate St Ives in Cornwall. Tate chairman Lord Browne described him as ‘one of the world’s greatest museum directors’.

In 2004 it emerged that leading modern art collector Charles Saatchi had offered to give his entire £200million collection to the Tate Modern, but that his donation was rejected by Sir Nicholas because the museum ‘already had commitments’.

Sir Nicholas, who earns £160,000 a year at the Tate, will formally take over his new £40,000-a-year job in February, but is to continue as Tate director until later in 2017.